'Part Of Who I Am': New Lenox Woman's Passion A Sweet Treat For Many

NEW LENOX, IL — The name has been floating around for three years, but plenty of people still seem to wonder who "Rocky" is.

Rocky's Rolls—we're talkin' ooey, gooey, gourmet cinnamon rolls made to order—is the passion project of Raquel Van Allen, a New Lenox woman who goes by "Rocky." It's all her.

A 30-year-old mother of two, Van Allen started it from her kitchen, a concept born of a deep desire to reach people's hearts through food. The Oak Lawn native's family has restaurant roots as owners of Vito and Nick's, and the idea of entrepreneurship was never far from her mind. Her family, "worked hard, we ate good food, and we had one big, messy family," she shared on social media.

"I’ve always been around food, it’s been part of who I am," Van Allen told Patch. "I knew I’d either take over the family business, or have a bakery. Anything that had to do with food, I was all about."

Sweets seemed to tug at her more. She started exploring business ideas at 18, with a homemade cupcake endeavor.

"I had no clue what I was doing ... literally no idea," she shared with followers. "I handmade all my cupcake picks and my business cards, learned to drive with a backseat full of cupcakes in the city and had jusssst dipped my toe into what business was really like. It didn't work out."

In her mind and on paper, she was always jotting down ideas of what she'd want her bakery menu to be, what treats she'd want to offer.

"I couldn’t let that part of me go," she said, "even though I’d found this job I loved."

It was a daydream that slowly wove into a possibility, until practicality called and she found a full-time job in oral surgery. She also married her husband Walter, and began their family with the birth of their first son Ben in 2016.

Something was missing, though. Still, the menus and hand-drawn logo designs swirled in her mind. The idea of going into business for herself never left her, but the what-ifs of it all held her back, she said.

"The what-ifs got me," she said. "They froze me to death. I didn't do anything but practice baking and not actually working on a business because I was too afraid to fail."

The COVID-19 pandemic—in tandem with the birth of her second child son Sammy—would set in motion a chain of events that would change things for her forever, and for the better. After Sammy was born, Van Allen experienced an intense bout of postpartum depression. She loved motherhood, but felt she was losing herself.

"Things got really dark," Van Allen told Patch. "It was a horrible time."

Van Allen struggled with suicidal ideation and planning, and was admitted for treatment. Following that, she was able to regulate her medication and undergo therapy. She was bouncing back, and now that she'd seen how low she could go, she never wanted to look back.

"Throughout the getting help process, I decided one thing: it was time," she shared on social media. "It was time to stop putting my dreams on the back burner. I literally had to hurry up and build my business before everything inside me told me no."

After being laid off from her 9 to 5 job due to COVID, she stared down an opportunity. She was so determined to have a bakery business and had spent years mulling what her pastry would be: donuts? Cupcakes? Cinnamon rolls?

"I kept coming back to cinnamon rolls," she told Patch.

She was as ready as she would ever be.

"I decided to jump with both feet in, and see where it takes me," she said.

It started with taking orders via direct messages on social media, or by call or text messages. Her customers were mostly her friends at first, but slowly word spread like the icing on her rolls. The dough is made fresh in a Mokena kitchen every week, with Van Allen up first thing in the morning, roll out the cinnamon, spreading out the roll, then waiting as they rise and bake. She delivers by hand, as they're practically fresh out of the oven. Van Allen wrote on social media of how she first "loaded up my car with cinnamon rolls and my babies, drove all over creation and called it a day!

"I remember working all night and all day, falling asleep at red lights in between deliveries, but I also remember all the love I've been shown throughout this journey."

Her business began to boom. She's been brought on as a vendor at farmers markets or other local businesses. You can find her rolls at The Wildflower Farm in Monee, the Frankfort Farmers Market, and in local coffee shops like WaterShed Cafe and Books and Grounded Coffee Bar in Frankfort, and Gost Coffee Roasters in New Lenox. Ultimately, she'd like to open her own storefront, preferably in New Lenox. Van Allen's husband also owns New Lenox-based PrimeView Window Cleaning.

"New Lenox is my happy spot, ultimately I'd like to be back here," she said.

Now three years into her dream coming true, Van Allen continues to experiment with some pretty sweet concepts. She offers varying flavors of icing—lemon raspberry and salted caramel, for example—and dabbles in artistic design. On the menu ahead of Easter are bunny-shaped rolls (and you can still place an order).

Baking saved her, and she wants everyone to know how special it is to her.

"It completely shifted my focus," she said, of starting Rocky's Rolls. "It brought so much happiness. Just being able to talk to customers, get my product to them, make them happy, let them create their own memories. That just totally lit me up. It made me so happy."

The name is a nod to her older sister, who died six months after the birth of Van Allen's first son. As she taste-tested Van Allen's pastries, she nudged her to call it "Rocky's Rolls."

Food was engrained in her family's culture, something she carries with her in heart and in business.

"I always come back to, you gather everyone around the table," she said. "That’s where the best memories are made, with your family—gathered around your island, eating, talking, and laughing."

The business means so much to Van Allen, who jumped at a chance to share her story, from her lowest to the highs baking brings her.

"It is so therapeutic," she said. "It’s just an outlet to be creative, and then the BEST part is you get to eat it afterward. I get to eat my stress away."

Check out Rocky's Rolls on Facebook, Instagram and their website. Easter orders are still open. Delivery area includes Mokena, Lockport, Orland Park, New Lenox, Tinley Park, Homer Glen, Manhattan, Lemont, Elwood, and Frankfort.