Tuesday, May 17th 2011
Eat. Drink. Walk. Talk. Milwaukee Food Tours!
By 2 Cents
We recently attended the ever-growing Milwaukee Food Tours for their inaugural Brady St. tour.
It was filled with delicious food, stories & enough time to walk from each place to digest and dig into the next dish. As a Brady Street resident & pseudo Milwaukee guide, I thought I knew everything interesting about the area, I walk up and down it everyday. Oh my-I was wrong! Apparently I didn’t know half of it! I was completely entertained and found such delight in the tour as a local.
There were 4 other people on the tour, from Green Bay & from Brookfield: in other words, locals. We met at Zaffiros on Prospect on a warm Sunday. Honestly, I never ate there & was pleasantly surprised about this family owned pizzeria. There’s an ongoing debate of square vs. triangle cut pizza. Thersea was our tour guide, owner & creator of Milwaukee Food Tours. She grew up in MKE & being Italian, visited Brady street often with her family since it was filled with Sicilian heritage. Hence why Brady St. was the set for the first tour. Two of the main stops & most historically interesting were to Scortino’s Bakery and of course, Glorioso’s (Best deli ever.) There were 6 stops that took us over a mile’s walk. There was a table and food set out as soon as we arrived so we could dig in and be on our way to the next. They were healthy portions too, and things I wouldn’t have normally ordered, which was a treat and really appealed to the foodies. But over the two hours, you found yourself on a relaxing trip down history lane & quite satisfied, not stuffed.
We walked through the residential areas and made a few more stops to eat. Not all the places were filled with history, but simply had good food & offered something diverse to the area, although it would’ve been nice to have each place truly a landmark. But, you can’t forget that you’re on foot...gotta get back somehow! We were left at the Lakefront Brewery with cold brews, new friends & a satisfied appetite. It was great to see that locals were interested in their own city. Theresa said there are school groups and many tourists that join as well. But I found our day to be quite intimate & a great group.
So if mom’s coming to town or the in-laws, take ‘em on the Third Ward Bloody Brunch Tour or even one through Wauwatosa. Totally worth it for foodies, locals & history buffs alike. If you’ve got a few hours, are hungry & want to learn something new, check out Milwaukee Food Tours. They’ve got a Ghosts & Spirits tour coming up for Halloween which sounds fantastic, where they’ve combined food, drinks & MKE ghost stories! Check it out at www.MilwaukeeFoodTours.com.
DID YOU KNOW:
That the big blue tiles that line the length of Brady Street are a symbolic art piece that connects the Milwaukee River to Michigan Lake? I bet you’ve crossed them a million times and never took notice. Look down, Each tile represents a key business or person to the Brady Street area.
Neighborhood: Brady Street
