Pop-Up Restaurant Taking Over La Grange Grocery for One Week

La Grange, IL - A La Grange native who worked at DeVries Grocery while attending Lyons Township High School will return with friends to transform the store into a restaurant — but only for a week.

From Dec. 27 to Jan. 2, DeVries Grocery will become “boire,” a pop-up restaurant serving a different five-course, prix fixe menu each night after the store closes.

The idea was cooked up by three young chefs trained at the Culinary Institute of America in New York. Yejin Yoon, Aaron Best and Jacob Katz-Berger are giving up their winter break to open the temporary business.

The chefs have earned culinary degrees from the institute, and they’re each working toward business degrees. Pastry chef Cayley Boire, a student at Cornell University, is also helping out and lending her last name to the restaurant.

Yoon said most of the ingredients they’ll use to build each menu will come straight from DeVries Grocery.

“La Grange was the most potentially successful place we could have this pop-up,” Yoon said. “This is a fun thing we wanted to do — it’s something everyone in culinary school wants to do — and since Aaron worked at DeVries in high school, it makes sense to do it here.”

There will be two seatings each night of the pop-up, and each seating serves 10 people.

• Sunday, Dec. 27: 6 p.m. and 9 p.m.
• Monday, Dec. 28 to Friday, Jan 1: 7:30 p.m. and 9:30 p.m.
• Saturday, Jan. 2: 7 p.m. and 9 p.m.

The grocery store space, which includes a kitchen, is provided by the owners at no cost, and the chefs paid out of pocket for ingredients and dining room decorations.

Yoon said they’ve already sold enough tickets to break even. They’ve even had a couple buyouts for entire seatings.

“We’re having fun and stretching our imaginations, and this is our chance to have 100 percent freedom, which is rare in this industry,” Yoon said.

Tickets $75 each and can be purchased at DeVries Grocery, cash or check only, or by calling Aaron Best at 630-926-1156.

Part of the proceeds from ticket sales will benefit the St. Francis Food Pantry and The Legacy Guild.

Photos courtesy of Yejin Yoon.