Chef Rene has finally come home to Eagle River! After spending years perfecting his craft, he will now reside at the Eagle River Inn. This beautifully renovated restaurant is the perfect backdrop for a night out enjoying food and friends. You can stop by and warm up if you’re out snowmobiling on the trails and come in the summer by boat, easy to do, being situated on Lake Watersmeet, which is one of the 28 lakes on the chain!
Many are familiar with Chef Rene. The Ayvazzadeh Family has been a fixture in the community for 50 years. Starting with Homer and Carol’s restaurant, The Persian Paradise, that opened in 1970. The family has made fine food their legacy. Anyone who enters Chef Rene’s restaurant can still find Homer delighting kids and adults alike with the finger puppets his beloved wife Carol was known for.
About Chef Rene: Chef Rene grew up learning and working in the restaurant business. His father Homer, and his beloved mother Carol, opened the Persian Paradise in 1970. Homer manned the bar, and Carol was at the helm as a Hostess. For anyone fortunate enough to have had the opportunity to dine there knows that this family has had more than great food to offer, they had a place that reflected the love for their family, and they made everyone who entered feel like family. They ran the restaurant and motel from 1970 to 1994. Homer and Carol loved to motorcycle across the county when they could find the time.
Chef Rene was an apprentice in Phoenix, Arizona in 1984, from there he went on to attend the Culinary Institute of America, in Hyde Park, New York from 1985 to 1987. Then returned to Eagle River to help run The Persian Paradise alongside his mother and father until it’s closing in 1994.
In the Summer of 1995 he went to work for Froelich’s Sayner Lodge for a short time. He then moved to Fence Lake Lodge in the Fall, and worked there until 2004. From there he went to Chef Rene’s Back Bay Cove for 10 years, then onto Timber Ridge until December 2018 and now he is back in his home town here in Eagle River.
His only son Kyle, was born in 1994. He was very involved with baseball and hockey while growing up. His grandfather, Homer, was a huge supporter of the Eagle River Hockey Arena. Kyle went on to Coach the Bantams after he graduated from high school. He joined the Menomonee Falls Fire Department, and really took an interest in the operation of fire fighting and decided to go to Fox Valley Technical College for Fire Science in Appleton, Wisconsin. He is now employed at the Menomonee Falls Fire Department.