There's a new bright spot in the back of one of the darkest rock clubs in town, hooray.
Ever since I started eating stuff like "tempeh," "kale" and "nutritional yeast" (okay, not so much of that last one), I've been wishing someone in Milwaukee would open another restaurant for hipsters like me. I exhausted Nessun Dorma's menu in a month, and although I love Beans & Barley, it can't be healthy to eat there more than 10 meals every week. Barossa is lovely but affordable only for special occasions. That leaves the veggie burger at Bella's Fat Cat (not a bad deal when you add the blue cheese), and, when I can find my "College" sweatshirt, Thai Peanut Sprout Whatever at Noodles and Co.
Who woulda thought that the Onopa Brewery would fill the void? I've had some great laughs there on sweaty summer afternoons, bargaining with the bartender for a Special Export. I've seen some raucous shows there, too, including the Trachtenburg Family Slideshow and The Horn Band. And once Craig bought me four of their most disgusting shots (The Pickled Parrot: Cap'n Morgans and pickle juice), and each time the paint-pealed place smelled like the devil's armpit on fire.
So I never thought I'd enjoy their Vegan Lasagna as much as I did, or what's-that-stuff, some sort of baby squash with spinach cooked up inside of it. But I did, I did! Yes, and as I wondered if the accordian was going to fall from the pillar, or if that other thing was a trolling motor, I bit into Monica's mouth-watering pizza. At $7, you should do the same.
Their menu is mostly animal friendly, but they also offer some sophisticated seafood and chicken dishes. It's encouraging to live in a neighborhood where restaurants like this one flourish, but it makes me feel bad that they are the exception to Applebee's and steakhouses. Come on; it's 2004, do we really still need factory farms?