A New Companionable Cuisine At The Crossroads

By Kaaren Valenta

When Lee Cheney decided to open a deli and country market in the former Crossroads Market on South Main Street in Botsford, she had no trouble deciding on the name Tillie’s Country Market n’ Grill.

“Tillie is my grandmother and a huge inspiration to me,” Ms Cheney explained. “She’s a widow who owned Henry C. Young & Son Jewelers in Fairfield for 28 years and she’s a phenomenal home cook. She’s 88 and keeps in touch by email daily with an endless list of friends and family. She just gave up driving a year ago – because she didn’t trust the other drivers on the road!”

Lee Cheney grew up in a family of strong women who worked, raised their families, and cooked wonderful meals.

“I grew up on Fairfield Beach surrounded by food,” Ms Cheney said. “Food was the focus of all things. When my mother went back to work when I was in my early teens, she used to write up recipes for me to make a meatloaf, or chicken. We always used fresh ingredients, nothing frozen or canned.”

Now a resident of Monroe, Lee Cheney brought that philosophy with her when she opened Tillie’s four weeks ago. She soon was joined by Rob Singer, a Newtown resident who operated a steak house in Greenwich for more than 20 years.

“Rob’s a neighbor. He walked in one day, we got to talking, and now he’s an integral part of this,” Ms Cheney said. “I call him my director of public relations.”

Together they create the cuisine that is already attracting a steady clientele. On a recent Friday an order of fish resulted in fish and chips, or baked fish for those who didn’t want fried. Lee Cheney mixed a three-bread sausage stuffing with caramelized onions to make stuffed pork chops.

“We carry Omaha beef and Boar’s Head lunchmeats, and we make our own salads,” Ms Cheney said. “I make my own honey mustard, horseradish sauce, and tartar sauce. “

A 10-pound porchetta roast, marinated and cooked, became sandwiches that literally flew out the door. “Yesterday, we had pulled pork – we can’t keep it in the house. We have a lot of [tradesmen] who come in and really enjoy a home-cooked meal,” Ms Cheney said. “I want to do a lot of good ethnic food too, like spaetzle and stuffed cabbage, and pot roast with caramelized onion gravy.”

Breakfast, mostly varieties of egg sandwich specials, is served six days a week. Lunch includes deli sandwiches and grinders, burgers and hot dogs, salads, and hot entrees of the day. There are muffins and other baked goods, fresh fruit, and desserts, including Scoops ice cream. There’s a coffee club – buy six cups, and get one free.

Tillie’s has started to offer take-out gourmet dinners. A recent meal included farfalle pasta with pink vodka sauce and sweet Italian sausage, Caesar salad, and bread for $5.95.

“I do food gift baskets, too, for someone who needs a gift,” Ms Cheney said. “They include everything to make a meal.”

Like a convenience store, Tillie’s offers a small selection of items for those times when patrons need to pick up an item or two. It isn’t a fully stocked grocery store like the Crossroads Market that the Andrejczyk family operated for 48 years until it closed in 1997. The extra space in the store has enabled Lee Cheney to set up a room for children with books, toys, a chalkboard, and a wall decorated with the tiny painted handprints of customers. There’s also a picnic table and a and a corner table where salesmen often stop to eat and do a bit of paperwork.

Lee Cheney came to Newtown by a circuitous route. She earned paralegal certification at Fairfield University in the early 1980s, then headed off to Aspen, Colorado, to teach skiing and work in a catering business. Two years later, she became a white water river rafter in Taos, New Mexico, and worked in a restaurant. Then she moved to northern Vermont, settling in Jeffersonville, and taught skiing for three years at Smugglers Notch.

“I met my husband, Jason, there,” Ms Cheney said. “He’s a project manager for a commercial/residential construction company. We have two children, Morgan, 7, and Ben, 5.”

During the years in Vermont, she dreamed of operating a crepe cart on the downtown cobbled streets of Burlington. “I didn’t think my kids would want to sit on the sidewalk while I did this,” she said, laughing, “so we decided in 1996 to move back to Connecticut to be near my family.”

When she taught skiing, she often worked with children in the adaptive program that serves those with handicaps, Down’s syndrome, and autism. She also became involved in working with the deaf.

“I have two deaf cousins, and my grandmother Tillie was president of the Bridgeport chapter of the Quota Club, which works with the deaf,” she explained. “I’m level-three certified in sign language and have done programs in several of the schools in Fairfield, and in Monroe, where we moved a year ago.”

After she moved to Monroe, the dream of the crepe cart surfaced again, but it soon evolved into Tillie’s. “In February I happened to drive by and see this building,” she said. “It must have been meant to be because everything moved very easily.

“I grew up with women who could do everything, so with my family’s help I tiled all the floors, sheetrocked, and taped. I stayed away from anything that had water or wires,” she said.

Although the deli closes at 6:30 pm Monday through Friday, Lee Cheney is thinking about having longer hours if the demand for gourmet take-out dinners increases. She also is thinking of having evening events featuring local acoustic musicians.

Currently Tillie’s is open 6 am to 6:30 pm, Monday through Friday, and Saturdays, from 7 am until Ms Cheney is tired and decides to go home. That’s getting more difficult as the business grows in popularity.

“I made up a saying that says it all,” she said: “Come, sit, chat and chew. A full house is still too few.”