James Trees begins selling Esther’s Kitchen sourdough to go

One of Esther’s Kitchen’s most requested breads is finally leaving the dining room. James Trees will start selling the restaurant’s housemade sourdough in a retail pop-up at Bar Boheme in downtown Las Vegas, turning a loaf that had long been tied to table service into something customers can take home.

For years, the answer had been no, not because the bread was unavailable, but because it was part of the restaurant’s dine-in bread service. The new setup changes that. Beginning June 20, the pop-up will run from 8 to 11 a.m. on the third Saturday of each month, with a counter-service format designed for early shoppers rather than a full sit-down bakery.

The lineup is broader than a single sourdough sale. Alongside Esther’s housemade sourdough, the pop-up will offer Parisian-style baguettes from Bar Boheme, focaccia from Al Solito Posto, and a rotating selection of croissants, pastries and other baked goods from across Trees’ restaurant group. That gives the project the feel of a compact bakery program, not just a one-item pickup window.

Bar Boheme is a natural fit for the move. Under James Trees’ direction, its menu already leans into French tradition with a modern eye, including “genuine Parisian baguettes” and “exquisite desserts.” The bakery pop-up builds on that identity while giving Trees a retail test case for breads and pastries that have so far lived mostly inside his restaurants.

The sourdough itself carries a long history at Esther’s Kitchen, which Trees opened in January 2018. A 2018 Review-Journal review praised the restaurant’s house-made levain bread and its sourdough character, and the current dinner menu still lists “Our Housemade Sourdough Bread” with options such as basil ricotta, cambozola blue cheese, beet conserva, burrata, anchovy butter, cannellini beans and fegatini. The pop-up now gives that same bread a life beyond the plate.

The move also fits the story of Trees’ restaurant group, which includes Esther’s Kitchen, Bar Boheme, Petite Boheme, Al Solito Posto and Ada’s Food + Wine. Trees has said Esther’s Kitchen was named for his great-aunt Esther, who helped pay for his Culinary Institute of America education and later left him the nest egg that helped him open his own restaurant. For longtime diners, the bread they only knew at lunch or dinner is about to become a morning pickup, boxed up and ready to go.