Liz and Jason Menke at Sea Level Bakery + Coffee.

CANNON BEACH — Liz Menke describes Sea Level Bakery + Coffee as a “little corner of France, right here in Cannon Beach.”

That’s where her journey began, alongside her future husband and co-owner. In 2004, she helped put together a conference in southwest France for an international group of surfers, one of which was Jason Menke. The two immediately bonded over their shared love of helping people feel at home.

“We had a mutual dream of doing something hospitality related,” Liz Menke said. “We talked about cafes, we talked about hostels, things like that.”

After the couple got married, they focused on raising three daughters.The idea of a hospitality business was pushed to the back burner. When Liz Menke surprised her husband with a coffee maker one Christmas morning, the dream was reignited.

Their home in Lincoln City was soon filled with pleasant aromas and a love for the culinary arts; while Jason Menke explored the endless possibilities of coffee roasting, Liz Menke was embracing a passion for food. She began baking sourdough bread, and cites that as her first step toward learning that food can be a way to heal and commune.

“I really started learning a lot about food, where my food was coming from,” she said. “I was fascinated by world-famous chefs and flavor combinations and traditional foods from all around the world and from our region.”

As they developed their niches, the couple held tight to French influences, honoring the place where their life together began. Jason Menke fondly remembers visiting his grandmother in France as a child and enjoying the local bakeries.

“It’s a big part of our background,” he said. “I have a memory of going to the boulangerie daily to grab baguettes and carrying them home either by hand or on the back of a bike.”

During her two years living in France, Liz Menke was struck by the way families saw dining as a way to connect with each other and take a gentle pause from a busy day.

“Kids would come home from school on their scooters to have lunch together for a couple hours in the middle of the day, and then they go back to finish school,” she said. “It was a foreign concept to me.”

“The food is part of celebrating life there,” Jason Menke added. “It’s not an afterthought, it’s the key. And it’s something we want to bring to life here.”

While on a family trip to Cannon Beach, the Menkes noticed an upcoming vacancy at a renovated cottage on Hemlock Street. The bakery in the space, Waves of Grain, was planning to relocate to Portland, and locals were concerned about losing their favorite place to buy baked goods. The duo had been thinking about opening a spot in Lincoln City, but were enchanted by the cottage and began talks with the owners of Waves of Grain and the building’s landlord to start working toward making their dream a reality.

To hone her baking skills, Liz Menke reached out to a Lincoln City locale, Rockfish Bakery, which has since rebranded as Hearth & Table. She began an informal apprenticeship with their bakers, learning new techniques and perfecting old ones.

“I had never worked in the back of the house in a food establishment before,” she said. “That was a very steep learning curve for me. I would come home, and I would just open my notes, and I would write as fast as I possibly could about everything that I had seen or experienced. I knew every single thing would count. It was a massively transformative couple of months.”

In January 2014, the Menkes relocated to Cannon Beach. As they began to renovate and decorate the cottage, locals became curious about the business, and if it would do as well as their former favorite bakery. That April, Sea Level opened its doors to the public.

They were embraced by the community, and as they got to know their neighbors and customers, the Menkes eventually became a part of it.

“We have our regulars, we have people who feel that this is, like, their cafe and it’s super special to them,” Jason Menke said. “When we were closed during our remodel, that was one of the hardest things, to have to say, ‘Sorry, we’re closed currently.’ Getting to have that sort of community hub back is really meaningful for us.”

Sea Level‘s recent remodel took six months to complete. The Menkes expanded the space and added stairs to an upstairs area, allowing for more room for patrons, employees and products. They reopened in August.

“We really wanted to preserve as much of that cottage feel as we could while still making it a more practical work environment for us,” Jason Menke said. “We’re going to put an apartment up there, that’s actually going to be for my parents.”

Family ties are an important aspect of the shop. As the couple’s daughters grew older, two of them began to help out at Sea Level alongside their parents. The Menkes also employ a handful of helpers that assist in keeping the place running smoothly during its days of operation on Fridays, Saturdays, Sundays and Mondays. Though the other employees are not related to them by blood, Jason Menke said that they have become like family.

Outreach to the community extends past customer and employee relationships, all the way to the regional partners Sea Level collaborates with. Heart Roasters in Portland, Kingfisher Farms in Nehalem and Camas Country Mill are a few of the companies that the Menkes work with to ensure that their ingredients are top quality and made with care and sustainability.

“That’s one of our values too, is just working with as many regenerative farming practices as possible. These are people who care about the soil and care about the people who are involved in all their processes,” Liz Menke said. “That’s a huge deal.”