The House Cafe and Bakery
The House Bakery Cafe and Bakery opened in the former Cow & Quince space in New Glarus.
A while back I wrote about how Lori Stern of Cow & Quince in New Glarus was trying to sell the business and the building, never having quite intended to open a restaurant in the first place. (Cow & Quince began as a “local market with light fare” that just kept expanding.)
I would have sworn that I wrote that article about three years ago (more?) at this point, but it was actually published on Jan. 23, 2020, right before everything hit the fan. Okay, so it was not a great time to be trying to sell a restaurant.
“It has been quite a year and a half!” Stern reports via email. “A friend and former employee has opened a restaurant in the space, and has plans to purchase the building.” As for Stern, she’s returned to policy making on the issues surrounding eating local and organic that brought her to open Cow & Quince in the first place; she’s now executive director at Midwest Organic and Sustainable Education Service.
The new restaurant is called The House Cafe and Bakery and it is continuing many of the philosophies that guided Cow & Quince: fresh, local, quality ingredients. “Think of us as a very eclectic small-town vegetarian Whole Foods,” The House’s website explains.
“It’s been very well received,” owner Kaylee Walters tells Isthmus. “Opening any food business is hard. Opening a food business in a rural area is harder. Vegetarian during a pandemic is extra hard.” But things have been going well since The House opened in February. After having worked at Cow & Quince, Walters says, “I have a feel for how business goes in New Glarus. Sometimes you are inexplicably very busy and some days, completely not. I like to think it balances.”
Walters feels that her restaurant is filling a local niche because most other New Glarus eateries focus on heavier foods, Swiss specialties or bar food. “We have fresh vegetables, salads, healthy food.”
The House serves a big selection of tea and coffee drinks, housemade ice creams, quiche, soup of the day, sweet potato broccoli soup, Thai green curry, a banh mi bowl, several salads, and breakfast tacos (with Thai, “Midwesty” and Texan fillings). There are also a lot of sweet treats, from cookies to pies.
The House Cafe and Bakery is currently open Tuesday through Sunday at 407 2nd St., New Glarus. Some days the cafe is open for breakfast and lunch, some days for dinner, and some days for all three; check the website or call 608-636-2162 for daily hours.
The Ready Set is Matthew Stebbins’ new venture in Oregon, Wisconsin. Stebbins, a co-owner of Brothers Three Bar & Grill and Natt Spil, has been working on The Ready Set for about 13 months, he says, longer than he’d anticipated. He set his sights on Oregon as one of the more underserved bedroom communities around Madison. “I have a positive outlook,” Stebbins says about restaurants emerging from the pandemic. “With people in Dane County having a high vaccination rate, and people who are dining in following the [masking] rules, I think people are comfortable going back to restaurants. People want to get back to some level of normalcy.” Still, the goal is to keep both diners and employees as safe as possible.
As for The Ready Set, it’s not quite ready or set, but Stebbins hopes to open in the former Charlie’s on Main space at 113 S. Main St. in the first couple weeks in January. “It’s going to be contemporary American food,” which he says is actually a code term for “We’re going to cook whatever we want.” But the mainstays will be sandwiches, burgers, and handmade pastas, as well as pizza. Pizza is somewhat of an insurance policy if there’s “another pivot in the future” — pizza is one food for sure that thrives with delivery and takeout.
“Mostly we want the food to be approachable and thoughtful,” he says.
Stebbins’ has another new project in Middleton, part of the redevelopment of the old Tumbledown Trails golf course as the new Pioneer Pointe 13-hole golf course on Mineral Point Road. “We’ll be the anchor tenant with food and beverage,” says Stebbins, who projects a June opening. It’s a big space, but he thinks that will work out with it being used as an event space for weddings.
“We’re trying to make things work, as much as serious stuff is still going on,” he says. “We’re finding better and safer ways to do things.”
Delicacies of Asia is open at 506 State St. in a long vacant space that was briefly a build-you-own pizza spot called Lotsa Stone Fired Pizza and a long time ago, Pic-a-Book (if you remember that). It’s right next door to another Asian restaurant, Koi Sushi, and almost right across the street from Chen’s Dumpling House. Taste of Sichuan is just a few storefronts down from Chen’s. It’s an unlikely pileup of mostly Chinese menus, but Delicacies of Asia is one of those Asian and Cajun seafood boil places. (Of which there is another— Mad Seafood Boiler — about two blocks away.) Delicacies of Asia augments its seafood feasts with ramen, bao, rice platters and dumplings. It is also the former Mr. Seafood, which moved, (gaining a new name) from the former Wah Kee Noodle site in the Gateway Mall. That storefront is now occupied by Double 10 Mini Hotpot, formerly on South Park Street, which was displaced by development before the pandemic hit.
And on the other side of the Square, Little Palace is prepping to open at 225 King St. in the former Mr. Kimchi, which closed early in the year. (Over the years the space has housed Cocoliquot, Restaurant Muramoto and Cuco’s Mexican Fusion.) The operators describe the menu as “American Chinese with Tiki drinks.” Little Palace is starting with some soft opens during the week before Christmas. Keep an eye out for its full opening.
[Editor's note: This story has been updated with additional information about Double 10 Mini Hotpot and Mr. Seafood.]
