St. Charles deli gives lessons for children and adults in cooking and baking

By the time Joanna and Daniel Migo opened DRM European Café and Delicatessen in St. Charles in December 2016, they had each developed some dreams. Daniel dreamed of filling a Polish restaurant desolate tract inside the Fox Valley with an oasis of fresh food and Polish import items.

“When we opened, we desired to offer something honestly one of a kind,” Joanna Migo stated. “At first, all the imports and the meals on the hot buffet have been Polish.” Over time, Daniel decided to increase the local geography of their imports. “So, we have a few German and gadgets from Bulgaria and France,” Joanna said. “It took off.”

Joanna’s desires stuffed out the undertaking to create something precise. “I continually estimated an excellent bakery and cooking classes,” she said. As a former Chicago instructor, she favored the concept of offering culinary training at the eating place.

Bill the Baker

When the Migos, both of St. Charles, met Daniel’s mother’s neighbor Bill Reichman, the idea he is probably the baker they’d was hoping for. “One day, he dropped off a few scones, and they have been so properly. We requested him to bake for us,” Joanna recalled.

He wasn’t involved. “They requested me to bake for them. However, I advised them I didn’t experience baking for retail due to the fact my praise is the smile in your face while you take something out of the oven,” Reichman, otherwise known as Bill the Baker, remembered.

Reichman wasn’t a baker with the aid of change; in reality, he formerly worked with computer systems. But baking had mingled in with his private history from the first actual within the shape of a live-in European grandmother who changed into the family cook.

“She changed into an outstanding baker,” Reichman said. “From my earliest recollections I have, I grew up with sparkling pastries and sparkling bread every day.” When Reichman changed into high faculty, his grandmother was disabled, and Reichman took over as his own family cook dinner.

“My mom got here to me and said, ‘You’re the first one domestic for the duration of the day, so you want to be the cook,” he said. “My mom wrote out express instructions, and I observed them to a T, and those tell me it is why I realize how to bake so nicely — due to the fact I observe recipes to a T.”

As Reichman grew into maturity, baking remained an interest he might return to again and again. When his kids were young, they bonded with their father over baking. While he became compelled into early retirement, he commenced educating baking in Chicago and Newport, Connecticut.

“I knew had to do something, and I determined to share my ardor.” When Reichman met the Migos, he discovered they weren’t best searching for a retail baker; they had been searching out a person to teach at their deli. It turned into amazing shape, and he began to educate grownup classes.

Joanna’s notion he needs to strive to bake for children. “He becomes doing the baking for adults, and I put that trojan horse in his ear. The trainer in me thought he should try it,” she said. Reichman located that coaching kid to bake changed into a delightful experience. “The look on their face in elegance invaluable, after they see what they have performed,” he stated. “I’m hoping to awaken the baker in some of them and deliver them the life that I had, the pleasure that I had all my life.”

The Petit Foodies

Meanwhile, Perrine Quivron, a French immigrant, arrived in St. Charles. “We moved from France three years ago, and in France, I was working in a cancer studies charity,” she said. Chevron located herself perplexed via the difference between American kids and their French opposite numbers served for lunch at college.

“I become amazed while we moved right here whilst my kids advised me about what they consume at school,” Quivron stated. “I was bowled over. Also, after I went to a restaurant, what became labeled as children’s food; It’s now not even real meals.””

Chevron does not fault American food choices; she believes that the difference between the two international locations’ attitudes about meals is constructed. “It’s a cultural difference,” she said. “In France, food is taken into consideration very essential. It’s something that you need to teach your children as it’s a part of your health.”

Like Reichman, Quivron had a lifelong hobby in getting ready food. “As some distance as I don’t forget, I’ve continually cooked, and it’s been my passion. Especially when I had my 3 sons, I was given into cooking tasteful things that they could try and discover and educate their flavor from an early age,” Chevron said.

Chevron’s kid’s instructions at DRM The Petit Foodies begin with mothers and babies up through elementary-aged kids. “I want to start as early as I can as it’s less complicated to get them to discover and to get them to be curious approximately food,” she stated. “It’s not only about cooking, recipes, and nutrients. It’s greater approximately taste, scent, touch, colorings; how stunning colorations fruits and veggies can be. It’s an entire sensory enjoyment.”

“Perrine talks approximately color and styles and sizes with little flashcards,” Joanna stated. “She’s focused on healthful, holistic, organic food. How to get your children to consume green veggies and ‘now we are going to attend on the orange,’ and she or he’ll do songs with them.”

Chevron added recipes from all over the world and has determined that youngsters in her instructions are receptive to new ideas approximately food. “They are clearly very curious in my magnificence. They need to try new things. They want to research.” Soon the Migos will be adding a class where they’ll educate pierogi making. Although The Petit Foodies and Bill the Baker maintain multiple training every month, they may be scheduled and brought to the calendar at the DRM website at the teacher’s discretion. But, the latent demand may additionally necessitate alternate. “Moving ahead, there can be extra of a fixed timetable,” Joanna said.