Just in time for hot weather, Starfruit Cafe has opened a second location in Lincoln Park.
These lively cafes offer delicious and healthful frozen kefir, a tangy, yogurtlike treat, with fruit or a variety of toppings, as well as kefir-based parfaits and smoothies. Kefir is a creamy, effervescent dairy beverage, which contains ten probiotic cultures. By contrast, yogurt contains just two or three.
Michael Smolyansky
The first Starfruit opened in West Town last year, but its roots go back much farther. The founder of parent company Lifeway Foods, Michael Smolyansky, emigrated from Russia in 1976. Arriving in Chicago with his wife, young daughter and just $1 in his pocket, he set to work as an engineer.
After a 1985 European trip reminded him of kefir, Smolyansky began to brew the probiotic beverage in his basement, trying to peddle it to Chicago grocery stores. It took a year before he sold his first order. Today, Lifeway Kefir, made in Morton Grove, is in the dairy cases of groceries nationwide.
