A delicious trip to Wisconsin

Last night we got home from our latest trip to Wisconsin to visit with my stepdaughter's family, and this time we had the fun opportunity to be on hand for the sixth birthday party of grandson Michael! It was a fun trip, as always, and this one was also quite delicious in many, many ways. Alex and I usually take a day to go off gallivanting and see something new, and this time, he wanted to introduce me to a place he'd visited with one of the guys previously, Uncle Mike's Bake Shoppe. Apparently this place is known for its award-winning kringle, a pretzel-shaped pastry that is oh-my-goodness-how-did-I-not-know-about-this delicious. My town, I'm sorry to say, can never seem to support a bakery for very long, so I am like the proverbial kid in the candy shop when all these delicious baked goods are before me!

We sampled a few different flavors while at the shop, and the one we came home with was the Sea Salt Caramel Pecan Kringle. Oh, it's a good thing I don't live near Uncle Mike's!

And I trust I can safely share this here without inciting a political riot, but I was amused that they sell cookies with the likenesses of both Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump. The sign on the counter, which was already a week old when I was there, reported "Clinton 48.5 percent, Trump 51.5 percent." (But in fairness, I have to tell you that I saw far more Clinton yard signs than Trump ones as we drove around Green Bay, though I always wonder whether such signage indicates actual voting patterns, especially in an election year as bizarre as this one has been.)

Alex and I didn't purchase either of the presidential candidate cookies. As two former newspaper reporters, we HAD to try the New York Times Chocolate Chunk Cookies. These were rich chocolate cookies with a liberal sprinkling of sea salt, and they were great. (But not as great as the kringle. Oh, was that stuff good!)

Our other culinary adventure up in dairyland took us to Scray Cheese, where Alex wanted to purchase a gift box of cheeses to send to a friend back home. The actual production of the cheese occurred behind a glass window at the shop, where visitors can watch them at work, and I was most intrigued to see these huge vats in which liquid was being swirled around, then eventually turned into the cheese curds I have so grown to love. (If you've never had real Wisconsin cheese curds, my friends, you have missed out.)

Even the grocery store in Wisconsin did not disappoint, because a trip to Festival, a grocery store we don't have in my neck of the woods, turned up some great new-to-me Stash Tea in the White Chocolate Mocha flavor. I enjoyed quite a few cups of this lovely dessert tea alongside slices of kringle!

And I'll close with a photo of the two most delicious little faces on the whole trip, Michael and Andrew, shown here beating me at the matching game with their "Minions" cards. The only thing I don't like about Wisconsin is that it and they are so far away!