Eating in Madison A to Z

"X" is for XX

There were no restaurants beginning with X on the List, and we only went to two beginning with Y. So for this and the next "reflection" entry, we decided to give each of us our own post. Here's Nichole's.

Food blogging is the path to a career in professional food writing these days. At a 2011 UW Humanities panel-before-talk with Pulitzer prize winner (and our hero for beginning his food career by eating an entire street) Jonathan Gold, someone asked him how to break into the scene. It used to be by establishing a reputation on CHOW or other forums, he said, but now you pretty much have to start a blog.

I think this is true. The expansion of social media and its conflation with business has had a big impact on EiMAtZ since JM and I started journaling together in 2004.

When I used to tell people about the blog, they would ask "Which letter are you on?" or "Who makes the best crab rangoon?" or "What's the worst meal you ever ate?"

Now it's usually "How much money do you make?"

This is disheartening. Not because of the answer (pretty much "none"), nor because I won't talk about money, but because I'd rather talk about food. And yet, it's a smart and relevant question.

In 2009, the FTC cited the rise of blog/ad networks as one reason to revise its guidelines on sponsorships and testimonials, which hadn't changed in decades. Since then, when it comes to getting paid, it seems bloggers have been damned if they do (see the 2010 Milwaukee Press Club-winning article, "The Future of Journalism"), damned if they don't (see the 2011 She Posts GOOD READ-featured essay, "When it’s OK to Work For Free (Really!)").

The truth is, even if I had the talent to write about food for money, I don't have the hustle or the guts (ha!). I think JM has the talent, and he's the most trusting, generous, and brilliant collaborator and generator of good ideas that I've ever met (I might be biased). So when blogging changed, we had to figure out what we wanted to do. The answer for us was to stay amateur.

We decided to take the FTC guidelines very seriously and be as transparent about money as we could. We started posting a list of any freebies we got and gradually took fewer and fewer offers.

Partly to make myself look better, mostly to make myself feel better, and despite it being totally Pharisaical, I also started disclosing our hunger-fighting-related charitable giving. We joined the Electronic Frontier Foundation in case we should ever need legal aid - something we never worried about before bloggers were considered viable targets for lawsuits.

Plus, it just feels all weird now that there are publicly private dinner clubs and pop-ups and PR people PR-ing things and mixing it all up with social media and celebrity/notoriety appeal. The lines between customer, resource, colleague, and friend are blurrier than I can usually make out.

Somewhere in Letter O I looked around at these changes and my own reaction to them and realized the project wasn't as much fun as it used to be. But what was I going to do, quit?

Food writers, whether professional, aspiring, or amateur, rarely talk this openly about these peripherals (at least, I haven't had too many conversations about this stuff - so maybe it's just me). I do wish more food writers would share why they write. I loved reading Marcelle Richards' and Kate Hopkins' essays on that.

I also wish material connections were more transparent, because restaurants are businesses, with business-related interests and yes, politics, and I have this romantic idea that it's a good thing to be an informed consumer and to use my money in accordance with my values.

So what happens next? If we keep posting, we'll probably take down the Google ads because it's hypocritical to have them. If the perfect paid side project landed in our laps, we might go for it. If courteous professionals ask to re-use our stuff, in the future we might ask them to donate to a food bank for us. But the blog itself will stay free.

All that is to say, writing EiMAtZ has not been about money nor launching a writing career. It's about JM and me answering the where-to-eat question with the happy side effects of teaching us about where we live and providing opportunities to meet and eat with all kinds of people. I am here to make friends, or to try, preferably around a real table. So where friendship has truly begun to grow, I want to say thanks for all the presence.

Our grades thus far:

	Nichole	JM
A	328 43%	296 38%
B	310 40%	390 51%
C	113 15%	79 10%
D	16 2%	4 1%
F	2 0%	0 0%

GPA by first letter:

	1st Pass	Cumulative
A	3.11	3.32
B	3.15	3.20
C	3.25	3.22
D	3.20	3.23
E	3.03	3.05
F	3.24	3.26
G	3.21	3.30
H	3.16	3.20
I	3.40	3.38
J	3.13	3.09
K	3.08	3.17
L	3.23	3.24
M	3.32	3.23
N	3.15	3.15
O	3.23	3.20
P	3.09	3.12
Q	3.39	3.39
R	3.19	3.23
S	3.14	3.18
T	3.19	3.17
U	3.03	3.08
V	3.48	3.52
W	3.21	3.21
X	n/a	n/a

Victory

In a word: Of the people.

The specs: #0769  
Address, hours & details via Isthmus; reviews at Yelp; Facebook, official web site,

Latest Victory news and reviews at del.icio.us

JM ate the ham and cheese panino. (#66)
Nichole ate the chorizo empanada with a macchiato (comped).
The bill was $11, or $5ish/person, plus tip.
JM gave Victory an A-; Nichole gave Victory an A (see our grading rubric).

Victory opened in late summer 2010 but didn't appear on the List until October 2011. As it happens, our post-W make-up visit on Thanksgiving weekend was just 11 days after a large rock bearing a political anti-recall note crashed through the Victory's front window.

These are the times we live in.

According to the owner, Patrick, the rock was propelled with such force that it hit the back wall of the cafe. Fortunately it was higher than the heads of the customers sitting in the window, and no one was hurt.

The window was not covered by insurance. While Patrick wasn't planning to ask for donations, a young customer who was in the cafe that night decorated a jar asking for support. It flooded in; meanwhile, they patched up the window with protest posters and the now-iconic blue painter's tape. It was sort of beautiful.

We haven't been back since then because we've been so fixated on getting the list done, but you can bet we would go the distance for Victory.

We had a small lunch. Nichole got a macchiato, which Patrick fixed while they talked about the rock and another worker put together JM's panino. Patrick then comped the macchiato because he was concerned that the conversation overrun the espresso's optimum consumption window. It was still perfect.

The ham and cheese panino was fantastic, with sweet ham, soft, slightly gritty white cheese (gruyere?), spinach, and a honey mustard that had a belated horseradish kick, all on an airy/chewy roll.

Spotting a familiar, whimsical font on the sign for empanadas, Nichole knew she was in luck. Not only was the Honey Bee chorizo empanada with red peppers and a wee bit of potato almost as good as it had been at Bea's Bonnet, it was served with a spoonful of blood-red hot sauce that might have been Sriracha ketchup. Eating it between sips of coffee felt like accomplishing something, somehow.

Looking back now, clearly Victory rose up over those unfortunate circumstances. We hope they continue serving coffee and delicious sandwiches for a long time to come.

UW Union South (Sett)

In a word: Belongs between a match and the game.

The specs: #0768  
Address, hours & details via Isthmus; reviews at Yelp, official web site;

Latest Sett news and reviews at del.icio.us

Bill ate the burger and fries with a fountain drink.
JM ate the nachos and a chicken sandwich with a lemonade.
Jennifer ate the Spicy Cat sandwich with fries.
Nichole ate the chicken sandwich with tortilla chips, salsa and a beer.
Nino ate the Spicy Cat sandwich with onion rings.
Toby ate the Usinger's brat with garlic fries.
The bill was about $12/person, plus tip.
Bill and Toby gave the Sett an A-; Nichole, Nino and JM gave the Sett a B+; Jennifer gave the Sett a B (see our grading rubric).

UW Union South was added to the list as four locations but they all started with "UW Union South" and since they are all serviced and run by the same organization, we considered it a chain. Which was a handy cheat, because despite Union staff's reassurances to the contrary just a week before, the Sett was the only food vendor open on the day after Thanksgiving. Ginger Root, Harvest Grains, Prairie Fire and Urban Slice (not to be confused with Urban Pizza - remember them?) were all closed. Has anyone been? Are they good?

Sadly, our notes were not very clear on who had what so the rest of this post is a little diffuse. Stick around for the art at the end.

The thing about the Sett is that it seems like it's still mostly Sysco supplied. So while the Usinger's brat and onion rings combo was a good one, there's nothing really super about it relative to its environs. The Spicy Cat cajun-spiced catfish sandwiches were passable. The nachos were out-of-the-box nachos, maybe a little sweet and pepper-spicy.

Nothing really stood out apart from Bill's burger. Bill liked his burger a lot. You can trust his opinion. He's a burger expert.

They do have an extensive selection of local microbrews but they're called "imports." Does not compute. Didn't keep us from partaking.

Now for the real problem: it is very loud inside the actual Sett. Like someone screaming at you at all times from wall-to-wall TVs loud. On the other hand, pointed out Nino, it would be a good place to have a one-on-one conversation safe from eavesdropping.

We only found quiet in the Sun Garden by the huge fireplace, and when we took some time to see Time (Im)material, a gallery show in which Toby took part. His installation, Horizon Life, was beautiful and meditative. Also compelling was Susan J White's Gut Lace. Wow. We're glad we got to see it. (Be sure to check out, har, Bookless on January 28, 2012.)

Anyway. We enjoyed the company of those with us far more than we enjoyed the Sett's fare.