Photo by Lynn Venhaus
Courtesy of LongStory Coffee
Clara B’s Kitchen Table will join forces with LongStory Coffee in a new location in Belleville: the renovated train depot at 732 S. Illinois Street, the space that previously housed Balance Coffee and Tea.
In the meantime, Clara B's, which specializes in Texas- and Southern-inspired dishes, had outgrown its small space on Main Street downtown. “I’d see people walk in and then walk right out when they had to wait for a table,” says Ferguson. The new location will nearly double the space.
After she closed Clara B's original brick-and-mortar location on December 4, Ferguson plans to take over kitchen service in February, pending permits. "We are doing final menu development over the next two weeks," Ferguson says. Hours are tentative, possibly 8 a.m.–2 or 3 p.m. Wednesday through Sunday. “If demand increases, we could go seven days, if we find the right staff,” she says.
Courtesy of LongStory Coffee
Erik Busch and Jodie Ferguson
Ferguson plans to restart catering, offer special occasion dinners, and have outdoor seating this spring. Sharing the space with LongStory Coffee will also provide her with new opportunities, including expanded offerings. “Pancakes will be back on the menu,” Ferguson says. “We may have barbecue breakfast plates—I do a mean smoked brisket. We might have beans and eggs, like an English breakfast. One goal is to have food items that aren’t served anywhere else.”
"Having Jodie’s breakfasts and lunches will be phenomenal," adds Busch. "She doesn’t have to worry about serving coffee drinks. It lets us do what we’re good at."
Behind the Business: Clara B’s Kitchen Table
Courtesy of Clara B's
Ferguson has long had a passion for food. She used her grandmother’s recipe cards, written in longhand, as a guiding light—except she skipped the lard. As a marketing major at the University of Missouri–Columbia, she transitioned to a culinary career during her last semester, in 2005.
After Ferguson was furloughed during the pandemic, in 2020, the fine-dining chef opened a food truck, with plans to offer the kind of comfort specials that she grew up savoring in Austin, Texas. Specializing in brunch items, Ferguson’s food truck soon made the rounds on both sides of the river and became a mainstay at 9 Mile Garden, as well as various businesses, social events, and special occasions in Metro East.
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Courtesy of Clara B's
Clara B's shrimp and grits with andouille sausage
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Courtesy of Clara B's
Seafood gumbo served with cornbread
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Courtesy of Clara B's
Pecan Pie French Toast
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Courtesy of Clara B's
Hot Honey Chicken Biscuit
While still offering catering and taking the food truck on the road, she opened a scratch kitchen serving breakfast and lunch on Belleville’s Main Street. Specialties included wood-fired shrimp and grits, biscuits with sausage and duckfat gravy, her Louisiana-born grandma’s seafood gumbo, added an egg to a bacon, lettuce, and tomato sandwich and atop a Frito pie served over cornbread. “My influences come from all over the place – Alabama, Arkansas, the Philippines,” she says.
Courtesy of LongStory Coffee
Owner Eric Busch
Behind the Business: LongStory Coffee
Busch has been roasting and selling coffee as an online retail business for several years, after a career in beer (hence the moniker “Long Story”). After graduating from the University of Missouri–St. Louis with a history major, he worked in local breweries and fell in love with the process of creating beer—but not how long it took.
Courtesy of LongStory Coffee
After being introduced to home coffee roasting, he found that his background in brewing science came into play while roasting beans to create a full flavor. He says every order is roasted fresh to bring out the “fruity, nutty, floral, earthy, or chocolatey flavors hidden within each bean,” and it's packaged immediately.
Busch had been selling coffee at local farmers' markets and boutiques before growing his online business during the pandemic. He also became a popular vendor at O’Fallon’s seasonal Vine Street Market in 2021, where he met the Suga’ Pies owner, who supplies pies, cookies, and snacks in the coffee shop's cases.
The new coffee shop, which opened in mid-December, offers take-home bags of coffee, mugs, T-shirts, and gift cards, which can also be purchased online.
Courtesy of LongStory Coffee
