(upbeat Southern guitar music)
- [Bill] I'm Bill Addison,
Eater's ever-roving national critic.
My next stop: Milwaukee, Wisconsin,
perched on a concave bend on Lake Michigan's western shore.
The city is synonymous with breweries,
though its culinary ambitions stretch well beyond beer.
But one deep-seated tradition that makes Milwaukee
a special place to eat is the Friday fish fry.
The place that impressed me the most,
with its warm spirit and the straightforward goodness
of its Friday fish fry
was a basement restaurant called the Foxhole Tavern
in the Northshore American Legion, Post #331.
- So, when I first walked in here,
I thought, "What a great place."
I love supper clubs, I love that basement bar feel.
We've got the original wood grain on the walls
and we keep our drink prices really low.
We're one of the only nonprofit
American Legion bar-restaurants in the area.
During the day, we've got a lotta regulars, a lot of vets,
a lot of neighborhood people that come every day;
it's kind of their social hour, and it's a really great mix.
Everyone seems to get along,
everybody just gets to know each other.
So, bringing in Lloyd, he redid our entire menu,
he increased food to seven days a week.
The food is mostly made from scratch now,
versus frozen deep-fried food, that sort of thing.
The fish fry is our most popular day of the week
and the neighborhood loves it.
We get pretty busy for our fish fry.
Typically, on fish fry nights,
non-Lent-time, we do about 100, 150 fish frys.
During Lent, we up it to about 300 fish frys a night.
(upbeat acoustic guitar music)
- I've done nothing but work in kitchens
since I was 16 years old.
I went to culinary school here in Waukesha, Wisconsin,
gave me a really good background.
And since about 2000-ish, I've kinda been on my own,
doing my own menus and doing consulting things,
which is kinda what this is, kinda like a consulting gig.
Giving the place a new life, really,
which has been a lotta fun for me the last few years.
Diane gave me a call.
She knew I was coming here for the summertime,
I was coming back to visit family and friends and whatnot.
Diane gave me a ring 'cause she knew I was gonna be here
and asked me to come
and she said that the kitchen needs some touching up,
and I was more than happy to oblige.
And fish fry is just a fundamental part
of the fabric of society here.
And you grow up doing it as a kid,
you grow up eating fish frys constantly,
and what I've learned is that no matter how high you climb
in any sort of restaurant,
you just can't escape a damn fish fry here.
About 10 years ago,
I estimated that I have made clam chowder
958 times in my life, and that was 10 years ago,
and that's strictly Friday fish frys.
And to me, it's something that I've been doing
for quite a while
and it's something that I feel like I've perfected it.
Just doing things from scratch and taking care
in the way you do things, it pays off, you know?
And to hear someone say
this is the best fish fry in the area, it's amazing.
I can leave here with a huge smile on my face
and be proud, it's cool.
(upbeat pop music)
- [Bill] Plates of golden fish fry
are so much a part of Milwaukee's food culture now,
the side dishes are classic: hash brown-like potato cake,
applesauce, cole slaw, rye bread.
It all comes together just right,
particularly with a pint of local beer.
- The fish fry is a sacred, really, and storied meal.
Along about the 1880s, there were more Germans
of a Catholic persuasion, which is key, in Milwaukee
than there were anywhere else on the globe.
It was verboten to eat flesh meats on Friday.
Now, Wisconsin is surrounded by water on three sides,
so fish was something that was inexpensive,
accessible, nutritious.
A fish fry really grew out of that tradition.
And then comes the breweries.
They started offering fish specifically on Fridays
at a very reduced rate right when Prohibition hit.
And if you can't get a beer,
how do you lure the gentlemen back in?
Well, you start serving fish on Fridays.
And oftentimes, the whole family would come and meet there.
And out of that grew this devout tradition
of the Milwaukee fish fry, where great places like this,
an American Legion, VFWs, churches,
and to come to Milwaukee and not have a good fish fry
means that you actually didn't visit the city.
(driving acoustic guitar music)
You belong here.
These are your people, this is your place.
Even if you know no one else in the room,
I guarantee you sit down for a fish fry
anywhere in Milwaukee and within 10 or 12 minutes,
the person across the table or across the aisle
is gonna be reaching over and saying hello,
and it doesn't matter what car you drove up in,
how much is in your bank account.
You come hungry, you come sincere, you come human.
It's who we are.
We're unabashed about it, but it's also so good.
- [Bill] Friday fish fry.
To get a taste of the community
and the care that makes the meal a treasured ritual,
hold off until the weekend
and seek out a true Friday fish fry.