Lost Tables: Lake Forest Pastry Shop

Lake Forest Pastry Shop

Henry Schaumberg Jr. was born in 1872 in Kansas. Schaumberg is listed in 1895-1898 city directories as a draftsman, and after 1898 as an architect. Although his name is associated with many houses in south St. Louis and the Skinker DeBaliviere neighborhood, much later in his career Schaumberg designed a "bakery, shop and garage" in the city of Clayton.

Schaumberg's Art Deco design was executed by builder H. Beetz and Son in 1940 at the corner of Clayton Road and Bemiston. The August 26, 1940 building permit lists the cost of the construction at $14,500. A $700 addition to the shop was built in 1945 and a $6,000 addition to the bakery and garage was constructed in 1946.

Art Deco provided a convenient means of giving identity to small commercial buildings that might otherwise have lacked character. Schaumberg's design achieved its modern look with cubist massing, glass block and yellow glazed brickwork with orange stripes.

The main entry is angled at the southwest corner. It has a fluted stone frame set in sidelights and toplights of glass-block. The remaining three bays of the ground floor are occupied by a big display window, with tiled bulkhead. Door and window are sheltered by a marquee which curves around above the door to a one-story, one-bay wing. This wing has a glass-block window three-blocks wide in front and one-block windows flanking a conventional window on the side. The roof of this wing forms a balcony sheltered by an added sloping metal roof. Other west windows have awnings. The wing, which has a saltbox roofline, is tied to the main building by a one-story curving wing with a very large glass-block window.
Office of Historic Preservation, Jefferson City, Feb 1987

Schaumberg designed his building at 7737 Clayton Road for baker Carl Bollenmueller. It was the last St. Louis bakery built with a second-story living quarters. Bollenmueller named his enterprise Lake Forest Pastry Shop.

Lake Forest Pastry Shop, 7737 Clayton Road, 1987
(click image to enlarge)

Carl Bollenmueller was born Karl Bollenmueller in Oberbaldinger, Germany in 1886. He immigrated to the United States in 1923. Before moving into his bakery and home on Clayton Road in 1940, Bollenmueller was listed in the 1933 St. Louis City Directory as having a retail bakery at 3305 Arsenal.

By 1950, Lake Forest Pastry Shop had changed hands. The new owner was Walter Schuchardt.

Lake Forest Pastry Shop, 7737 Clayton Road

Walter Robert Schuchardt was born in St. Louis in 1905. As early as 1929, he owned the Schuchardt Pastry Shop at 3538 Gravois Avenue, living above the bakery with his family. When he moved his bakery and home to 7737 Clayton Road, he kept the existing Lake Forest moniker.

Walter Schuchardt was adept at promoting his bakery. In February of 1952, when Eddie Cantor was in St. Louis for a fundraiser, Schuchardt designed a cake for the famed comedian's sixtieth birthday. In 1956, Schuchardt was elected president of the Associated Retail Bakers of America.

Schuchardt was an innovative baker. A story in the September issue of Bakers Weekly gave Schuchardt credit for developing the German Chocolate Cake.

According to a double-page story in the September issue of Bakers Weekly, Walter Schuchardt, owner of the Lake Forest Pastry Shop in St. Louis, added a succulent "German Chocolate Cake" to his baked foods line that took the city by storm and is now sweeping the country like wildfire.
A progressive baker, always alert for new ideas and new baker creations, Mr. Schuchardt struck upon the idea of preparing the now nation-wide popular German Chocolate Cake.
Here is what the food editor of the St. Louis Post Dispatch had to say about this sensational cake: "It's a mystery . . . why, why, why does everyone seem to be talking about a particular chocolate cake? What is there about the recipe that it should be the talk-of-the- nation? So are dozens of other favorite cake recipes used now and again. But, starting with an unknown homeowner in Texas or Oklahoma, this recipe for German Chocolate Cake has traveled like wildfire north, south, east and west. The cake hasn't been 'promoted' by any commercial organization, so then it must be the light, texturized, chocolaty layers . . . or perhaps the rich satisfying cocoanut-pecan frosting that is more like a filling than an icing . . . or is it the inspired combination of both cake and frosting that makes it so popular that almost everyone who tries it has the urge to pass the good news along to someone else just as fast as she possibly can? Many women have even written letters to their friends and relatives clear across the nation to tell about this unusually great cake."
Lock Haven, Pennsylvania Express, Sept 19, 1958

Walter Schuchardt continued making German Chocolate Cakes at 7737 Clayton Road until he retired in 1962. The Lake Forest Pastry Shop again changed hands and belonged to Walter Binder.

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Walter Frederick Binder was born in St. Louis in 1920. His grandfather, Henry Binder, immigrated to the United States from Germany in 1883. Henry Binder made his way to St. Louis and in 1886 opened a bakery at 1530 South 11th Street.

By 1917, Henry's son Robert had become the proprietor of the bakery. By 1922, Robert Binder had moved the bakery to 1621 South 39th Street. His wife Elise and their three children – Roberta, Walter and Lorraine – lived above the bakery.

The Robert Binder Family, 1930
Robert, Roberta (age 12), Lorraine (age 7), Walter (age 9), Elise

Walter Binder began working in the bakery at age eleven. By age 21, he was his father's foreman.


Neighborhood News, Oct 18, 1934	Neighborhood News, Apr 9, 1936

In 1944, Walter Binder married Wilma Brudner. In January of 1946, Walter and Wilma Binder took over the bakery at 1621 South 39th Street and reopened it as Binder's Pastry Shop.

Neighborhood News, Jan 24, 1946

The Binders operated their pastry shop on 39th Street for over sixteen years. The July 5, 1962 South St. Louis Neighborhood News listed Binder's Pastry Shop as a participant in an August street carnival. However, on July 17, 1962, Walter Binder registered Lake Forest Pastry Shop with the state of Missouri and moved his bakery and family home to the Art Deco building on Clayton Road.

Lake Forest Pastry Shop, 7737 Clayton Road
(click image to enlarge)

Walter Binder owned Lake Forest Pastry Shop for over 35 years.

This is hand-craft and everybody does it just a little bit different. We bake basically the way my grandfather did in 1886. The main difference is that 90 percent of his product was rye bread.
We have 12 bakers here. The first baker starts at 9:30 at night; the second comes in at 11. I come in at 4 a.m. We are usually done about 2:30 in the afternoon.
When I first come in I make paradise, which is a nice seller, and cheese strudel . . . and then I make puff pastry, tarts, cupcakes.
We're thankful that people come in and buy our bakery goods because I'm too dumb to do anything else and I would be starving to death.

Binder began advertising "This Week's Bakery Features" in the St. Louis Globe-Democrat in 1962 and continued in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch until he sold his business in 1998. The tantalizing descriptions provide a cumulative overview of the bakery's offerings.


St. Louis Globe-Democrat, Nov 5, 1962	St. Louis Post-Dispatch, Mar 2, 1998

Paradise Coffee Cake – Our most popular Danish product. A coffee cake filled with butter and pecans and chewy filling.
Lemon Crunch Cake – Our delicately blended yellow cake, flavored with fresh grated lemon, baked in pan coated with butter, lemon crunch and pecans.
Japanese Apple Ring – Danish coffee cake with streusel topping and filled with spiced apples.
Double Dutch Chocolate Cake – A moist chocolate cake filled with creamy chocolate pudding. Iced with chocolate frosting and topped with roasted, salted pecans.
Apple Strudel – Deliciously rich Danish pastry, streusel bottom, filled with luscious apples and lightly iced with fondant.
Cherry Sour Cream Cake – Old world sour cream cake, topped with cherries and streusel.
German Chocolate Kuchen – A Danish pastry with a filling of chocolate chips and creamy coconut. Topped with German chocolate pudding.
Lazy Daisy – Tender coffee cake, almond filling, topped with brown sugar, coconut and creamy icing.
Baked Alaska – Three layers of angel cake, and two layers of ice cream, one of strawberry and one chocolate. Covered with meringue.
Strawberry Divinity Cake – A fluffy angel cake marbled pink frosted with fresh strawberry icing.
Pecan Crunch Ring – Danish pastry with almond filling. Covered with a crunch topping of pecans, almonds, filberts and cashews, blended with sugar, butter and eggs.
Confection Roll – A delicious Danish dough thinly layered with brown sugar and hazelnuts.
Ambrosia Cake – A rich square butter cake split and filled with pineapple, iced with pineapple and smothered with tender fresh coconut.
Cinnamon Toast – All butter coffee cake rolled thin, covered with butter and cinnamon sugar, baked to a golden brown.
Saratoga Coffee Cake – A tender coffee cake topped with juicy cherries, streusel and creamy caramel.
Neapolitan Angel Cake – Three layers of angel food, strawberry, vanilla & chocolate. Strawberry icing and topped with dribbled chocolate fondant.
Bavarian Kuchen – Danish pastry filled with cheese, apples and raisins.

Binder didn't advertise two of his more popular creations. His Black Forest and Gooey Butter cakes sold as quickly as he made them. But with time, tastes changed.

The old-fashioned deep butter cake use to be the largest seller by far. It has declined; the old people over 65, 70 they like the drier cakes.

Lake Forest Pastry Shop Gooey Butter Cake

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In 1998, Walter Binder sold Lake Forest Pastry Shop to Annette and Robert Garrett; Robert Garrett had been an employee. The following year, columnists Jane and Michael Stern wrote the following after visiting the bakery.

Lake Forest is a grand survivor, a civilized take-a-number store that feels like a specialist’s waiting room – hushed, reverent, filled with customers’ anticipation. A staff of uniformed ladies with buttercream complexions speak in soothing tones and glide among the cases and shelves, boxing bundt cakes, cupcakes, tea cakes, and coffeecakes; round cakes and square cakes; cakes that are strawberry-iced, chocolate-sprinkled, nut-studded, sugar-dusted, coconut-scattered, and caramel-glazed. There are several dozen ravishing cake varieties every day (not to mention cobblestone Cheddar bread, crusty ryes, frozen Vienna tortes, and baked Alaskas); among them, of course, is gooey butter cake.
Gourmet Magazine, 1999

In 2002, the Garrets sold Lake Forest Pastry Shop to Damian Gerard, who opened a second location in South County at 5445 Telegraph Road. Gerard also added check and credit card payment options; Lake Forest had always been a cash only business.

My whole thing, everything I do, is geared toward customer service and to make the customer experience better.
All I've been working on is to restore the quality of the bakery and clean it up. My plan is to build it up better than ever.
We plan to follow the population west. If you drive down Manchester Road from I-270 to Clarkson Road, there's like only one bakery. We will fix that.

By October of 2003, Lake Forest Pastry Shop had closed its doors for good.

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In May of 2010, the Art Deco building at 7737 Clayton Road was demolished to make way for a nail salon. All that was left of Bollenmueller and Schuchardt and Binder were their recipes.

Lake Forest Pastry Shop Recipes