By Carolyn Sloan

Spectator

NovaNewsNow.com

With roots that go back to first contact, she loves the irony of being referred to as a newcomer. While it’s true that Chantelle Reid has never lived in Annapolis Royal, her great grandfather, going back 400 years, sailed into the Annapolis River with Samuel de Champlain and became the area’s first Justice of the Peace.

Four centuries later, a new resident of the former Acadian settlement of Tupperville, Chantelle serves up her own kind of peace in the form of homemade comfort foods and gourmet treats at the Pony Expresso Café, located in Annapolis Royal’s old post office building. Try a “tout” cookie, and all will be right with the world again. Like the name suggests, this treat has it all – raisins, coconut, oatmeal, peanut butter, and chocolate. In short, it defies the idea that there can ever be too much of a good thing.

Chantelle and her husband began construction of the café last January, moving to the area the following month. The two had been running a bakery in Dartmouth, Nova Scotia and been trying to relocate to the Valley area for three years. When they found space to rent in downtown Annapolis Royal, they promptly sold their house and business for a new start in the small town.

Chantelle’s affection for the area stems from the years she lived in Cornwallis and attended junior high school at Annapolis Royal Regional Academy. She later went on to community college in Dartmouth for a bakery and pastry arts program. Before that, she had taken a two-year hotel and restaurant course in Ontario.

Her love of baking, however, began at a young age.

“My mom was a very hands-on mom,” Chantelle recalls. “When she baked, she showed us how.

“I always wanted to play homemaker, so I just started making my own recipes. I was actually catering things for people.”

After working in hotels for a while, she returned to the restaurant scene, realizing that she had discovered what she wanted to do with her life. Being at college, baking day and night, was pure pleasure.

“It was seven o’clock in the morning and you’re eating ganache!” Chantelle explains. “Oh God, it was wonderful being at school.”

A new addition to the business community in Annapolis Royal, she plans to keep the café running year-round and is willing to play around with her hours to better fit the town’s needs. While still a young entrepreneur, Chantelle shows no lack of confidence in her ability to make a living in rural Nova Scotia, despite being aware of some of the challenges she will face. With an abundance of enthusiasm and a forthright willingness to lend a hand in creating a more vibrant retail environment in Annapolis Royal, she has already got other business owners singing her praises as just the kind of person the town needs to attract.