a gourmet tour of milwaukee.

there are some days when i wish i could be a foodie for the travel channel--i'd let them send me wherever they wish, and i'd fully investigate the food in whatever city i'm traveling to. in a way, my job is kind of like that. we make mental notes of good places for lunch, dinner, drinks, coffee and pass it on to our coworkers. we get fixated on little things like the bluegrass blend from aiken, south carolina's moonbeans coffee (guilty as charged) or raw oysters & chicken-fried chicken from maxie's in ithaca, new york (guilty, again). and then there's the times when you go to an unknown city. say, milwaukee, and you find out bits and pieces as you go. we all know wisconsin is famous for cheese, but apparantly milwaukee is famous for beer, custard, beer, german food, and more beer. there's lakefront, sprecher, miller, stonefly, leinenkugal, and more... i've been trying to do my best to try them all. here's today's activity:

• lunch at beans & barley: sprecher ginger beer and sweet potato black bean burger w/ lime sour cream (amazing). i also picked up some peruvian coffee (rej's fave) for office enjoyment--whole beans only, obviously; and a replacement lunch bag as mine was recently lost. also, i found organic poptarts. probably the highlight of the trip.
• snacktime at the milwaukee public market: blue point (va) and gold band (la) raw oysters and a taste of lakefront's ipa at st. paul's fish company. sniffing some spices at the spice house. and a taste of some beer cheddar cheese (wisconsin's finest) from west allis cheese.
• we walked all the way from the market and trendy new shops in the third ward to german bars & restaurants in old world third street and back again. milwaukee is a neat city, although there weren't many people out, and, well, it is in the midwest. ( ;
• dinner at mo's. not the best service, but the food was okay. i am usually a fan of butter, but their specialty cajun butter tasted like wax. the waiter was pushy, and collected our checks as to get rush us out. i got a filet and a sprecher mai bock--i'd order the beer again any day.

on the list for tomorrow is some custard! i can't wait! if only our project would push forward instead of me waiting here exploring food options through friday...