Bolzano's Artisanal, Dry-Cured Salami

Scott Buer considers himself a brewer of sorts, but instead of crafting beer, he makes dry-cured meats. The process behind the two is surprisingly similar, he explains. In both cases, you're fermenting a product to create unique, natural flavors...

Pastiche Wines Opens in Bay View

When Bay View's Pastiche Bistro and Wine Bar (3001 S. Kinnickinnic Ave.) opened in 2010, it was promptly greeted by brisk business. That wasn't a surprise for owner and chef Michael Engel, who had extensively researched the neighborhood...

Treat Bake Shop's Candied Pecans With a Kick

Sarah Marx Feldner is just one step away from realizing her longtime dream of owning a bake shop, but it's a big one: finding a retail storefront. She's scouting locations now, hoping to find one with a kitchen where she can make her triple chocolate truffle...

Eating Local in Wisconsin, All Year Round

Eating local is easy enough in the summer and the fall, but it becomes a lot more difficult in the winter, when some of the most popular produce goes out of season and farmers' markets retreat indoors, where they're often out of sight and out of mind...

'12 Drinks of Christmas' Benefits Hunger Task Force

As part of the “12 Drinks of Christmas” promotion to raise money for the Hunger Task Force, a dozen Milwaukee bars and cocktail lounges are featuring special menus of holiday cocktails through the end of the year. Participating bars include...

Made in the Badger State

An online source for Wisconsin foods and gifts

Bill Kurtis' Healthier Way of Eating

Better beef and the push for a more natural diet

With his warm yet decisive voice, Bill Kurtis is best known for his long career in television journalism, where he's served as a news anchor and the host of documentary shows including “American Justice...

Sprecher Releases Its Fresh Hop Amber Lager with a Party

Early this fall Sprecher Brewery founder Randy Sprecher and vice-president Jeff Hamilton drove to a farm in Wausau to select 200 pounds of hops for something of an experiment: the first batch of the brewery's signature Special Amber beer made...

Wine & Dine Wisconsin's Culinary Smorgasbord

Enjoy wine, beer, cheese and cooking demonstrations

Milwaukee's largest food- and wine-tasting event returns to the Frontier Airlines Center this weekend. The third annual Wine & Dine Wisconsin will feature more than 100 exhibitors, three stages of cooking demonstrations from some of the city's...

Planting the Seeds for a More Edible Milwaukee

Victory Garden Initiative's 'Fruity Nutty Campaign'

In an effort to promote a healthier environment and more sustainable food system, the local Victory Garden Initiative encourages Milwaukeeans to grow produce in the city. If the idea of nurturing an urban garden seems too daunting...

Chiselled Grape Brings Wine to Grafton

Though wine won't soon replace beer as Wisconsin's unofficial state beverage, wineries have sprouted around the state over the last decade. That growth coincides with wine aficionados becoming more open to a wider variety of wines, including ones...

Local Hot Sauces With a Gourmet Twist

As convenient as they are, mass-produced hot sauces don't offer much variety or nuance. Most are just simple combinations of vinegar, salt, garlic and cayenne pepper. Like many spicy-food lovers, Milwaukee's Byron Jackson grew tired of the big-brand...

11th Annual Kohler Food & Wine Experience

For Lynn House, making a drink is something she takes very seriously. So seriously that she is renowned for her delicious sounding (and tasting) concoctions, having won numerous...

Certified Organic: Wisconsin's Clover Meadow Winery

The only certified organic winery in Wisconsin, and one of less than 15 in the entire country, Clover Meadow Winery operates as a carbon-neutral business as a matter of both philosophy and necessity. Surrounded by 300 acres of forest...

Griddlers Café Launches New Era

Former George Webb franchises break the mold

After more than 50 years, customers have learned what to expect from the George Webb franchise: a familiar menu of burgers, sandwiches, soups and 24-hour breakfasts at a bargain price, in a humble, earth-toned lunch-counter setting with a pair...

BelAir Cantina's Tequila Society

Milwaukeeans gaining a new appreciation for an old favorite

You wouldn't know it from the way it's typically consumed in America—either via fast, lime-chased shots or sugary margarita mixes—but tequila is a remarkably complex, versatile spirit, a drink that like brandy or wine can be made in a variety of colors...

Cedarburg's Wine & Harvest Festival

'Cheers' to 39 years

The festival season in Wisconsin doesn't end when the leaves begin to turn colors. Cedarburg's Wine & Harvest Festival offers opportunities to enjoy live outdoor music while sipping wine or beer, sampling tasty foods and browsing the wares of local...

Café Centraal's All-Local Sausage Throwdown

From its beginnings as a backyard barbecue six years ago, the Lakefront International Festival of Sausages—more concisely known as Sausage Fest—has grown into a block party outside of Café Centraal (2306 S. Kinnickinnic Ave.), and as...

Kosher Food From the Heartland

Authors trace Jewish cuisine in the American Midwest

The first Jews to arrive in the Midwest in the 19th century left no record of what they ate, but with no kosher butchers or dairies—or even a synagogue—within hundreds of miles, they presumably made do with whatever was at hand. In their book From the Jewish Heartland...

Milwaukee Recipes Find Second Life Online

The Internet long ago replaced the need for generalized cookbooks. If you're looking for a simple sugar cookie recipe or ideas for a squash soup, there's no need to turn to a book when a simple Google search will bring up dozens of suggestions. What the Internet hasn't always been as...

Celebrating the Food of the Emerald Isle

Milwaukee's Irish Fest runs Aug. 18-21

There's significant dispute over which county first invented Irish coffee, that mixture of whiskey and sweetened coffee topped with cream, but in a way both Donegal and Derry counties can lay claim to the popular hot drink. One of the most widely accepted origin stories...

Purple Door's Premium, Local Ice Cream

Given Milwaukee's love of all things dairy, it's a bit of a surprise that the city didn't have its own ice-cream wholesaler until this spring, when Lauren Schultz and her husband, Steve, launched their Purple Door Ice Cream company. The business was the culmination of a longtime dream...

Yes, There's Deep-Fried Beer Now

Here's what's frying at this year's Wisconsin State Fair

The Wisconsin State Fair never fails to introduce at least one or two almost impossibly decadent food items each summer, so it's in typical fashion that this year's fair debuts a couple of head-turning additions to its fried-food menu: deep-fried beer and deep-fried butter...

A Taste of Armenia

Armenian Fest's homemade cuisine

Though it's not as large as its counterparts on the lakefront, few of Milwaukee's ethnic festivals are more tightly knit or distinctive than Armenian Fest, the annual celebration that has been held since the 1930s. The event began as a small picnic, with families sharing homemade dishes, and nearly eight decades...

Limelite's Lower-Caffeine Energy Drink

The crowded energy-drink market is dominated by Red Bull and Pepsi- and Coca-Cola-distributed products like AMP, Rockstar and Monster, but there's still room for smaller upstarts, the Appleton-based T-D Innovations is discovering. Just eight months after the company launched its energy drink, Limelite Premium Fusion, the product has been picked...