An interview with the pastry chef who worked with František Myšák Jr.
Myšák: Pastry shops on both banks of the Vltava River
We're waiting outside the Myšák pastry shop in Prague, looking out for Mr. Rudolf Linka, son of the esteemed delicatessen owner Alois Linka and the last apprentice of pastry chef František Myšák. Moments later, a smiling gentleman arrives in a wheelchair, eyes full of joy, accompanied by his energetic wife Blanka, who has escorted him to Vodičkova Street along the same route he used to take to work back in 1944.
They tell us how the kremrole were smaller back then, the atmosphere felt Viennese, and the pastry shop was full of customers who kept coming back for their favourite caramel with vanilla ice cream and whipped cream. We sit down at a table, order an espresso for Mr. Linka, and delve into a past worth admiring.
The delicatessen back in 1911
“My father was a great man. He came from a poor village, and in Prague he managed to build a business that reached European scale,” Rudolf recalls of his father, Alois Linka, who rented an apartment on Hybernská street in 1911 and opened one of the first, and best-know, delicatessens in Prague and throughout the country. His product range was could not be rivalled, as Mr. Alois kept a close eye on trends abroad, from which he imported exclusive ideas and products.
In 1935, due to rising cost of rent, he decided to buy a house on Havlíčkova street and open a new store with modern technology, seating areas, and a diverse selection of delicacies from around the world.
“Dad traveled a lot and built up a network of contacts, often visiting to Germany and France. He would then transport the goods himself or have them shipped, including wines, oils, cheeses, and other select delicacies. “No one can imagine that today, because these delicatessens don’t exist anymore. The store had several sections; there were barrels of wine in the cellars, and cheeses were cured in salt until they matured into large loaves,” Rudolf Linka describes the list of delicacies, which we gaze at in disbelief in a preserved catalog from the 1930s.
Today, La Bottega Linka occupies the space of Mr Linka's delicatessen in Havlíčkova street. A restaurant operated by the La Collezione group, guests still enter through the original door from 1935.
The delicatessen offered both local and exotic goods — vegetables and fruits in various forms, meat and cured meats, cheeses, seafood and fish specialties, spices, seasonings, nuts, chocolates and candies, coffee, teas, and a long, carefully curated selection of wines, liqueurs, brandies, cognacs, and other spirits.
For true gourmets, bird’s nests from China, turtle meat, and rooster combs were ordered; palm hearts, hop salad, and asparagus beans were also available for purchase, but the refrigerated display cases also featured classic open-faced sandwiches, homemade mayonnaise made from fresh egg yolks and olive oil, and the legendary Walnut Salad, invented by Rudolf’s mother, Marie.
“On Saturdays, we used to have sausages for dinner, making use of what hadn’t sold,” Rudolf notes, before adding another childhood memory. “Once on St. Nicholas Day, my dad dressed me and my brothers up as St. Nicholas, the devil, and an angel, and put us in the store window to attract customers. We attracted so much attention that traffic came to a standstill at the intersection, and Dad was later banned from doing live advertising.”
If you were going to be a pastry chef, it had to be at Myšák’s
As the youngest child, Rudolf spent a lot of time in the deli alongside his mother, without realising how his father’s dreams would shape his life. “Dad wanted to open a gourmet restaurant. So my brother started a farm near Poděbrady to supply the shop with meat, vegetables, fresh butter, and other produce. My second brother was supposed to train as a butcher, my third as a baker, and I as a pastry chef,” Rudolf recounts.
The second world war derailed Alois’s plan, but even so, he sent 14-year-old Rudolf to be an apprentice with pastry chef František Myšák. “Mr. Myšák wasn’t taking on any apprentices at the time, but my dad used to meet him at the Merkur business association and worked it out with him. I got the job purely through connections and worked there for four years for nothing but meals. I wanted to train as both a pastry chef and a waiter, so I spent my mornings at the pastry shop, where I rotated through all the departments, and my afternoons serving customers at the café.”
Rudolf remembers Mr. Myšák as a kind man and a truly exceptional pastry chef: “Everyone knows his caramel sundae, but few people know how beautifully he could blow caramel and that he won awards for it at international competitions, including in Paris.” Even as an apprentice, Rudolf wanted to do everything his own way, and since he had a vivid imagination, they let him decorate cream cakes. So each one turned out a little different.
With a smile, Rudolf also recalls the mishaps that Mr. Myšák managed to forgive him for — the time he tripped and all the pastries he was carrying to the shop on a large tray balanced on his head fell to the ground, or when he ran off without permission to watch the bombing of Prague.
Instead of recipes and techniques, Rudolf passes on to us a far more valuable legacy from Mr. Myšák: “For me, it was the best school I could have wished for. I learned honesty there, and my whole life I’ve held fast to the great truth that Mr. Myšák often repeated to us: Our customer is our master. The guest must get what they paid for.”
The fruit bar on Wenceslas Square
As Mr. Myšák’s last apprentice, Rudolf witnessed the sad end of the nationalised pastry shop in 1948. He then moved to a small pastry shop in Vršovice, owned by one of Myšák’s former employees, and later to the state-owned enterprise Pražská cukrárna (Prague Confectioners).
After two years of military service, he gained further pastry-making experience at the Pramen Dairy Cafeteria on Hybernská Street, and shortly thereafter, an opportunity he couldn’t refuse — managing the business at 52 Wenceslas Square. “The owners had envisioned a vegetable cafeteria, because salad bars were all the rage in Europe at the time, but I hadn’t traveled anywhere and had no experience with vegetables, so I proposed the Pramen Fruit Bar. We opened two months later,” says Rudolf.
The fruit bar was part of the Ovoce a zelenina Praha store, which was located on the ground floor and imported produce from various countries. Thanks to this, Rudolf was one of the few people in Czechoslovakia able to experiment with exotic fruits and create a concept that was unique not only in Prague but also in Europe.
In addition to banana variations, such as the “Žůžo” banana with hazelnut sauce or a daring combination with ham and mayonnaise, which was inspired by the unusual tastes of one of his guests, Rudolf also served oranges with chocolate or pineapple with whipped cream.
“We were the first to make fruit soups, such as strawberry or orange. That was a huge hit, much like our banana ice cream. The queues were so long that the produce vendors on the ground floor were unhappy,” Rudolf smiles proudly. He was one of the first in the Czech Republic to use a machine to churn ice cream with 50% fruit content.
“I can’t say exactly where or what inspired me. I wanted to do something no one else around here was doing, and I knew I had to constantly offer people something new,” explains Rudolf. The famous Cuban cake with chocolate and bananas also sits on his long list of creations.
“It was a huge hit — I made a hundred of them for Christmas. Back then, the store promised me they’d get a new variety of long bananas from Cuba, so I named the cake ‘Cuban’ in advance. The bananas never actually arrived, but I never changed the name.”
Rudolf handled production on his own, with just one assistant, but the hard work paid off. Around a thousand guests visited Pramen every day, including state envoys and a number of famous artists: “Waldemar Matuška was a daily guest of ours. He had his favourite spot and often liked to wait for it. Karl Höger and I called each other ‘master,’ and I created Bikaveri — a mulled wine with banana — based on his suggestion,” Rudolf recalls, thinking back to Wenceslas Square, where he surprised and entertained guests with his creativity.
A dream come true in Sweden
Management of the fruit bar was eventually passed on to Mr. Hájek, who had trained there. He and his brother would later go on to open Světozor. Rudolf and his wife Blanka, whom he met at Pramen, chose a different path: in 1977, they traveled to Sweden for the wedding of Rudolf’s daughter Zdena and ended up staying there.
“I’d always dreamed of having my own business,” says Rudolf. After three years of searching for a suitable space, he found a location in Gothenburg, secured a loan from the bank, and set up his own venture, the Fructus fruit bar.
Blanka adds: “The banks didn’t want to take a risk on something so innovative and turned us down several times. But then one day, my husband carved a picture out of fruit and took it to the banker who had sent us away the day before. Rudolf convinced them that he was a master of his craft, and we got the loan.”
Rudolf poured into Fructus the same dedication and integrity that had previously brought him success in Prague, and as a result, the café, which had about thirty seats on the ground floor, a production facility upstairs, and a summer garden, gained a reputation far and wide and filled with guests from all over Sweden and beyond. Artists such as director David Rodok sent colleagues from the local theatre to visit, members of the band Roxette were regulars, and Jiří Suchý, Karel Kryl, and Jitka Molavcová also stopped by Fructus from time to time.
“On Saturdays, queues would form out front even before opening time. We had to hire extra staff because the four of us couldn’t handle it on our own. It was demanding. Rudolf got up at five every single day to go to the market for the best fruit. In that respect, he’s old-school. He didn’t trust anyone too much and had to keep an eye on everything. That’s also why we refused to open another bar. Rudolf was always convinced that the owner has to be present at the business and that it wouldn’t work the way he wanted it to without him,” Blanka notes.
They included some hits Linka’s menu in Prague, but Rudolf created most of the selection based on the season and his own ideas. It was precisely those ideas that set him apart from the rest. The menu featured baked potatoes with fruit, a pear stuffed with marzipan, a fruit burger with pineapple, and fruit-based meals such as pancakes, fruit soups, and salads. But it was chestnuts that were the biggest hit.
“Our employees hated it because making chestnut purée is very labour-intensive, but the guests loved them. We used them to make soup, ice cream, fillings for desserts, and patties,” Rudolf explains.
Some combinations were quite extravagant, such as roasted pineapple with a fried egg or tomato ice cream with vodka. The pair also recall a few less successful variations, such as the cold “Mishmash” pasta with fruit, drizzled with chocolate and a dollop of whipped cream.
“We wanted to show people something Czech, so we offered "rakvička" cookies. Unfortunately, we used a literal translation, which is "coffin", and we quickly realised that Swedes just don’t find the name "whipped cream coffin" funny,” Blanka laughs, telling us a story that confirms her husband’s talent and precision:
“When Swedish Princess Victoria was born, Rudolf baked a beautiful, elegant cake with layers of white, nougat, and dark chocolate, covered in chocolate, and sent it to the palace. The royal family thanked him and allowed him to name it ‘Victoria.’”
Returning home
This dynamic chapter of Fructus’s history came to an end when Mr. Linka retired in 2002. At the time, the couple decided to sell the business and move back to Prague, where they still live today. Mr. Linka’s eyes radiate contentment, suggesting that he wouldn’t change a thing about his journey. Or would he?
“There is one dream that didn’t come true after all — living in America, which for me was the epitome of freedom and enterprising people. And you know what else? My wife won’t even hear of it, but I’d like to open something new. Maybe an ice cream shop next to our apartment, right where the currency exchange is,” muses the 90-year-old master, whose spirit never ages and who rejoices in a life filled with the sweet scent of confectionery.
4 recipes from Mr. Alois Linka’s 1911–1936 catalog
Beignets de bananes: Peel the bananas, cut them into 4 pieces, soak them in rum for half an hour or longer, and sprinkle them generously with sugar. Fry in hot oil or other cooking fat until light brown, let them drain and sprinkle with vanilla sugar.
Stuffed tomatoes: Fill the tomatoes with rice cooked in broth and bake in a pan with oil, anchovies, garlic, a pinch of pepper, and a few sprigs of peppermint in a moderately heated oven for about 20 minutes.
Hot pâtés: Chop any cold meat, a piece of lean ham, a few cooked mushrooms, a piece of bread roll soaked in milk, and parsley. Chop everything very finely and mix with one or two egg yolks. Season generously with pepper and salt. Fill small puff pastry pastries with the mixture, brush with beaten egg yolk, and bake in a hot oven until they turn a delicate golden colour. Serve hot.
Fresh chicory salad with a dressing made from oil, a clove of crushed garlic, a few sprigs of mint, and a pinch of salt.
Source: The Memoirs of Rudolf Linka by Jana Slabá
