Madison Essentials July/August 2022

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vol. 80

publisher Amy S. Johnson ajohnson@madisonessentials.com

editorial director Amy S. Johnson ajohnson@madisonessentials.com

lead designer

INSIDE

july–aug 2022

what’s

essential arts Lisa Binkley.......................................................................... 30

community

Jennifer Denman

senior copy editor & lead staff writer Kyle Jacobson

sales & marketing director Amy S. Johnson ajohnson@madisonessentials.com

Badger Rock Neighborhood Center................................. 10 Ice Age National Scenic Trail—Six Segments................... 18 Jillana Peterson.................................................................. 26

dining Ahan................................................................................... 14

designers

food & beverage

Crea Stellmacher, Linda Walker, Barbara Wilson

Landmark Creamery............................................................ 6

administration Debora Knutson, Olivia Seehafer

contributing writers Chris Gargan, Brenna Marsicek, Melissa Pierick, Anne Sayers, Renata Solon, Kaitlin Svabek

nonprofit Learning Together: Madison Audubon’s Nature Education............................................................ 22

travel Uncovering Wisconsin’s Hidden Gems: Traveling by Fork.............................................................. 34

photographer Eric Tadsen

additional photographs Lisa Binkley, Carolyn Byers, Cameron Gillie, Becky Greiber, Sarah Karlson, Bob Kasper, Arlene Koziol, Nick Lane, Madison Audubon, Makenzie McDermit, Heather McEllistrem, Jillana Peterson, Hedi Rudd, Kaitlin Svabek, Travel Wisconsin, L. Unruh

subscriptions Madison Essentials is available free at

over 200 locations. To purchase an annual subscription (six issues), send mailing information and $24 to Madison Essentials, c/o Towns & Associates, Inc., PO Box 174, Baraboo, WI 53913-0174. Or sign up for a FREE online subscription at madisonessentials.com.

including From the Publisher................................................................ 4 Contest Information........................................................... 38 Contest Winners................................................................. 38

(continued)

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from the

PUBLISHER

As I write this, the amount of pain in our country, our state, and our own backyard seems to have been magnified with every additional act of hate. But listing them doesn’t provide solutions, and it won’t provide healing. Bottom line, each is a lot to deal with, and having them overlap can be overwhelming, making it difficult to address each appropriately and as significantly as needed.

comments

We welcome your questions and comments. Please submit to Madison Essentials, c/o Towns & Associates, Inc., PO Box 174, Baraboo, WI 53913-0174 or email ajohnson@madisonessentials.com.

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What can one person do? First, make sure to take care of yourself—make you a priority. This helps you remain healthy and at your best when taking care of others, working, and participating in your community. And when you’re doing so and expressing your personal beliefs and wishes, please do so with empathy and an openness to understanding the others in it as well. We don’t have to always agree when working together on behalf of our community—no one person or group is completely right or knows the best direction to take. Life is a lesson that leads to learning and growth. I think human interaction where we’re open to the stories of others can be the most impactful. Though we can read books and take classes, listening to human experiences has the potential to expand our own awareness. My challenge to you over the next couple of months is to be vulnerable— allow yourself to meet and really get to know someone new. This may not only be positive for you, but also those around you. How we make it through the toughest times in our collective present and history may be determined by how well we listen and interact.

amy johnson

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all rights reserved. ©2022

No portion of this magazine may be reproduced without prior written permission by Madison Essentials. Towns & Associates, Inc. PO Box 174 Baraboo, WI 53913-0174 P (608) 356-8757 • F (608) 356-8875

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Watch for the next issue

September/October 2022. Cover photograph—Tom Yum with Fried Chicken from Ahan taken by Eric Tadsen Photographs on page 3: left— Green Curry with Tofu from Ahan taken by Eric Tadsen right— Valley View segment of the Ice Age National Scenic Trail taken by Cameron Gillie

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e sse nt i al food & beverage

Landmark Creamery by Kyle Jacobson The world of cheese geeks is more than niche in Wisconsin...barely. For most of us, after cheddar, parmesan, mozzarella, and maybe feta, we can’t see beyond the rind. You could fit everything I know about cheese into a colander, but what I do know is that cheese is usually delicious, which is a good place to start when visiting Landmark Creamery in Belleville. First thing I learned when meeting Landmark Creamery owners Anna Landmark and Anna Thomas Bates is that Wisconsin doesn’t play in the minors when it comes to cheesemaking. Anna Thomas Bates says, “Wisconsin is the only state in the United States that requires cheesemakers to be licensed. It’s a number of classes at the Center for Dairy Research, a 240hour apprenticeship with another cheesemaker, and then an exam. Anna Landmark (certified cheesemaker) was 6 | madison essentials

pursuing that, and I said, ‘Well that’s really cool. What are you going to do next? What’s the plan?’” After chatting and learning that they each had a kid in the same grade, it was only logical that they would go into business together. Anna Thomas Bates had been a “food writer and had some chef connections and had some artisan food experience and farmers’ market stuff. I would do sales and marketing and promotion. And Anna Landmark is cheese, cheesemaking, food safety operation, all of that.” 2014 marked their first full production year. Anna Thomas Bates refers to those early years as nomadic, renting vats at different places, from Clock Shadow Creamery in Milwaukee to some places in Darlington and eventually Cedar Grove Cheese in Plain, Wisconsin. They also needed space to age their

cheeses, all but one made from sheep milk. “Affinage is the French word for aging cheese, and that’s an important step in our process,” says Anna Thomas Bates. “It’s a traditional old-world style


of aging cheese on wooden boards in a humidity- and temperature-controlled room. We had to rent that space, and we had to rent cold storage.” It wasn’t until 2017 that the Annas started renting their Belleville building. After careful consideration, they decided to use the front of the space as a shop where they can also do cheeseboards and grilled cheese

sandwiches. They have their cheeses for sale along with crackers, jams, salami, nuts, and cheeses from other producers. Now before you go to landmarkcreamery .com and “oh my” like Takei at some of the prices, let’s get cheducated. Sheep milk costs at least four to five times more than cow milk, but why? First off, the sheep cheese industry hasn’t evolved in the United States as much as it has in

Europe. Anna Thomas Bates says, “Their production has been going on longer. It’s a more advanced industry. The genetics are better. The yields from the sheep are better.” Anna Landmark adds, “For two or three decades, the United States prohibited importing any new genetics from Europe, and it really set our dairy industry behind. It has to do with different disease and things like that that were spreading.” But we’re not stuck in limbo, as some genetics are having those restrictions removed thanks to the efforts of cheesemakers Jeff Wideman of Maple Leaf Cheese and Mariana Marques de Almeida of Ms. J. and Co., both located in Monroe. Anna Landmark says, “We’ll see a pretty big increase in production and the quality of the dairy sheep here because of that.” Even after the advancements, a sharp eye will notice that a cow is actually larger than a sheep. Now consider that it takes 10 pounds of milk to make a pound of cheese and that a sheep produces roughly 2 quarts of milk daily (15 times less than a cow). It might take less land and food to take care of a sheep, but when you take the above information and couple that with the madisonessentials.com

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Cheese? local?

History? scarcity of sheep farms, at this point in time, sheep cheese is just going to cost more. Aside from getting some great cheeses, investing in sheep cheese comes with a sweet bonus. “I think sheep are a little bit lighter on the land than cows,” says Anna Landmark. “It makes them a little bit more sustainable. And I love the fact that you can renovate an old barn for sheep instead of having to build a big brand-new parlor.” The original plan for this article was to buy some sheep cheeses from Landmark Creamery, take some notes, and share them. I learned two main things from the experiment: I like cheese, and I don’t know anything about describing how cheese tastes. I called the awardwinning Anabasque a martini—what? Their website describes it much better: “Smooth and fruity with a bit of funk, this washed-rind sheep milk cheese is inspired by the mountain cheeses of the Basque region of Spain. Pair with marcona almonds, marmalade, or a farmhouse ale.” The next chapter for Landmark Creamery involves the building once occupied by the old Paoli cheese factory from 1888 to 1980. Since then, “it’s been an art gallery and several other things,” says Anna Thomas Bates. Purchased by Nic Mink and his wife, Danika Laine, the old factory is soon to transform into Seven Acre Dairy, which is going to have “a restaurant, a boutique hotel, a café, and they’re going to make ice cream. So Nic approached us to be their dairy partners. We actually have titles; we’re the chief dairy officers of Seven Acre Dairy. “The story with Seven Acre Dairy is a visitor coming to town will be able to drive past some of the farmers we buy 8 | madison essentials


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Cheese? Check. Local? Check. History? Check. Landmark Creamery is offering the present and future of Wisconsin

Kyle Jacobson

Famous for Steaks

Home of the 20 oz. Bone-in Tenderloin

Photographs by Eric Tadsen.

Photograph by Barbara Wilson

milk from. They’ll be able to look in our window and actually watch us making cheese. And then they can go down to Seven Acre Dairy and enjoy an ice cream cone from milk that passed through our plant or butter that we made right there or cheese that we made right there and then, this is my line, that milk will have traveled less far than the visitor potentially eating it.”

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e sse nt i al community

BADGER ROCK Neighborhood Center by Renata Solan

In 2019, Badger Rock helped to kick off the first official Wisconsin School Garden Day with a visit from Representative Shelia Stubbs.

Jasmine Banks is one of the founding gardeners at the Badger Rock Community Garden.

Rooted evolved in 2020 from the merger of two community-based organizations: Community GroundWorks on Madison’s north side and Center for Resilient Cities, which operated through BRNC to offer community events and programs as well as garden-based education for Badger Rock Middle School (BRMS) students. Badger Rock’s programs have grown and evolved as part of the merged organization while always remaining rooted in community. Now, a new era is beginning for BRNC. In 2020, after years of owning the neighborhood center building and being co-located with BRMS, Rooted sold the building to Madison Metropolitan School District (MMSD). Rooted staff are working to ensure that the neighborhood center, still located at Badger Rock, remains a staple of Madison’s south side and continues to offer community-based programming. 10 | m a d i s o n e s s e n t i a l s

Photograph by Hedi Rudd

Rooted’s Badger Rock Neighborhood Center (BRNC) is all about learning, growing, eating, and gathering with people of all ages. The projects range from monthly dinners and a market featuring local vendors to collaborations with Foundation for Black Women’s Wellness, Wisconsin Alzheimer’s Disease Research Center, and Briarpatch Youth Services. “Our primary job is building relationships,” says Sarah Karlson, Rooted’s education director and farm and education manager at BRNC.


Photograph by Hedi Rudd

“We bring the resources into one accessible place, but the space is really about the community. We might have the tools, but it’s the community that brings the flavor.” Nowhere is this more evident than at the CommUNITY Dinners and Badger Rock Community Markets that Rooted hosts at BRNC. CommUNITY Dinners have historically been offered on the second Friday of the month during the school year. After a brief hiatus due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the dinners returned last summer as an outdoor event with boxed meals. Rooted is again hosting CommUNITY Dinners at Badger Rock this summer and hopes to return to monthly meals during the school year soon. “Over the years, we’ve seen the CommUNITY Dinners grow,” says Hedi. “We worked with the school community to invite students’ families as well as members of the wider community.” The dinners were organized to build relationships among families and community members, with long tables

Photograph by Sarah Karlson

Hedi Rudd, deputy director of south side programming, says, “Because of the close relationship between the middle school and the neighborhood center, we have always been able to create a family-friendly environment. Everyone is welcome at the BRNC, not just middle schoolers and their families.

Badger Rock Community Gardener Venus Washington and her family. to facilitate meeting new people. “Sitting together and having a conversation with each other, that’s how people start to connect with each other.”

how to be independent. … They use food that they grew in [the school’s] garden. They cook things they never imagined, and then they try what they’ve cooked.”

The dinners have also been an opportunity for BRMS students to showcase their culinary skills. Chef Kipp Thomas, Rooted’s culinary arts manager and founder of Kipp’s Kitchen, works with students to prepare dishes that can be offered at CommUNITY Dinners. “The kids learn the fundamentals of the kitchen,” says Kipp. “Safety, sanitation,

CommUNITY Dinners aren’t the only place to find vegetables grown by BRMS students. The Badger Rock Community Market features vegetables grown at Rooted’s Badger Rock educational farm and by gardeners in the community. Vegetables are sold alongside food and goods from local businesses, many of which are owned and run by women and people of color.

Photograph by Hedi Rudd

CommUNITY Dinner at the Badger Rock Neighborhood Center in 2019.

The market is accessible to both vendors and the community thanks to collaborations with the market’s co-founder, Tara Wilhelmi, who is also co-founder of UJAMAA Business Network and founder and CEO of EOTO Culturally Rooted. Through Tara, partnership between UJAMAA Business Network vendors and the market is streamlined and strengthened. “The market is a collaborative space in which community members can be together,” says Renesha Carter, Rooted’s community connector. “I love that we offer sustainably grown fruits and vegetables from the Badger Rock Farm at a low price. We invite community members to come in and sell their products and services, and we offer it as a space for local chefs to sell hot food and expand their businesses.” madisonessentials.com

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Photograph by Hedi Rudd

Badger Rock Middle School students grow, cook with, eat, and sell vegetables from the Badger Rock Urban Farm.

Photograph by Hedi Rudd

Neighborhood kids enjoy a treat at Badger Rock’s CommUNITY Dinner.

Local chefs are invited to use the Badger Rock kitchen to prepare delicious food and feed their community. The kitchen is managed by Thomas, who is also a vendor at the market. “For people who can’t afford their own kitchens or can’t afford to rent, it’s set up in a reasonable manner: you take care of the kitchen, the kitchen is yours.” Showcasing the chefs who represent the food, flavors, and cultures of the community around Badger Rock is core to both CommUNITY Dinners and the market. And, as Hedi explains, the benefit is mutual. “The kitchen vendors have their own following business networks.

We collaborate with them, and their following helps to bring more people to the neighborhood center.” Chefs aren’t the only ones building their careers through the neighborhood center. Rooted offers employment opportunities for high-school-aged youth to work at Badger Rock’s farm and gardens in the summer and sometimes even during the school year. “It’s one of the coolest programs we offer,” says Farm and Education Assistant Manager Mari Verbeten. “Kids who graduated can come back and be a role model for former classmates.” Over the years, Sarah has seen the neighborhood center grow with and around the innovative, hands-on programming that Badger Rock offers students and the community. “Badger Rock is unique because it provides a space for building intergenerational and cross-cultural relationships. Middle school students and community members all come to the CommUNITY Dinners. School families grow in the Badger Rock Community Garden. Some of the people building businesses out of the kitchen also lead workshops with

12 | m a d i s o n e s s e n t i a l s


the community. There are just a lot of people growing, cooking, teaching, and learning in that space all together.” You can get a taste of BRNC on Facebook every week on Sunday and Tuesday through live gardening and cooking events hosted by Rooted staff and community members. Follow Rooted and BRNC on Facebook and visit rootedwi.org to find out about upcoming CommUNITY Dinners, Badger Rock Community Markets, and more. Renata Solan is the communications director at Rooted.

Renata Solan

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e sse nt i al dining Red Curry Udon with Tofu

Nam Khao Salas

AHAN by Kyle Jacobson In August 2020, only seven months after the first laboratory-confirmed case of COVID-19 was recorded in the United States, opening a new restaurant probably wouldn’t have been advisable. But Jamie Hoang and Chuckie Brown didn’t see it that way when they opened Ahan in The Bur Oak. Though there would be difficulties, where some other restaurants were having to figure out how they would transition away from dine in, Chuckie says, “It was nice, in a way, because we 14 | m a d i s o n e s s e n t i a l s


“I think what we bring to the table is the next generation of Southeast Asian food.” didn’t have to flip our whole concept. We started out just doing takeout. Then, shortly after that, delivery. And then later, dine in.” The drive to go for it really came from Jamie. “I had a hard goal of having a restaurant by the time I was 30,” she says. So pandemic or no, it was happening. She already knew how to run a kitchen from working with Chef Tory Miller of L’Etoile, and after working for 10 years in Madison’s service industry, “I just know a lot of people in the industry and have a pretty good customer base and got to know a lot of guests over the years. “I just wanted to use my cooking background and combine that with my culture to express myself the best I can. ... I think what we bring to the table is the next generation of Southeast Asian food. Not just do I bring traditional recipes

from my mom (a Laotian refugee), but I bring a little bit more creativity, some farm-to-table things, working with different community members. We work with Vitruvian Farms, Garden To Be, Enos, Roots Down, Vindicator Beef, breaking the mold that everything has to be a certain way just because it always has been.” One brainchild of Jamie’s is the Red Curry Udon. “That’s just a dish that I made up, and it became really popular. I think it’s just really delicious, and we’re able to switch out certain ingredients seasonally.” It’s certainly my favorite. Having the thicker udon noodle creates a burst of flavor when biting into it that just fills your mouth. The heat is there a little bit, lingering just enough to be noticed. Then there was the squash, which added just enough sweetness to bring out the heat in a meaningful way. If you’re new to Southeast Asian cuisine,

this is a very approachable entry point. Another key to the success of Ahan has been the community support. Regulars all over love their location, just off East Wash by UW Health Union Corners Clinic, and Jamie and Chuckie can deliver to parts of town that might not otherwise have access to Southeast Asian foods. “We love it here,” says Jamie. “A lot of our neighbors are amazing.” With the summer in full swing, Ahan also has some great ways to stay cool, including their new soft-serve ice cream. For drinks, the Thai Iced Tea is almost too good—one glass might not be enough. Then there’s the Chanh ớ or salted Vietnamese limeade. “It’s Muôi, gonna be fermented lime,” says Chuckie. “You take limes, slice them up a little bit, put salt in them, put them in brine, put them in the sun for a couple weeks

Summer Roll

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Tom Yum with Fried Chicken in a jar.” He describes it as a Gatorade or alcohol-free margarita. Something between those two things. As for what to snack on, Chuckie is allin on the Laab. Chewy Vindicator beef in rich herbs and spices so much so that they have a light and earthy texture that’s quite peppery. The meat itself melts on the tongue into a bouquet of flavor, and the cilantro gives an overall plant quality that serves to further accentuate the meat. “It’s like a cold beef finger-food salad,” says Chuckie. Part of the evolution of the food served up at Ahan is recognizing the popularity of veganism. “I think plant-based diets are a huge trend right now,” says Jamie. “It’s also very important for many things: the environment, health. I think we’re just trying to help people out that are trying to follow those diets.” Their online menu indicates a collection of entrees, an appetizer, and a soup that can be modified for a vegan diet. They’re also able to meet health-related dietary restrictions (also indicated on the menu). My only regret is I didn’t try one of Ahan’s customer favorites: the summer roll. In my defense, the violas, provided by Garden To Be, weren’t in yet. Apparently, that’s the cat’s pajamas. I don’t know why I said that, but it sounded good in my head. I’ll just edit that before this goes to print. Anyway, it’s dope... Baby romaine from Black Earth Valley Produce, the aforementioned violas (Vitruvian microgreens when the flowers run out), radishes from Blue Skies Farm, cucumber, carrot, bean sprouts, cilantro, mint, scallion, and peanuts all wrapped in rice paper with some of that sweet, ớ ưướ châm sour, salty, savory, spicy nuoc for dipping. There’s something special happening at Ahan, and the immediate future seems to indicate that it’s only going to get better. Our collective understanding of Covid has grown, and many of us have taken efforts to respect the health of one another. Their Bur Oak location will hopefully be hopping more than any other year Jamie and Chuckie have been there, as old and new local celebrities 16 | m a d i s o n e s s e n t i a l s


perform music, stand-up, and so much more on stage. Guess I’ll have to go back soon for a show and some summer rolls. Kyle Jacobson is lead writer and senior copy editor for Madison Essentials.

Kyle Jacobson

Photograph by Barbara Wilson

Photographs by Eric Tadsen.

AHAN

2262 Winnebago Street Madison, WI 53704 (608) 867-4001 ahanmadison.com

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McFarland Urgent Care Clinic 5614 US HWY 51 | (608) 838-8242

Oregon Urgent Care Clinic

990 Janesville Street | (608) 835-5373

Stoughton Hospital Urgent Care 900 Ridge Street | (608) 873-6611

Virtual Visits at stoughtonhealth.com

Consult a Stoughton Health provider online about minor illnesses and injuries.

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e sse nt i al community

Brooklyn Wildlife Segment

ICE AGE National Scenic Trail

by Melissa Pierick

Six Segments

The Ice Age National Scenic Trail courses 1,200 miles throughout Wisconsin, roughly following the path where the last glacier ended. Along the way, it takes hikers, backpackers, trail runners, and walkers through some of the most scenic areas in the state, including spots right here in Dane County.

Brooklyn Wildlife Segment

East of Belleville in the Brooklyn State Wildlife Area. Trailhead and parking lots on Highway DD and Hughes Road. This pleasant 3.3-mile hike offers a little bit of everything: woodlands (including a small pine grove), prairie, marsh overlooks, and a nice boardwalk. It’s a great place for 18 | m a d i s o n e s s e n t i a l s

birdwatching. In fact, don’t be surprised if a pheasant crosses your path.

University Ridge Portion of Madison Segment

Parking available at Noer Turfgrass Research Center on Highway M or off-road parking on Woods Road. Did you know a National Scenic Trail runs directly through University Ridge Golf Course? For two miles, the Ice Age Trail takes you through wooded areas of the course. During late spring and early summer, wild geraniums are in full bloom and blanket the woods, making it magical. Except for when you pass by a cart path and the clubhouse, you’ll barely notice you’re on the golf course. It’s a lovely hike any time of day,


Madison Segment (University Ridge)

particularly right before sunset. Be mindful and quiet if you’re out when golfers are playing.

Valley View Segment

Madison. Parking at trailhead on Moraine Ridge Road and lot on Timber Lane. An absolutely stunning segment to hike during late summer or early fall when wildflowers are in bloom, this 2.6mile portion of the segment takes you through a restored open prairie from which you can see the Blue Mounds on a clear day and a residential area featuring prairie-style homes. Your feet will stay dry and out of the mud thanks to an impressive 400-foot boardwalk, completed by volunteers last year.

Photograph by Bob Kasper

Just outside of Cross Plains. Parking lots at trailheads on Scheele Road and Table Bluff Road. This 2.4-mile portion of the Ice Age Trail is a true jewel of the trail and a prime example of ecological restoration. What was once agricultural land plotted for development is now a beautifully restored prairie, marsh, and oak/ hickory woodland. At the right time of year, you’ll encounter rare purple coneflower, shooting stars, hoary vervain, prairie smoke, cream gentian, and cream baptisia. Depending on

Valley View Segment

Photograph by Becky Greiber

Table Bluff Portion of Table Bluff Segment

where you start your hike, it’ll either end or begin with dramatic views from atop the bluff area. For more amazing prairie, head to over to the short 1.1-mile

lollipop loop portion of the segment, which takes you through the Liebetrau Prairie (parking off Pine Road). During the summer, you’ll experience an everchanging explosion of prairie flowers, like monarda, coneflowers, coreopsis, and more. It’s something to see.

Photograph by Heather McEllistrem

Lodi Marsh Segment

South of Lodi. Parking at trailhead on Lodi Springfield Road. Lodi Marsh is one of the more popular segments of the Ice Age Trail in the county. As you hike this 1.8-mile portion, you’ll understand why. It winds you through glacially sculpted landscapes, along the edge of a marsh, through lowland prairie, and over limestone bedrock ridges and drumlins. A spring 2022 boardwalk building project means hikers can now enjoy the marsh’s flora and fauna without traversing through mud and muck. As you hike, be sure to watch and see if you can spot the beaver madisonessentials.com

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Once you’ve hiked one or more of these segments, there’s a high likelihood you’ll want to hike the entire trail.

Table Bluff Segment

Photograph by Nick Lane

dam or any variety of waterfowl. Expand your hike and follow the Ice Age Trail across Lodi Springfield Road for an additional 3.1 miles toward the Ice Age Trail Community of Lodi. Make it a day—hike through Lodi on the trail (another 2.2 miles) and stop for a snack or drink.

Prairie Moraine Portion of Verona Segment

Lodi Marsh Segment

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Located southwest of the Ice Age Trail Community of Verona. Parking at the trailheads on Wesner Road or Highway M. Of all the places in Dane County to imagine glacial history, the trailhead at Wesner Road is the place to do it. That’s because the ridge you see just yards north from the parking lot is the terminal moraine, where the last glacier ended. To get an idea of how thick the glacier was, glance at the 911 tower you see protruding into the sky to the east. The ice reached about the same height as the top of the tower. With this in mind, begin your 1.7-mile trek. You’ll pass through prairie and oak woodlands, which include an oak that’s nearly 400 years old. After you cross Highway PB, you’ll pass several kettle ponds in the Ice Age Trail Alliance’s Moraine Kettles Preserve. Stop at the trailhead on Highway M or continue the trail through the Ice Age Trail Community of Verona for a 6.4-mile hike, which ultimately takes you to the trailhead at McKee Road.


Once you’ve hiked one or more of these segments, there’s a high likelihood you’ll want to hike the entire trail. For an interactive map of the entire Ice Age Trail, visit iceagetrail.org. While there, check out itineraries created to help plan your hiking trips. As you hike the Ice Age Trail, remember it’s created, supported, and maintained by volunteers. To get involved in trail building or trail maintenance projects, visit iceagetrail.org/volunteer.

Photograph by L. Unruh

Melissa Pierick is the director of marketing and community relations at Ice Age Trail Alliance.

Photograph by Makenzie McDermit

Melissa Pierick

Prairie Moraine Portion of Verona Segment madisonessentials.com

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LEARNING TOGETHER

by Kaitlin Svabek and Brenna Marsicek Did you know that blue jays can mimic the sounds of other birds, including red-tailed hawks? Or that queens are the only bumblebees that live through the winter? Or that the roots of a prairie plant can be 40 feet deep? Nature has always been an important source of inspiration and learning for humankind, from inventors and scientists to poets and writers. A key part of Madison Audubon’s mission is to get people of all ages outside, engaged, and curious about the amazing world around us because when we care about something, we tend to care for it.

Explore, Enjoy, and Discover Madison Audubon partners with local schools and community centers for 22 | m a d i s o n e s s e n t i a l s

Madison Audubon’s Nature Education

nature-based education programs that connect kids from all backgrounds to the natural world in their own communities. Our educators might be outside with students on a scavenger hunt, dodging imaginary dangers on a bird-migration-themed obstacle course, or tromping through mud to identify bugs and animal tracks. Many of our lesson plans are available to teachers and classrooms for free on our website at madisonaudubon.org/free-lessons. Our education team is constantly coming up with new ideas for games and programs. For older students, our Conservation Academy, done in partnership with Operation Fresh Start, seeks to inspire young folks and help them acquire the skills needed to take part in conservation

work. These career-oriented sessions, supported by generous grants from the Alliant Energy Foundation, the Evjue Foundation, and the Friends of MacKenzie Education Center, might involve local conservation leaders discussing topics as wide-ranging as urban canid tracking or electrofishing. In addition to working with students and young adults, Madison Audubon is involved in creating opportunities for all members of the community to learn and grow. Beyond classes about birding and learning how to identify birds, you can find classes on art and drawing, photography, and crafting collision-prevention curtains for windows. New this fall, we’re offering a class called All About Hummingbirds,

Photograph by Carolyn Byers/Madison Audubon

e sse nt i al nonprofit

Students use binoculars to explore the natural world in one of Madison Audubon’s education programs from 2018.


where participants will learn about these beautiful birds and even how to attract them by providing robust hummingbird habitat.

Photograph by Kaitlin Svabek/Madison Audubon

For a quick burst of information in a friendly format, pop in for one of our Evenings with Audubon, a free series open to the public. These one-hour talks feature fascinating speakers with unique perspectives on nature and the environment, from birders, researchers, writers, and scientists to artists and even game designers.

Collaborating to Further Conservation Science For folks who want to deeply experience the world around them, one of the best ways to get involved is to become citizen scientists. Madison Audubon trains community volunteers to participate in a variety of research programs that have local, national, and even global significance. Imagine watching the entire process of a pair of bald eagles raising young: from nest construction to egg laying to feeding chicks to the youngsters eventually flying from the nest. Volunteers in our Bald Eagle Nest Watch

Becky Abel, Madison Audubon’s director of philanthropy, holds an American kestrel chick during bird banding. document nest activity at over 100 eagle nests in 26 Wisconsin counties to help the Wisconsin DNR better understand what the eagle population is like in our state. If eaglets mature and fledge from the nest, the volunteers track how

many. If the nest fails, the volunteers hypothesize why. The Kestrel Nest Box Monitoring Program focuses on supporting the nesting needs of American kestrels,

Photograph by Carolyn Byers/Madison Audubon

On an educational field trip, families use nets to find wonderful water critters and bugs in the ecosystem.

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Photograph by Arlene Koziol

North America’s smallest (and perhaps most fabulous) falcon. Volunteers visit nest boxes regularly in the spring to document if there are kestrels nesting, how many, and get involved in banding the birds later in the summer to study their migration and nest fidelity. The fuzzy white kestrel chicks are a hoot to watch. On the other end of the circle of life, our Bird Collision Corps volunteers survey buildings in the Madison area to document if, when, and where birds fatally collide with windows. It’s an intense but meaningful project aiming to find solutions to this problem, which kills up to a billion birds each year in the United States.

During a citizen science butterfly count, a volunteer holds two gorgeous eastern black swallowtail butterflies.

Tune In. Stay Connected.

If you like learning through getting your hands dirty, the volunteer opportunities at our sanctuaries offer an incredible experience. Your task may be to plant wild strawberries, but you’ll also learn the context for how and why—this native plant provides pollen and fruit for wildlife, ground cover for plants, and was once so abundant that horses’

award-winning music and news programming compelling interviews local music focus LISTENER-SPONSORED COMMUNITY RADIO 89.9 FM MADISON WORTFM.ORG WORT FM app Facebook: @WORTFM Twitter: @WORTnews Instagram: @wortfm

KEEPING YOU CONNECTED

24 | m a d i s o n e s s e n t i a l s


hooves and wagon wheels were stained red. You may help study the success rate of these plants and wonder what that northern harrier overhead is hunting. You could also sign up to count butterflies, identify dragonflies, or collect seeds of native plants. Anyone interested in how to get started with birding is always welcome to join Madison Audubon’s upcoming field trips or get outside with a local club, like the BIPOC Birding Club of Wisconsin or Feminist Bird Club’s Madison Chapter.

More than pet supplies

In the next issue, we’ll share more ways for everyone to get outside and enjoy the natural world together. Until then, happy learning! Kaitlin Svabek and Brenna Marsicek make up the Madison Audubon communications team. Connect with them at info@madisonaudubon.org and follow @madisonaudubon. For a full calendar and educational opportunities, visit madisonaudubon.org/events.

Furniture and more!

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Kaitlin Svabek

Brenna Marsicek

SOURCES CONSULTED:

madisonaudubon.org/nature-education madisonaudubon.org/community-education madisonaudubon.org/classrooms madisonaudubon.org/citizen-science madisonaudubon.org/volunteer madisonessentials.com

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e sse nt i al community

Working with ts Maydm studen

JILLANA PETERSON

We all use extrapolation in our lives. It’s a large part of our decision-making process—taking past information and projecting it to make predictions. Ruthless extrapolation, however, describes information extrapolated beyond its context. One example Professor Tom Murphy of University of California, San Diego provides is people in the ’60s believing we’d be on Mars by 2020 simply because of the rate technology was growing at the time. He also notes that the way many people use of the phrase “common sense” is synonymous with ruthless extrapolation. Now let’s apply the concept to our biases. Think about someone you consider kind and intelligent who just happens to belong to a group you disagree with (Democrats, Republicans, anti-vax, pro-choice, etc.). Do you see them as a reason to reassess your understanding of the individuals in that group, or do you instead choose to view them as the exception? 26 | m a d i s o n e s s e n t i a l s

At the Food Pantry Gardens

by Kyle Jacobson

All this to bring up the very thoughtful Jillana Peterson. Jill grew up in northern Wisconsin between Eau Clair and Minneapolis. “I didn’t necessarily see eye to eye with everybody,” she says. “But I really loved this whole spectrum of opinion—political, religious. I also come from a household where my mother’s a Jehovah’s Witness and my dad’s a Lutheran. Always in my life seeing how people with very different philosophies or beliefs coexist and get along.” Like many kids growing up in the ’90s, Jill had the dream of moving out to Seattle to be at the heart of the grunge scene, but that changed when, in 2005, she had the opportunity to be the first member of her family to go to college, the University of Wisconsin–Madison, to be specific. When she first arrived in Madison, she says, “I was like a kid in a candy shop talking to people on the streets. I made friends everywhere I went because I was so excited to be surrounded by people.”

At the River Food Pantr y

Being around a much larger number of people meant being exposed to a lot of different ideas and worldviews. “I grew up my whole life with people just demonizing Madison and Milwaukee.” In terms of ruthless extrapolation, there were people in those numbers who probably didn’t know many others from Milwaukee and Madison. On the other side of the coin, while at university, “I was always feeling like I had to defend everything outside of Madison to people who would make these comments. ‘No one’s educated.’ ‘No one cares about things.’ I’m just like, this is my family you’re talking about. These are my neighbors. Even if they have different politics, they’re not bad people.” Not without her own views, living between two very predominate Wisconsin perspectives exposed Jill to a wide range of individuals. Effective communication was not only vital to maintaining the relationships


Jill landed a job at the university after she graduated in 2010 with a Bachelor of Arts in international studies and Scandinavian studies, one year before Scott Walker signed Act 10 into law. The effect of Act 10 was detrimental to Jill’s plan to retire with the state. She remembers seeing her work benefits disappear, forcing her to ask some pretty tough questions about whether to stick it out or change lanes. As for the state of the state, the polarization is ongoing. Fun Fact: in 2005, Jill had to defer her enrollment to college when diagnosed with a rare cancer after struggling for years to get doctors to believe her pain. Okay, maybe not a fun fact, but fact with a happy ending as, after three years, she finally received the lifesaving chemo, surgery, and radiation she needed. It’s probably the most important lesson she’d received in learning to be an advocate for herself, showcasing that we’re not as far removed from Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s “The Yellow Wallpaper” as we might hope. Jill tells those she works with and mentors to “be an advocate for yourself in any way that you possibly can. Especially women. People tend to be, ‘Oh, you’re hysterical.’ How do you

get around these issues? Keep seeking second opinions until you find someone who hears what you’re saying.” Tying it all together, Jill was derailed from her career, but she’s not the sort to wait around until someone gives her direction. A Silicon Valley tech startup, Zendesk (zendesk.com), caught her attention, and though she had her reservations, she went for it. “It’s a career I never saw myself having, and that really set a tone for a lot of my giving back. ... [A career in tech] is a good job. It’s a way to impact other people on a larger scale, and you’ll be able to use it wherever you go.” That’s where a lot of Jill’s focus has been lately. Helping others learn self-advocacy isn’t just about making sure you’re being heard; it’s about adaptability. In the tech world, things change so fast. “Kids will ask, ‘What coding language is the best to learn?’ If I tell you one to learn now, it’ll already be out of date much faster than if you’d asked that questions in the ’90s.” And what is communication, whether to a machine or person, if not one of the most sophisticated models of adaptability. Where computer code is oftentimes a very precise communication, the daily interactions we have with humans function more fluidly with the potential for dramatic redirection or abrupt endings. Being on the advisory board for the Information Technology Academy, a

Painting with Housing Initiatives

large piece of Jill’s heart lies in her work with young students to find and develop their own voices, and she sees tech as something many people don’t realize can help them do so, especially women and communities of color. From falling through the trailer floor of her house at a young age in rural Wisconsin to attending UW–Madison, working with entrepreneurs and nonprofits, and finding tech to be a viable career for herself, Jill has exposed herself to an abundance of people and lifestyles. It might be difficult to determine just where in our lives we use ruthless extrapolation, but to minimize it, perhaps we can take Jill’s advice and ask ourselves “Where do we find our shared humanity? And then build from there.” Kyle Jacobson is lead writer and senior copy editor for Madison Essentials. Photographs provided by Jillana Peterson.

Kyle Jacobson

madisonessentials.com

Photograph by Barbara Wilson

she’d established at university and at home, but taught her to start from a position of respect, rather than malice, for individuals who didn’t share her opinions.

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e sse nt i al arts

Lisa

BINKLEY by Chris Gargan

“Those who contemplate the beauty of the earth find reserves of strength that will endure as long as life lasts. There is something infinitely healing in the repeated refrains of nature—the assurance that dawn comes after night, and spring after winter.” Rachel Carson, Silent Spring Lisa Binkley’s route to her current art practice has taken a circuitous path not unlike that of the intricate stitching that so characterizes her imaginative and painstakingly detailed efforts in quilting and needled beadwork. While studying fiber arts at the University of Wisconsin–Madison, she entertained the idea of making large-scale weavings and rugs. This intention was deflected by marriage and subsequent sojourn to Milwaukee, where a series of less than 30 | m a d i s o n e s s e n t i a l s

satisfactory jobs led her to graduate school in urban planning and land use policy at UW–Milwaukee. Lisa worked for over a decade for the Department of Transportation (DOT) helping craft public policy for the creation of regional transportation authorities as well as involvement with efforts at historical preservation policy.


Attending a seminar on identifying and categorizing priorities, ironically at the behest of her employer, Lisa realized that her penchant and urgency to find a more creative outlet for her energies led to her decision to leave her DOT career and engage with her art on a full-time basis. A friend introduced her to the field of quilt design, putting her on the path toward national recognition as a bead worker, fabric printer, quilter, and much sought-after teacher and workshop director. Lisa now travels about one week a month across the country demonstrating her techniques, inspiring like-minded artists, and expanding the fabric arts community. Lisa begins her description of her work with an insistence that she avoids any unnecessary distinctions between art and craft. She maintains that much of her impetus for her expression comes from the manufacturing of her pieces—by engaging with the physical process of her work: the feel, the sight, the sound, the very material presence. She often feels more kinship with a woodworker in the primacy of the sensory experience. None of this, of course, denies the discipline of design and decision-making, but rather that in her taxonomy of creative concerns, idea/material/and image, it’s the nature of her materials that will always drive the final creative decisions. Good natured and untidy, Lisa’s work falls roughly into two arenas: delicately and intricately figural beadwork (often depicting fantastically imagined forces of air, water, and energy) and botanical dyeing (a more recent development in her art which depends on a process called mordanting, in which leaves and flowers are wrapped onto woolen or silken fabrics and rolled around copper pipes and steamed in order to release the tannins, which produce the soft, muted, and often surprising color transfers that become the images in her larger quilt works). Not only are the scales involved in these diverse works striking, but also the dramatic change in color palette. While the colors in the beadwork are already present in the raw material, the transfer pieces are often more subtle and surprising than their parent material. The color of the transfers is frequently quite different from the naturally apparent color of the sourced leaf or flower. Lisa’s beadwork has the longer history, combining materials sourced from around the world, especially Japan and the Czech Republic. The textures are often a contrast of hard and soft, shiny and mat, accompanied by densely worked stitching. As she explains, “Handwork is good for your brain. That’s a lot of therapy.” The scale is often dictated by discarded cigar boxes that she collected from her father and uses as frames, and begun with a fabric that begins to suggest the image.

“Art is not what you see,

A number of these works feature anthropomorphic or zoomorphic elements, as in the work Archipelago, in which small polychromed turtles swim in a sea made of concentric and intersecting waves of turquoise, cerulean, and cobalt accented with complementary beads of orange and yellow. The square of beaded waves is set into a larger quilt that has been delicately gridded over a subtle fabric suggesting passing clouds.

Edgar Degas

Going In is a playful narrative of a rainbow turtle carrying upon its back a seascape with a bright sky and popcorn-shaped clouds. The turtle sets

but what you make others see.”

madisonessentials.com

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Lisa has taken the often overlooked tools of needle, thread, buttons, beads, and fabric

and, using the skills passed on by generations of women, created works of lasting and compelling beauty. forth into a bejeweled pond of subdued violets and floating golden leaves. Just as the turtle carries a landscape with him, a different treatment of land and sky is

explored in Fruition, a small vertically oriented design that settles a quiescent head of a Buddha into a gentle earthtoned soil and from which springs

Tadsen Photography Drone/Aerial Imagery

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emergent flowers of startling complexity and geometric invention. A revealing and very personal work entitled On the path each day I realize the journey is my only home suggests a karesansui garden, or dry landscape of raked sand, intended primarily for contemplation rather than meditation. Lisa has created islands of pearlescent orbs and black monoliths that float upon the surrounding beadwork raked into interacting ripple-like rings that resonate the contours of the interposed forms. In 2019, Lisa began to explore botanical dyeing as a precursor to making larger quilted and stitched tapestry-like hangings—from small picture-sized objects up to wall size (70 by 100 inches), such as her current effort, Forest Clearing. The larger works are composed of multiple smaller, disparately sized dyed fabric pieces with mysterious, ethereal, almost fragile images that seem to fade into and out of focus. Joined together like carefully tended fields seen from the air, these quilts are accented and abetted by tiny arabesques of stitching set against the evanescent traces of botanical diversity. Unlike the centripetal and centrifugal forces at work in the beaded images, these pieces seem to possess a more organic quality of growth, neither


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Lisa’s work remains playful, pensive, mysterious, and enduring. She has taken the often overlooked tools of needle, thread, buttons, beads, and fabric and, using the skills passed on by generations of women, created works of lasting and compelling beauty. Chris Gargan is a landscape artist and freelance writer working from his farm southwest of Verona. You can find his work at Abel Contemporary Gallery in Stoughton. He’s seen here with his dog Tycho Brahe.

Chris Gargan

Photograph by Larassa Kabel

Photographs provided by Lisa Binkley.

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e sse nt i al travel

UNCOVERING WISCONSIN’S HIDDEN GEMS

Traveling by

For k

by Anne Sayers

No matter your reason for travel—adventure, relaxation, culture, or entertainment—the good news is that you always have to eat! Personally, culinary travel is a top motivator for booking a trip. If traveling by fork through Wisconsin has you thinking beer and cheese, you’re not wrong. But you’re also not all the way right. Certainly, we’re known as America’s Dairyland for a reason, and we’re recognized worldwide as a leader in brewing. But our proud agricultural heritage means there’s a lot more to Wisconsin’s food and drink story. In fact, Wisconsin was doing farm-to-table long before its rise as a mainstream culinary trend. For Wisconsinites, farm-to-table isn’t even a trend. We just call it eating. So this summer, grab your crew, pack an appetite, and make some memories savoring Wisconsin’s fresh spin on food, drink, and dining experiences.

PIZZA FARMS

For a unique Wisconsin farm-to-table meal, visit one the state’s beautiful and immersive pizza farms. What’s a pizza farm, you ask? There are several Wisconsin farms where you can enjoy pizza made with local and fresh ingredients grown right on the 34 | m a d i s o n e s s e n t i a l s


farm. If it tastes like the ingredients were picked earlier that day, it’s because they probably were. Don’t miss Suncrest Gardens Pizza Farm in Cochrane, nestled amidst the rolling hills of western Wisconsin. Enjoy their scrumptious Italian wood-fired pizzas inside the rustic barn or picnic style next to the blooming gardens. Stroll around the farm and visit the farm animals in their pastoral settings or pick a bouquet of flowers from the u-pick flower garden. After dinner, grab a s’mores kit and enjoy dessert by the fire or grab a local beer or wine and groove to the live music in this truly unique atmosphere. You can even stay at the farmhouse for the weekend to keep the fun going! Other great spots to check out include Stoney Acres Farms in Athens, where you can also pick up some fresh produce and artisan cheese on your way out, and The Stone Barn in Nelson has scrumptious ice cream to top off your meal.

SUPPER CLUBS

You probably already have your favorite local supper club, but don’t miss a chance to discover another classic Wisconsin staple as you travel throughout the state. If you haven’t visited the iconic Ishnala Supper Club in Lake Delton yet, put it on your bucket list now. Located in the middle of beautiful Mirror Lake State Park, a long winding road takes you through hundreds of acres of meadow and forest, where you’ll find the restaurant perched above the shore of tranquil

Mirror Lake. They’re known for their vast menu, picturesque dining room, and for making a mean old-fashioned. In fact, in 2021, Ishnala broke its record for old-fashioneds sold, pouring a total of 93,738 delicious drinks—that averages out to 455 old-fashioneds per day! This record nearly doubled its previous record, set in 2019. Another option known for its award-winning flavors, exceptional ingredients, and spectacular scenery is The Red Cabin at Green Acres Bar & Supper Club in Fond du Lac. Make sure to save room for dessert, as rumor has it that they make the best bread pudding in all of Wisconsin. Don’t take my word for it; check it out for yourself. One more supper club with a can’t miss view is Sunset Bay Supper Club in Phillips. Grab a table inside or on the outdoor patio and witness the beautiful setting sun over Solberg Lake while enjoying traditional Wisconsin supper club fare. madisonessentials.com

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FESTIVALS

Wisconsin’s spirited nature shines through at our many events and festivals, and we truly do have a festival for nearly any theme. I look forward to the Wisconsin State Fair in West Allis every year, and you can’t attend the Wisconsin State Fair without partaking in one of the most iconic Wisconsin traditions: sinking your teeth into a fresh baked cream puff!

Cream puffs are an absolute must, but there’s a lot more state fair fare to enjoy with around 200 concession stands serving more than 800 different food and drink items. Gooey, deep fried, on a stick, or otherwise, there’s always something new to discover. Mark your calendars for August 4 through 14. Looking for something a little more unique? Join herds of festivalgoers for a tradition more than 50 years strong, Beef-a-Rama, which takes place the last

Saturday in September in Minocqua. You guessed it, there’s a beef eating contest and a roasting competition along with live music, games, and more. Cow costumes are optional (but encouraged). And don’t miss a chance to celebrate Wisconsin’s state fruit at Warrens Cranberry Festival the last full weekend in September. Wisconsin produces more cranberries than any other state in the nation as well as more than half of the entire world’s supply, so we know a thing or two about how to enjoy the bouncing berry. Dig right into the action and enter the cranberry-chiffon-pieeating contest or slowly taste your way through the more than 100 food booths, where you can enjoy a wide range of cranberry-inspired treats, including cranberry kettle corn and deep-fried cranberries on a stick. Grab a cup of cranberry coffee to keep you fueled while you explore more than three miles of shopping at the festival, including farmers’ market booths, a flea market, and handmade arts and crafts. This is just a small taste of what Wisconsin’s culinary scene has to offer. Whether you’re looking for something quirky and casual or fine dining inspired by Wisconsin’s locally grown ingredients prepared by awardwinning chefs, you’re bound to discover

36 | m a d i s o n e s s e n t i a l s


Photo by Kevin Sink

something delicious no matter where your travels take you throughout the state. Here’s to getting to know a place one bite at a time and sharing it with those who mean the most to you. For more ideas to travel Wisconsin by fork, visit travelwisconsin.com. Anne Sayers is the secretary-designee at Wisconsin Department of Tourism. Photographs provided by Travel Wisconsin.

Anne Sayers

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advertiser

INDEX

association

entertainment & media

Dane Buy Local................................... 17

Agora Art Fair......................................40

Dane County Humane Society..............................39

Fitchburg Center Farmers Market....40

Green Lake Chamber of Commerce................................. 21

CONTEST Win a $50

Olbrich Botanical Gardens............... 37 Our Lives Magazine............................ 37 WORT-FM..............................................24

dining, food & beverage Chocolate Shoppe Ice Cream........ 17

services

Clasen’s European Bakery................ 13

Coyle Carpet One...............................2

The Deliciouser.................................... 21

Four Lakes Veterinary Clinic................8

Fraboni’s Italian Specialties & Delicatessen.............33

Monroe Street Framing...................... 13

Lombardino’s........................................5 Nitty Gritty.............................................9 The Old Feed Mill Restaurant............ 27

The Petinary.........................................25 Stoughton Health............................... 17 Tadsen Photography..........................32

Old Sugar Distillery.............................28 Otto’s Restaurant & Bar.....................20 Paoli Schoolhouse American Bistro..................................5 Pedro’s..................................................25

shopping Abel Contemporary Gallery.............33 Anthology............................................28

Porta Bella Italian Restaurant........... 13

Dane County Humane Society Thrift Shop...........................25

Sugar River Pizza Company.............. 37

Deconstruction Inc............................. 12

Teddywedgers....................................33 Telsaan Tea..........................................28

Gift Card! Question: “Which U.S. state is the only one to require its cheesemakers be licensed?” Enter by submitting your answer to the above question online at madisonessentials.com or by mail with your name, mailing address, phone number, and email to: Madison Essentials c/o Towns & Associates, Inc. PO Box 174 Baraboo, WI 53913-0174 All entries with the correct answer will be entered into a drawing. Contest deadline is July 31, 2022.

Goodman’s Jewelers......................... 17 Little Luxuries.......................................28

Good Luck!

Tempest..................................................9 Tornado Steak House...........................9 The Village Green............................... 21 Vintage Brewing Co. ...........................5

Please support our sponsors!

Winners Thank you to everyone who entered our previous contest. The answer to the question “Which local chef is the Mango Man?” is Chef Thony Clarke of Café Costa Rica. A CityTins was sent to our winner, Diane Kratochvil of Fitchburg, WI.

CONGRATULATIONS! 38 | m a d i s o n e s s e n t i a l s


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