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For those who miss Toymakers Café, memories and recipes in new book

For those who miss Toymakers Café, memories and recipes in new book
Fans of Toymakers Café in Falls Village were disappointed when it closed last year. A new cookbook from the owners has recipes for favorite meals from the menu. 
Photo by Alexander Wilburn

FALLS VILLAGE — Toymakers Café on Main Street closed down operations on Labor Day, Sept. 7, 2020. Owners Ann and Greg Bidou reluctantly made the decision largely due to the restrictions imposed on businesses due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Whether or not the restaurant will reopen remains an open question, Ann Bidou said in a phone interview Monday, Feb. 1.

But the Bidous have not been idle. They have published “Recipes for a Good Ride: The Toymakers Café Cookery Book.”

With their friend (and author) Bud Wilkinson, the Bidous have assembled not just favorite recipes, but profiles and photos of the friends and customers they’ve met along the way.

Motorcycles figure heavily into the story, of course. Toymakers Café has long been a favorite destination for touring motorcyclists, which works nicely with Greg Bidou’s motorcycle parts business.

Ann Bidou said the cookbook idea started forming in 2014. She put together an email list of some 500 people to gauge interest. And there was plenty of interest.

But when it became clear that being limited to having just three or four people at a time inside the cafe was going to be the status quo for the foreseeable future, the Bidous suddenly had a lot of spare time.

So they got busy on the cookbook.

Ann Bidou said it took considerable time “to get the recipes out of Greg’s head. He works very intuitively.”

Wilkinson, who had written about the cafe in a number of different publications, wrote new material. 

And getting the technical aspects of producing a book took a while as well.

So the cookbook wasn’t ready to ship until December 2020.

A surprising revelation from the book: Toymakers has never had a stove.

In fact, a convection oven is the fanciest piece of equipment in the kitchen.

Ann Bidou explained that in order to have a commercial stove, they would have been required to install an appropriate ventilation system — for $60,000.

“We’d never make that back,” she said. “So we worked around it.”

The recipes in the book did not require modifications for home kitchen use.

“Except maybe quantities,” Ann Bidou said.

“Recipes for a Good Ride” is available at the D.M. Hunt Library, or directly from Ann Bidou (email annbidou@yahoo.com). It will also be available at www.square.com.

Patrick L. Sullivan

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