Wild Flour Bakery acquires Nokomis bread line, expanding to East Troy, organic bread

Expansion expected to create up to 15 new jobs and reintroduce the Nokomis Organic Bread Line, a product previously sold in the Milwaukee, Chicago, and Minneapolis wholesale markets.

Wild Flour Bakery & Café announced today that they are expanding into the organic bread market and opening a baking and retail facility in East Troy, Wis.

The new operation is located on the property of the Michael Fields Agricultural Institute (MFAI), W2493 County Road ES. Established in 1984, MFAI is farm and research center dedicated to developing agriculture that sustains the land and its resources.

The new East Troy Wild Flour Bakery will feature a retail store and café similar to the Wild Flour Bakery Café locations in Milwaukee. The owners anticipate that they will begin baking in mid-May and open for business in June. They project that the expansion will create up to 15 new jobs in the bakery, storefront, and distribution.

“Wild Flour is very excited about expanding our wholesale offering in Southeastern Wisconsin, Illinois, and Minnesota,” said company vice president, Josh Mertens. “Not only are we bringing back the famous Nokomis bread lines, but this is also an opportunity for us to bring our existing Wild Flour products to the East Troy area.  We are looking forward to being a part of the community.”

Josh Mertens is the son of Dolly and Greg Mertens, who own and operate four Wild Flour bakeries in Milwaukee and South Milwaukee. The opened their first bakery in 1996.

Wild Flour will operate in the former Nokomis Bakery at MFAI and reintroduce 14 varieties of Nokomis organic and wheat-alternative breads, using the original recipes. Mertens said that they have acquired the right to the Nokomis brand name but that they haven’t decided how they will incorporate the name on their labels. He said the new line will be branded with the Wild Flour Bakery name that he wants to include a reference to Nokomis.

Wild Flour’s Nokomis breads will include one or two low gluten or gluten-free breads.

Mertens plans to bake some of the organic bread in an outdoor wood-fire oven, which was part of the Nokomis baking operation. He estimates that the oven’s capacity is about thirty loaves. He said they will also mill organic grains on site.

Wild Flour will partner with MFAI on a variety of events including classes about bread baking and pizza-making using the wood-burning oven.

Mertens said they will cater to Michael Fields visitors who come to explore the gardens and hike the trails by making coffee and sandwiches available to them. The gardens and trails are maintained by MFAI.

Wild Flour Bakery & Café is a family-owned business with over 16 years of experience in the baking industry. They have received numerous awards including the Bakery of the Year Award from the Wisconsin Bakers Association, as well as the 2010 Greater Milwaukee Committee Inner City Business Award.

Wild Flour currently features four locations: 2800 W. Lincoln Ave.; 275 W. Wisconsin Ave. (Grand Avenue); 422 E. Lincoln Ave. (Bay View); and 1205 Milwaukee Ave. in South Milwaukee.

 

Bella’s restaurant building sold

The former Bella’s Fat Cat restaurant, 2737 S. Kinnickinnic Ave., has been purchased by SK Management, LLC. Shirley Konopski is the registered agent for the property.

Konopski said she was thinking of “maybe putting a Mexican restaurant” in the former burgers and custard venue, but that nothing has been finalized.

Tim Olson, a contractor employed by Konopski, said today that he’s making roof and plumbing repairs and cleaning the interior of the restaurant. He said that the owners intend to look for a leasing agent who will locate a tenant. Olson thinks there’s a fair chance that a restaurant may lease the space since the building is equipped with a kitchen.

In addition to the 3,895-square-foot restaurant space, there is another 1,700 square foot office space on the south end of the building that was last occupied by Kinetic Realty.

Michael and Kim Schmidt formerly owned the building and operated Bella’s Fat Cat Frozen Custard & Jumbo Burgers. The city didn’t renew their operating licenses in July 2010 due to multiple outstanding tax warrants. The owners closed the restaurant two months later, in September.

At that time the Journal Sentinel reported that Park Bank was granted possession of Bella’s Fat Cat Ltd.’s company-assets. They also foreclosed on the 2737 S. KK property, which was owned by Bella’s Holdings, LLC, another of the Schmidts’ firms.

SK Management acquired the property from Stearns Bank of St. Cloud, Minn.

 

Second annual Bay View Classic

By Sheila Julson

T

his summer the intersection of Kinnickinnic and Lincoln avenues will once again be the stage for racing drama when bicyclists compete in the second annual Bay View Classic. The race is slated for Saturday, July 21.

The Bay View Classic is part of the Point Premium Root Beer International Cycling Classic (ICC) and Superweek Pro Tour, the oldest and longest-running multi-category bike race. It takes place over a 17-day period, July 6-23, in southeastern Wisconsin, Chicago, and northern Illinois.

“There will be local, regional, and international riders,” said Andy Garrison, ICC director of operations. Because the Olympics take place this year, Garrison said, there is an increased interest in the ICC among international cyclists. They can ride the tour for 17 days as part of their training regimen and then be in tip-top shape heading into the Olympics. “I’ve already heard from the Hong Kong team, the Taiwan team, the Mexican National team, and Chinese and German cyclists,” he said.

A Little Lingo

The Bay View Classic is a race is a criterium (or crit), a closed circuit race of a specified number of laps that takes place on city streets or public roads closed to normal traffic. There are five race categories (cats). Cats range from 1 to 5; the most advanced cyclists compete in Cat 1 and beginners in Cat 5.

The Bay View crit is a Cat 4/5 and is .8 mile. The first race begins at 11:30am.

A succession of men’s and women’s races of various categories follows throughout the day. The finale is the Pro Cat 1/2 that includes elite cyclists from the United States and throughout the world. An awards ceremony caps off the event.

The total budget for the 17-day event is approximately $700,000, Garrison said, generated principally by entry fees, site fees, and sponsorships. South Shore Cyclery is a Bay View Classic sponsor. Garrison said ICC is still seeking additional sponsors and is soliciting financial support from the Bay View Business Investment District (BID #44).

BID secretary Joyce Parker said that some decisions would be made regarding the event and after-race party, etc. at the BID meeting on April 2.

In addition to its sponsorship of the Bay View Classic, South Shore Cyclery is the “title sponsor” of the third annual South Shore Cyclery Classic in Cudahy Thursday, July 12.

“South Shore Cyclery is committed to the community,” Garrison said, and added that the bike shop has been instrumental in expanding ICC races to Milwaukee’s south side.

“We’re looking forward to it again,” said Scott Wilke, owner of South Shore Cyclery. He feels that there’s value that neighborhoods and merchants receive from an event like the ICC race.

Criticism Considered

Garrison said that overall, feedback from last year’s Bay View Classic was positive, but he heard some complaints from area residents who claimed they were not informed about the event.

This year marketing and promotion plans include advertising, direct mail, posters in the windows of local businesses, and press coverage. Garrison is optimistic that there will be robust support among businesses and residents when word gets around.

He envisions the Bay View Classic becoming as popular and long running as the Great Downer Avenue Bike Race, where residents in the vicinity of the race course plan parties and cookouts around the event. “Bay View is a biking community,” he added.

ICC was founded by current race director Otto Wenz, Jr.

Professional cyclists Lance Armstrong and Greg Lemond competed in ICC races in past years.

More info, including an informative glossary and tutorial (Superweek 101): internationalcycling.com.

Licenses update

The Licenses Committee approved the following applications:

Class B Tavern and Public Entertainment License Renewal for Café Lulu, 2261-65 S. Howell Ave. The application included a request to remove the service-bar-only restriction and add bands to entertainment.

Permanent Extension of Premise for Hector’s On Delaware, 3040 S. Delaware Ave.

Public Entertainment License Renewal for Club Carnival, 2394 S. Kinnickinnic Ave. (Johnny’s Mexican Restaurant). Application approved with a warning letter.

Teddy Roosevelt aesthetic coming to Bay View

Gumby’s Pub, 2151 S. Kinnickinnic Ave., will soon be under new management, remodeled, and renamed Boone & Crockett. The new owners are Mike Kempka, Doug Williams, and John Revord.

The partners own Hotel Foster, 2028 E. North Avenue, which is located one door west of Whole Foods Market.

“Bay View was a logical next step for us. Bay View has the right vibe and the right clientele,” Revord said.

Boone & Crockett will sport a drastically different aesthetic that will make the establishment “a place Theodore Roosevelt would have gone for a brandy after a hunt,” Revord said, with decor that evokes a high-end rustic hunting lodge.

The bar will offer a selection of custom cocktails, a selection of higher-end craft distilleries, and a selection of unique beers. “Beer geeks and liquor geeks can geek out at our place,” joked Revord. He said they hope to be open for business by mid-May.

The building is owned by Scott Reiske and Russell J. Chicks. The current tavern license for Gumby’s was issued to Chicks; Gumby’s opened in late 2010.

Wild Flour Bakery & Café

1. How is sourdough bread different from breads made with commercial yeast?

Sourdough is sour and tangy made from natural yeast. A small piece of the sour (yeast) is added to the ingredients as the dough is being mixed. Natural yeast is a slower-rising yeast than commercial yeast; it is a 48-hour process from the time we start mixing the dough to selling the finished bread: Before we bake, the dough rises, cools, and is proofed.

2. How did you get interested in sourdough bread?

I have always liked the different taste, texture, smell of these breads. A natural sourdough bread just adds so much to meal.

3. How did you learn how to make sourdough bread? 

Practice, reading, more practice. Also, I helped to bake with my mother when I was a young girl.

4. Who makes your food and soups at the café and bakery in Bay View?

We have many trained employees who do the food prep, and much of the food is made to order when the customer places the order, so it is always nice and fresh and tasty.

5. What are some of your most popular baked goods?

Breads and cookies, muffins, and all our sweets.

6. Do you serve lunch at the Bay View café? Can customers get take out there?

Yes, we do. We also have breakfast sandwiches made on our breads and buns. Many customers call their order in so they can pick up and go.

7. How many locations do you have? Where are they?

We are a family-owned and operated business. We have four locations—Bay View; 28th Street and Lincoln Avenue; Grand Avenue Mall; and South Milwaukee. In addition, we sell our products at many grocery stores.

8. Do you cater? If so, what kinds of items do you provide?

We do light casual catering, sandwiches
and salads.

9. How has your business changed over time?

We started out only making breads, but our customers asked for sandwiches for take-out. We began making sandwiches and soon, soup and salad. And then they wanted sweets too so we added those.

10. How has Bay View changed since you opened Wild Flour?

I was able to be involved in the start of the South Shore Farmers Market. It has developed into one of the nicest events in the city. It is a very happy time and it crosses all barriers—people of all ages attend. It brings people into the community from everywhere. It is a delightful event and helps my spirit!!

Wild Flour Bakery & Café
Established 1996
Bay View Store opened 2003

Owners Dolly, Greg, and Josh Mertens
422 E. Lincoln Ave.
414-727-8145 (Bay View)
Wildflour.net   dolly@wildflour.net

Hide House home to HenschelHAUS Publishing

The Hide House in Bay View is home to a diversity of small businesses and studios occupied by artists, photographers, and musicians. For the past two years, Bay View resident Kira Henschel has been operating HenschelHAUS Publishing on the second floor of the venerable old complex.

What could be described as a one-stop-shop for all writing and publishing needs, Henschel’s services include coaching clients in writing and publishing, manuscript review, typesetting, book and cover design, editing, proofing, layout, marketing support, and product distribution and fulfillment. She even guides authors with book award submissions.

Henschel helps her clients create traditional hard copy books, as well as audio and e-books. But she has not always worked in publishing.

After earning her bachelor degrees in geology and international relations at UW-Madison, she moved to Innsbruck, Austria in 1979 to take care of her grandmother. There, she studied business, worked for the University of Innsbruck, and established her own technical translation agency in 1984 with 60 freelance translators for 32 different languages. Her team translated technical documents in the fields of engineering, business, and geology, as well as books with topics as divergent as Haflinger horses, the Austrian political system, and childhood trauma.

Henschel is bilingual in German and English; she spoke German in her home during childhood. Her Vienna-born father, Ernest Henschel,  and her mother, Ann Bardeen-Henschel, a native of Madison, Wis., were both anesthesiologists. They moved from Canada in 1960 and settled in Milwaukee, where both worked for the Medical College of Wisconsin. (Henschel’s uncle, John Bardeen, won two Nobel prizes in physics, one for inventing the transistor, 1956; one for superconductivity, 1976.)

Selling the translation agency in 1990, Henschel returned to Wisconsin in 1992, where she received a master’s degree in Engineering Management from the Milwaukee School of Engineering, then worked for Siemen’s Power Generation in West Allis as head of translations. In 1996, she and her daughter, Loris, moved to Madison, where she served as production manager for A-R Editions, a small specialty-publishing house, and learned the craft and business of publishing “from the inside out.”

In 1999, Henschel founded Clarity Consultants where she provided business coaching, which blossomed into a book publishing and consulting firm. Henschel designed her business to provide services for “the 82% of the population who want to write a book.” She said a lot of people have “write my book” on their bucket list.

Henschel said that guiding a client often means helping them organize a jumble of thoughts and ideas. “Whenever I work on a book,” Henschel said, “I want it to be the best book possible.”

She strives to preserve a client’s individuality. “I don’t want to take [their] voice away. I just want to make the book more easily understandable,” she said. “[This] doesn’t have to be hard. It doesn’t have to be this long, drawn-out thing.”

Henschel’s clients learn how to set measurable goals and she gives them the tools required to put their ideas on paper, navigate the publishing process, and market their book.

Some of Henschel’s clients are consultants or experts in their field who want to publish a book, some in order to be able to sell the book at speaking engagements. “Mostly people I work with want to write a book about their business,” Henschel said. “I work primarily with life coaches, with consultants, and presentation speakers. That’s pretty much my audience.” She also publishes works of fiction and memoirs.

Henschel said her clients’ book editions typically range from 25 to 1,000 copies, although she has printed editions as large as 10,000.

She’s also working on a book of her own about the publishing process, “The Art and Science of Successful Authorship.” “I don’t think there are a lot of books on how to put a book together with the market in mind,” she said. Her book will offer advice about the business of writing. A published book is the first step; the next step is selling that book. Successful authors work hard to market and sell their work and the message. “Each book is its own little business when you approach it properly,” she said.

Also in the works is a book based on the handwritten journals of her great-grandfather who, at the age of 18, sailed with Austria’s Archduke Franz Ferdinand from Austria to Japan in 1892-1893, twelve years prior to the Archduke’s assassination that launched the First World War.

In addition to her publishing business and personal writing project, Henschel teaches business classes at Cardinal Stritch and practices reiki, a Japanese technique for stress reduction and relaxation that also promotes healing. Until October 2011, she was also Technical and Safety Manager at the Association of Equipment Manufacturers in West Allis, but decided to return to publishing full time.

Henschel moved her business into Bay View’s Hide House in 2010. She appreciates the community aspect of the Hide House and the neighborhood. She likes being able to take her dog to work with her. “I love this place. It’s creative, it’s fun, it’s funky…It’s a place where work gets done,” Henschel said. Bay View is “just a nice neighborhood and I feel totally safe,” she said.

HenschelHAUS Publishing
2612 S. Greeley St., Suite 201, Milwaukee
HenschelHAUSbooks.com + Facebook and Twitter

Bay View Brew Haus sold

Steve Fix confirmed this evening that he sold the Bay View Brew Haus, 2535 S. Kinnickinnic, to the owners of the The Up And Under Pub on Brady Street.

More information to follow. (Fix was busy tending bar tonight and could not talk at length about the sale.)

Bay View Brew Haus began in 2009. Read more here.

2012 Bay View Business Map

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Statewide wind siting-rules go back into effect

Source: Clean Wisconsin

Suspension of rule created regulatory uncertainty that drove wind farm developers away

Today, clean energy businesses and advocates celebrated the reinstatement of the statewide, uniform wind siting rule, PSC 128. This important rule, which was suspended by a legislative committee last March, creates commonsense standards for permitting safe wind farms.

“The suspension of the wind siting rule drove several wind companies out of Wisconsin, costing our state hundreds of jobs and entrenching our reliance on expensive, dirty fossil fuels,” says Amber Meyer Smith, Clean Wisconsin’s director of government relations. “The wind siting rule will help lead our state to a cleaner, economically stronger future. Ending its suspension is a victory for Wisconsin.”

Last March, the Joint Committee for Review of Administrative Rules voted on party lines to suspend PSC 128, a set of rules created by the Public Service Commission to replace a chaotic patchwork of local ordinances for permitting wind farms with sensible, statewide standards. The rule suspension returned uncertainty to the process and in the following months, a number of companies pulled the plug on several proposed wind projects in the state.

The full Legislature is required to pass a bill for a rule suspension to become permanent. The Senate’s adjournment yesterday means the rule goes back into effect immediately, according to the Public Service Commission.

“A January poll showed that 85 percent of Wisconsin voters support wind energy, and the wind siting rule will help bring more safe wind farms to our state,” says Smith. “We’re glad this job-killing suspension has finally come to an end.”

On behalf of its 10,000 supporters, Clean Wisconsin advocates for clean air and clean water and protects the special places that make Wisconsin such a wonderful place to live, work and play. 608-251-7020, www.cleanwisconsin.org.

 

 

 

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Bay View BID requests KK business owners post no-overnight-parking-signs March 19 for street cleaning

Hotel Foster owners plan to open bar in Bay View

Mike Kempa confirmed today that he and his partners, Doug Williams and John Revord applied for a Class B Tavern License for 2151 S. Kinnickinnic Ave., which is currently Gumby’s Pub. Kempa said that they aren’t planning to remodel Gumby’s and that if granted the tavern license, they will take over the business as soon as they are licensed. They have applied for the license as Boone & Crockett, Owl Club, LLC.

Gumby’s opened in late 2010. The building is owned by Scott Reiske and Russell J. Chicks. The current tavern license was issued to Chicks.

Kempa, Williams, and Revord own Hotel Foster at 2028 E. North Avenue, located next to Whole Foods Market.

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