Kramer’s Kitchen recipes shared in a cookbook

PRINCETON — If you’ve been missing your favorite dish from Kramer’s Kitchen, you’re in luck.

While the restaurant no longer adorns downtown Princeton, it’s legacy lives on.

Eight months after the Kramer family made the decision to close their doors for good, Mindy Kramer, who managed the kitchen and catering services, released a Kramer’s Kitchen cookbook that contains all the beloved recipes had by all in the 12 years their restaurant and catering business was open.

The cookbook is proving to be a success. Within just a couple months, Mindy has sold all 500 copies in her first shipment and is already taking orders for the next shipment, which is due early February.

The Kramer’s Kitchen cookbook contains 280 recipes, but beyond that it’s more than just a book of recipes. It also contains special keepsakes like the Kramer’s Kitchen mission, family history written by “Kitchen Club Superfan” Ryan Sondgeroth of Princeton, a copy of its restaurant menu and catering brochure designed by Chuck Major of Princeton. One will also find many untold secrets from the Kitchen in the book, which might just shock some when they discover that certain recipes they loved all these years were actually store bought items.

The cookbook also includes hometown touches of popular specials requested by regular customers, like the Nick Davis Special.

Mindy said putting together a cookbook is something she and her family never imagined doing. It wasn’t until they closed their doors that they decided to keep the love of their recipes going.

The book includes old family recipe favorites that go back three generations. There is also a section dedicated to the recipes Mindy learned through 4-H as a kid.

“I learned almost everything I know from 4-H,” she said.

Many of the recipes are those she shared at the local 4-H fair, and some she even took to the Illinois State Fairs.

The history of Kramer’s Kitchen began before the restaurant opened in 2008. About four years before that, Mindy’s parents, Roger and Mary Kramer, decided to share their passion for food with others after they purchased a food trailer and began booking events and auctions around the county.

Around that time, Mindy was getting married and the family decided to cook all the food for her wedding. After that, people started encouraging them to begin catering family gatherings, which they did. With business growing from both the food trailer and the catering jobs, they decided it was time for a kitchen. That’s how Kramer’s Kitchen restaurant came to be.

The Kramers’ youngest son, Kenny, wrote out the menu for their restaurant, and Mindy took on the catering part of the business.

For 12 years, they operated on Main Street and grew their catering business. Kramer’s Kitchen quickly became known for Mary’s cheesecake recipe, which was originally made specially for Festival 56 in 2004 and became a popular dessert in town.

Customers also always looked forward to seeing the Kramers at the Bureau County Fair each summer. They worked the 4-H food stand for roughly 15 years. Then, from 2010 to 2019, they returned and sold Roger’s famous smoked ribs and chicken.

From 2009 to 2019, Kramer’s Kitchen also enjoyed catering the Princeton High School Madrigal dinner. They said working with the teachers and students was always a great pleasure.

In the spring of 2020, when the coronavirus closed down small businesses on March 14, Mindy said they had every intention of re-opening two weeks after the shutdown. But when the shutdown lasted longer than expected, they got to thinking a little harder about the future of their business.

Roger and Mary were on the verge of retirement, having sold their food trailer just the year before and Mindy was becoming more interested in a new endeavor in her life. That’s when the decision was made to close permanently. It was one of the hardest decisions to make, but looking back, quite possibly the best decision at the right time.

“We’re glad we don’t have to be in it anymore, because people are really struggling right now and we would have struggled, I know we would have,” Mindy said. “We loved our customers and we miss our regulars. That’s what made Kramer’s Kitchen — the customers.”

Mary and Roger have eased into retirement throughout the last year. Their youngest son, Kenny, has started taking over Kramer’s Garage Doors, which Roger has operated for many years. Mindy has gone back to school to pursue a career in cannabis production. She is currently working toward a cannabis certification and has started an internship in the field. It’s her hope to one day manage a dispensary where she’d work to figure out what’s best for people’s needs and ailments.

The Kramer’s Kitchen restaurant on Main Street has been sold to the Sisler family where an ice cream parlor is in the works.

While the restaurant journey is over, the food continues.

“Kramer’s Kitchen has not ended, everybody can take the recipes and share them with their families now. That’s what we want. We want everyone to remember and have these cookbooks,” Mindy said.

To order a copy, email kramerkitchen421@gmail.com or message the Kramer’s Kitchen Facebook page. Cookbooks can be shipped for a fee or a no-contact delivery can be made around the Princeton area.