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The Revolution Market Undergoes Its Own Revolution

7/2/2022

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I’ll be honest. I haven’t been back to the Revolution Market since Produce with Purpose moved out to pursue their stand alone operation and packing site. My work schedule doesn’t offer me many opportunities to visit the smaller vendors in town that close around five, Revolution Market included, so when I saw their Grand Opening to celebrate the renovations since Produce With Purpose left the facility, I knew I had to be there.

We arrived right at their five pm start time, and the crowd was already there. So many other members of the media were there taking pictures, but it was good for me to still be remembered by the ladies running Bountiful Boards and Souper Day. We spotted each other through the crowds and made time to talk when able. Being introduced to all of the new offerings by the people responsible remains the best part about the location.
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Early visitors to the Grand Opening
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Mushroom Gouda Soup from Souper Day
Souper Day has perhaps taken on the greatest changes since the vendor switch up earlier this year. Their space may have expanded, but so has their menu. These changes came in just in time for the shifting of the seasons that cause most people to give up on hot soup for the year. Cold sandwiches and gazpachos are now available, making Souper Day as viable an option in the summer as it is in the winter.

​Bountiful Boards has expanded to fill in the space left behind after Produce with Purpose left the market, and that means three cold cases of cheese to turn it into a proper cheese shop. This fills a hole left behind in Green Bay upon the closure of Nala’s Cheese and Wine in Bellevue sometime last year, and it makes it much more likely that I’ll make more frequent visits to the market in order to see them.
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Their previous business model focused entirely on the boards wasn’t as inviting for me as a person who doesn’t do much hosting at home. Access to a big cheese case, however, is very inviting. Cheese and crackers are a common snack in the Eating Normal House, and we left this visit with a brand new cheese in our lives after enjoying the cheese tasting during the event.

Souper Day and Bountiful Boards have also taken on joint ventures in catering. If you’re looking to supply a tasty, locally produced lunch to an office or an event, stop in to the Revolution Market to investigate your options. Many of the potential items were available for sampling and viewing during the Grand Opening event– including a lunch box which would fill that office lunch void perfectly. We took home one of their cold sandwiches for lunch the next day and enjoyed the Souper Day crafted sandwich with Bountiful Boards cheese to its fullest.
Perhaps most exciting for me was the opportunity to sample future offerings from the next tenant at the Revolution Building: McKayla Marie Sweets. A bakery is exactly what that region of town needs. Her sample macarons moved so quickly that they were gone within the first hour of the event, but I got my hands on her peanut butter and cacao nib mini macaron before then. The bitter raw chocolate flavor of the cacao nib balanced perfectly with the peanut butter flavored cookie. Their dainty size made them an attractive feature of the table. You couldn’t go by without grabbing one.

The owner hopes to be ready for business in August, and we will be there to say hello and welcome them into their new facility. The small business growth going on in the Revolution Market is exciting to watch. We wish the new tenants luck in their endeavor! Green Bay is spoiled for bakeries of all kinds, but dare I say none of them have made a macaron that got me as excited as theirs?

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McKayla Marie Sweets Sample Stand
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New to the building are two attractions: a kombucha bar and a small cold case of locally sourced produce from a collective of local growers. We did not get in to sample the kombucha, but we did take a look at the local produce that the market has added to the corner to keep people like me coming in even if we’re not in the market for lunch. If you miss Produce with Purpose over there like we do, it eases the pain a little.

These new expansions provide all businesses involved with a great opportunity, and we as a community would be foolish to ignore the opportunity that it also presents us. Eating well and eating local in the age of inflation takes some of the pain out of the wallet by putting the money into the hands of people you know, and the people here will know you. They make it their responsibility. 

Here’s to a new era at the Revolution Market.
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Going Nuts at the Dundas Testicle Festival 2022

5/31/2022

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I learned about the Dundas Testicle Festival over a drink with my husband one Saturday afternoon, and by the next Saturday, we were in the car traversing rural Brown and Calumet counties in search of the little unincorporated town called Dundas. We are only just taking the opportunity to travel in Wisconsin in search of good food and good stories now that COVID issues are slowing down and my health is better. We’ve missed more than a few good opportunities in the last three years.
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fried bull testicles at Dundas Testicle Festival 2022
We were not going to let that stop us from trying Rocky Mountain Oysters, or bull testicles. It’s an unusual delicacy in most of the US, much less Wisconsin. A festival that takes up an entire block in a little town surrounded by pasture and farms on all sides that celebrates exactly that is even more of an unusual experience. I didn’t know what to expect before setting off through the rural county roads.

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Food Resolutions for 2022

1/11/2022

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New Year, New Me– we try to tell ourselves. That’s not really the case, but by god, we can try. I have often not managed to meet the goals I set for myself in these sorts of articles that have graced the pages of this website in the past. 2022 can be that year if I am gentle with myself. There are many possibilities on the horizon for me at Eating Normal, and I want to share them with you. These Resolutions will help us get there together.

1. Eat 75% local ingredients.

This is hard to do in the modern world, but it is perhaps the most achievable goal I have in Green Bay right now. We have several local producers still putting out winter veg and hydroponic vegetables for us. Eggs and meat are still coming out of our farms, and there are plenty of winter markets out there to shop for these things. There’s still things that a woman has to get at a regular grocery store, and I will bend where I have to with out of season ingredients and pantry items. It’ll be okay. Still, I am putting my money where my mouth is quite literally this year. If I’m cooking, you bet your ass it’s local.
This will of course be easier as the growing season comes around. Meat will be more expensive locally, but high quality veggies will be more plentiful. I intend to learn how to do some proper canning in order to preserve the flavors of Wisconsin in every way I can.

2. Improve my photography

This is a struggle for every amateur food blogger. We’re the stylist, the writer, the photographer, and the social media manager. Something's got to give, and for me, it’s often been my photography. I haven’t invested in equipment in years. I use my phone for everything, and I don’t even have a good size ring light for a proper recipe photoshoot USING said phone. That’s changing. While I’ll probably still use my phone, I don’t have to use the same plates on the same boring background with the same bad lighting forever. It’s time to change.

Over the next few weeks, you’ll see new angles, lighting, and maybe even some more tiktok videos here and there while I work on improving my technique. Thanks for hanging on for the ride while I’ve been lazy about how stuff looks.

3. Do All Twelve Cookbooks of the Month

I’ve been saying this every year for four years. We did really well at the end of 2021 by keeping up with every month but December, so let’s try again. There are so many cookbooks from 2021 that I never got to after their release and even more coming in the next few months. Do you have recommendations of classics or new books coming out that you’d like me to cover? Leave your suggestions.

4. 
Explore Wisconsin
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I haven’t stepped foot much outside of the Green Bay area since moving here in late 2019. COVID and health issues have kept me close to home for far too long. There is a lot to eat, drink, and see in this state. I intend to start doing that in 2022 and sharing that experience with you here as well as at Nosh Wisconsin. As with cookbooks, I am open to recommendations of restaurants, breweries, and whatever else you think I might enjoy. 

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Cook90 2022

1/2/2022

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Ah, yes. It’s that time of year again. January has come again, and we once more attempt to cook 90 meals in the month instead of going out, ordering takeout, or otherwise wussing out of cooking with canned soups or frozen meals. We’ve tried to do this twice before, and both times, I’ve failed. A new job came in the way the first time, and the second time my health declined pretty suddenly for a period of time. Now, the world has changed. I’m feeling better, and I’m working from home full time with more time to take care of myself and my husband.
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If you’ve been around for awhile, you know that COOK90 has its origins from Epicurious’s David Tamarkin, and the rules are simple: cook every meal for the entire month with only three exceptions across the whole of the month, and do not repeat a recipe. Breakfast is something of an exception since we all have certain proclivities during breakfast, but there’s absolutely no eating out during this period of time.

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Thanksgiving Travel

12/1/2021

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This is the first Thanksgiving in two years that my husband and I have been able to return to one of our favorite cities in the world, Cleveland, Ohio, and share Thanksgiving weekend with my in-laws. The tradition was stopped first by our move to Green Bay and then by the pandemic, but we did not allow that to change our minds this year. We missed the city and the people. We needed to go home. 

Let me start by saying that I have never been a frequent flyer. I’ve been on less flights in my time, and many of those were as much as three years behind me when I prepared to fly to Cleveland on Thanksgiving day with my husband. My bags were heavy on my weak shoulders. I was anxious and excited. The drive down to O’Hare airport in Chicago from Green Bay was an easy one. The worst was yet to come.
We delayed the worst by finding two seats at an airport bar to eat our small breakfast of a bagel with cream cheese and a breakfast sandwich from the Berghoff Cafe on United Concourse C. We got to watch them pull our meal together from behind a pane of glass, and the cook juggled a few omelets at the same time. It’s an interesting feature to the little restaurant that I’m sure continues to be spellbinding outside of breakfast hours.
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Revolution Market's Oktoberfest 2021

10/24/2021

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Fall arrived in a rush this past week, and with it came the cool mornings I have been waiting for for weeks now. I woke up on Saturday morning ready to face the day and the inaugural Oktoberfest over at Revolution Market. The staff and vendors at Revolution have been some of my greatest supporters, hitting that like button for me at many opportunities. Who would I be if I didn’t set aside the time to visit an event that showed so much promise and brought together so many great vendors from across our Green Bay Community?

This event also presented itself as an opportunity to fill up my entire fridge with local goods where I have mostly stopped myself at my limit at the morning farmer’s markets for the last few weeks. We love the resident vendors of Revolution Market, and I was very excited to meet some new folks at Oktoberfest.

Some of these vendors we’ll discuss in their own separate articles as we spent a lot of time with them during the event, and their food deserves their own highlights. I had no idea what to expect when I showed up at the lot. The interior of Revolution was too small in my head to fit every single vendor that their facebook marketing promised, so I figured there would be parking lot spill over.

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Saturday Morning Market MVPs of 2021

10/21/2021

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As some of you know, in mid September, I published my first recipe with Nosh Green Bay featuring Booyah-- almost entirely shopped for at Green Bay’s Saturday Morning Farmer’s Market. Our local farmers are among our most treasured resources, especially so in an area like this that lends itself so well to the act of growing our food. Creating meals centered around what they produce has been one of the greatest pleasures of the year, and I intend to keep it up until the end of the season.

However, as the season ends, I would be remiss not to highlight the farmers and artisans that have made this farmer’s market season a delicious one for my husband and I. We’ve done our best to visit every stall at least once this year while still supporting our favs-- so here we go! Ya’ll are in no particular order. I love you all!
Cold Climate Farms

Cold Climate Farms has been one of my first stops for two years now at our Saturday Market. I can always find something there that I want to take home, and often they surprise me with something I had no knowledge about before that visit. They opened the doors for me to the wonders of garlic scapes my first year in Green Bay. They brought locally grown San Marzano tomatoes to Green Bay this year, and I canned tomato sauce made with those tomatoes this year. 

Their quality and variety is hard to beat, and as the temperatures get colder, the fall veggies will be a new experience for me too. Here’s for some yummy meals!​


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Cold Climate Farms' stand from 2020

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Zambaldi's Community Supported Brewery Box - Oct 2021

10/6/2021

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Zambaldi Beer has been doing these Community Supported Brewery Boxes for more than a year now. We've bought at least four of them over the course of this program, and we are now into two consecutive boxes for the first time in 2021 because of one simple fact: the offerings in the last two boxes are undeniable.  Last week, we got to taste their special beer for Lorelei Inn’s Oktoberfest a week early, along with a great Good Dog Porter brownie. I single handedly annihilated that pan of brownies in a weekend.

This week, we got a sample of their pumpkin spice beer-- along with brats made with their Meatball Man ale and a Good Dog Porter Mustard just in time for a Packers Home game. Their merchandise for the box is also timely for a home game-- a Zambaldi Beer emblazoned football that looks absolutely adorable in our kitchen right now. We may never take it out for a toss, but there are plenty of other patrons that will in the future. This is perhaps my favorite box that we’ve ever purchased given the full blown meal that can be made with the brats this time around.​


My husband and I play Dungeons and Dragons with some friends online every Sunday night after noon football games, so once the Browns were done and the Packers were at halftime, I set about cooking the Meatball Man Ale Brats on our grill pan after a little bit of steam to get the interior cooked all the way through. They were served with some caramelized onions, the mustard, and sour cream flatbreads that I made earlier that day.



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Zambaldi partnered with local producers Pingel’s Meat Market in Shawano to produce these brats, and you can taste the care that went into them. The flavor of the brats’ namesake beer is light when you eat the brat by itself, but with the caramelized onions and the mustard together, everything sings in a zesty harmony. It was a perfect meal for football and dungeons and dragons.

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Kickaas Cheese - Market Vendor Highlight

10/1/2021

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Green Bay’s Saturday morning market has been my favorite event of the year since my first visit. This new, relaxed season with fewer COVID guidelines has opened it up in a whole new way, and over the course of this new season, I’ve become very familiar with a Green Bay Cheesemaker-- Kickass Cheese-- who is our highlighted vendor this week. There’s not much time left in the season, so they absolutely deserve the recognition while shoppers still have a chance to visit.

We stop by their stall every week when we visit the farmer’s market looking for something new to try. Brie, cheddars, curds, jack cheeses, swiss, parmesan… They’ve got something for everyone, and their flavors regularly rotate. If you want to get an idea of what they have to offer before you make a visit to them at the market, you can visit their website to see pictures and descriptions of every variety that they produce on the reg.
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Brews, Bistros, and Bonfires at the Botanical Gardens 2021

9/22/2021

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One cool September evening, my husband let me know we were lucky enough to get tickets to the sold out event at the botanical gardens here in town. We’ve talked for awhile now about taking a nice saturday afternoon to visit the location for the first time, but this fell into our lap. With some trepidation, I agreed to go. I like being able to plan a little farther ahead than six hours!


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