South Side Chicago bakery looks to expand love of baking to community
CHICAGO (CBS) -- For this Foodie Friday, a bakery in Chicago's Hyde Park has become a favorite to residents within the community.
Strugglebeard Bakery came to be through a military vet finding baking as more than a tool to just feed himself, it also became his therapy, now four years later, his livelihood.
When Quinton McNair retired from the military back in 2019, his first order of business might come as a surprise.
"You really want to know? I was like, I'm about to grow my beard out," he said. "I've been shaving for 24 years. It hasn't had a chance to flourish and be the beard that is meant to be."
For the bulk of his adult life, McNair had been in uniform.
"That transition from military to civilian life was a hard one. like the last 24 of my years of my life, I've been institutionalized. I'm still me somewhere deep down inside of there," McNair said.
Getting into the kitchen helped bring McNair back out, especially amid the pandemic.
"We get into quarantine and I'm sitting here having a hard time with the depression, with the PTSD, and one of my friends posted a cookie recipe on social media, and I was like, you know what? I can make that," McNair said.
Turned out, he couldn't.
"The cookie was hot garbage. I never really baked anything from scratch before," he said.
But it sparked something new in him.
"It started with the therapy that baking kind of was, I was listening to music. I was jamming. I was in the comfort of my home just baking, not worried about the intrusive thoughts," McNair said.
And he'd post his creations on his socials.
"We know in Chicago was like the city of jokes. Roasting is an art, so I would post like my failures, my successes online, and as a joke, I would hashtag a Strugglebeard Bakery," he said.
While it may have been a struggle at first, in that process ...
"I got good," he said.
People started asking for McNair to bring his treats to events and to mail them around the country.
"The other part of the therapy is sharing stuff that you make, it was like a double dopamine rush," he said.
Demand was so high, he decided to go at it full-time - turning strugglebeard from a hashtag to a bakery.
"I came back with the intention of doing some kind of good in my city. The bakery allows me to do that kind of good," McNair said.
The storefront is just the beginning of McNair's plans for Strugglebeard Bakery.
"There young men in Chicago that look like me, that they were just like me. I felt like if I had, like, a role model, somebody that could guide me, I probably would've never went to the military," he said.
He plans on being that role model through his bake program, set to begin later this year.
"I found therapy through baking and sharing things that I create with my own hands. I know I can't be alone in that feeling," McNair said.
The bakery hasn't been around long, but it already seems to be a favorite in Hyde Park. Students would ask to get in before opening, and once they did open, the way that place filled up was a sight to see.
You can find them in Harper Court Tuesday through Sunday.
