The freezing temperatures have thrown an unexpected wrench into Ali Rudel’s plans to open her long-awaited pie shop in East Durham. But that doesn’t stop her from being optimistic. She started 2018 announcing a surprise on Instagram: “New year, new shop, new name!” she wrote.
What was known to local pie fans and Kickstarter supporters as the East Durham Pie Company will open its doors as the East Durham Bake Shop within the next couple of weeks. And with the name change comes the pleasant prospect of all sorts of baked goods.
“The intention was always to expand our offerings,” Rudel says. The East Durham Pie Company started as a sweet pie-making operation in Rudel’s home kitchen in 2015, and slices of the lemon chess, honey apple bourbon, peach pie, and many others sold at Ponysaurus and other spots around Durham and soon developed a cult following. A 2016 Kickstarter campaign paved the way for the brick-and-mortar shop. In addition to everyone’s favorite sweet pies, the East Durham Bake Shop will also carry savory pies, soups, salads, and other pastries like croissants from scratch, seasonal cobbler, scones, and morning buns.
“We didn’t have the capacity or the space to do anything else [but pie], but now that we have a kitchen, flexibility, and storage, we’re able to branch out and do some of the things we’re really excited about,” Rudel says.
She says the old name implied the shop would only sell pie, so the name change is meant to dispel the confusion. The shop is in its final stages of construction.
The weather has made tiling a bit tricky (“We are literally waiting for paint to dry,” Rudel says), but after that, the doors should open in a week or two. The shop will be open six days a week (closed Mondays) with a wide selection of menu items from the get-go.
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