Lake Zurich bakery offers old-fashioned goodness
Family recipes from Austria.
Real ingredients instead of cheaper imitations.
Bakers creating two prune danishes just because someone likes them.
Old World Bakery in Lake Zurich does all of this and more, living up to its name in an age when shortcuts in the food industry are a tempting way to fatten the bottom line.
Eileen and Jack Muhr have owned the shop at 64 N. Old Rand Road for 21 years. Eileen says she can't conceive of owning a bakery that doesn't do custom-made cookies, cakes and other treats.
"If you listen to the salesmen, you could buy a bucket and all you do is scoop it out and stick it there (in the oven) and you're done," says Eileen, 54. "But no, we don't do that."
Running a family-owned bakery isn't easy. Jack Muhr, 56, does the baking and starts work at about midnight each day, typically joined by two other employees at 2 a.m.
What Jack and his crew turn out of the oven is sheer bliss for the customers who arrive after sunrise. It's handcrafted, quality baking you don't find on the shelves of supermarkets or convenience stores.
Two of the customers' favorites - carmel-pecan rolls and cinnamon bread - are recipes from Jack's family in Austria. Butter, sour cream, eggs and fresh fruit are among the real ingredients used for the goodies.
Old World Bakery represents more than a place to buy tasty treats. It's practicing an old-school art form.
"I really do think that bakeries are a dying breed, because people want to make their money the easier way," says Eileen, who lives with her husband in Lake Zurich. "It's easier to sit at a computer or to be in an office than to have to get up at midnight and come to work."
Rachael Green, 19, of Lake Zurich, is one of Old World Bakery's employees. She usually waits on customers, but was meticulously icing long johns on a recent day at the store.
Green is known for her friendliness at the counter and enjoys getting to know Old World's customers.
"We have one man that always comes in for prune danish," Green says. "And we only make two of them every day. So, I always know what he wants when he comes in. It's kind of his reserve. But he only buys one."
At the end of a long day, Eileen Muhr says, the Old World Bakery provides a lot of satisfaction to her.
"I think when you feel it is when the customer comes in and goes, 'Wow, look at that cake,' " she says.
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