On a rainy night with a tornado warning, you don’t want the winter storm come. But if it does, you want to see the drops pour on tall windows, Spanish moss tousling in the trees… and you, snug in a leather-backed banquette with some of the greatest possible comfort food in front of you, pan-seared quail on hot spoonbread.

It was a late dinner at the restaurant Local 11 Ten, in a renovated 1950s bank near Forsyth Park in Savannah. And the next day we went back and met the chef, Jeff Rodgers, one of those humble kitchen masters who simply loves to cook. We talked of Mississippi, his cooking influences from there… French, Creole, Southern. He grows fresh herbs on the kitchen patio, cooks with lots of root vegetables in winter. In his chef whites, he stood for a portrait in the restaurant’s mix of organic and sleek – dark woods and crème-painted brick walls. Then we went back to talk of the cooking life. Turns out, Chef Rogers is a big fan of comfort food, too.

There were more bread comforts in Savannah. Out 20 or so blocks along Bull Street is Back in the Day Bakery, another good re-use of a corner building… this one with its taffy paint colors, cake stands and Formica tables, easy mid-century furnishings and feel. Early on a Saturday, I ordered a huge slab of the Bourbon bread pudding with my coffee, and then happily spent much of an hour watching the morning hum of customers come and go in the warm bakery… sugar glaze on my fingers, cinnamon scents in the air.

The photographs are by Peter Frank Edwards. The image of the staircase is from our four-story wander through Alex Raskin Antiques on Bull Street.

– By Sandy Lang, February 2009