FOOD & DRINK

restaurants. The two first crossed paths at Kai Zan in 2014 and bonded over their love for Asian pastries and early exposure to the food of each other’s cultures. Over the years they’d spitball ideas from di erent kitchens, always intending to collaborate on a pop-up, but never getting around to it.

Tran-Dean was on leave from her executive sous chef job at Smyth, honeymooning in Vietnam for a month when the country began shutting down in January 2020. Once home she returned to Smyth until shutdown, then worked takeout from the Loyalist for a while. But she didn’t feel safe after learning she was pregnant. She and her husband decamped for his parents’ place in Minooka to ride it out and recharge her creative batteries.

For Hollinger the situation was the opposite. When he worked at the Bakery at Fat Rice, he’d make maybe 20 egg tarts for the day. During the pandemic, Aya Pastry’s business exploded, and he found himself sometimes making 1,000 dinner rolls in a day. He found the overwork in a booming wholesale business gave him the itch to do his own thing.