In a gray season, where to find color
Ask any food photographer: Tasty things are often brown.
From piles of brown butter Rice Krispies Treats and everything bagel focaccia at Baked Lab’s recent opening to the hunter’s stew with kielbasa, pork and sauerkraut at Wish Upon a Wiener’s Polish dinner, so much of what’s on our plates is 50 shades of brown, from beige to mahogany.
Yet this blustery time of year is when I most crave color and sunshine. At that Polish dinner, where chef Mark Wroczynski was cooking the best food I’ve ever had from him, slender pierogi, potato salad with pops of crisp apple and buttery parsley potatoes needed the magenta sweetness of shredded beets in tart vinegar, following a fresh, creamy salad of cucumbers, sour cream and dill.
(Note: The Polish Table returns to Stoughton’s Heron Hall on Feb. 25 and twice more in March. Tickets are worth it for the hunter’s stew alone; it’s divine.)
Where I’m finding color lately: The Here’s Johnny, a tequila-based sour at Public Parking with enough Angostura bitters to make it glow a syrah-like purple. Beautiful renderings from four artists who want to make a major new art piece near the UW-Madison campus — I love the 9-foot robin! The glowing red party photos from Lola’s Hi/Lo Lounge, where the Harry Styles listening party definitely was on Wednesday, no thanks to the straight-up lies the owner told me last week. (I get it man, I get it.)…