It’s a familiar narrative – trying on one career trajectory for size only to realize it doesn’t fit at all. In 2010, while studying education at UW-Milwaukee, Amy Gorski found herself in that very situation. She didn’t have the same passion for teaching as she did for baking. In time, that passion became a business plan.
Last summer, Gorski’s East Side bakery, Poppy, opened with door-crashing lines and the pickings slim well before closing time. “We are aiming to be kind of like your everyday sweet treat, breakfast pastry, and then also your bread loaf for dinner,” says Gorski, brioche-ing her way into the fabric of our community.
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Bakeries serve a purpose larger than feeding a physical need. If only for a little while, they soften the sharp edges of life. And life has a lot of sharp edges. Not that the prototypical bakery was ever not friendly. But in these times, it’s writ large: sweet rolls, with a side of humanity.
Take the upbeat-despite-its-name Midwest Sad, which achieved its fought-for goal of a brick-and-mortar – inside an old Schlitz tied house in Walker’s Point – in September. The concept is more than a bakery that offers pizza-flavored pull-apart buns, cinnamon monkey bread, carrot cake in a jar, and fluffernutter cookies. Inclusivity is the motto, and owner Sam Sandrin’s baking tool is nostalgia. “Someone might be spending six bucks on a brownie,” but it’s their only splurge, she says. “That brownie should be healing.”
Sandrin battled financial roadblocks and construction setbacks to get brick-and-mortar Sad (a nod to seasonal affective disorder) off the ground. Her strategy has been to move forward in phases – sweets and snacks, to start; with the full deli menu and late-night hours rolling out in November, and cocktails expected to roll out after the new year.
It’s been well over a year since Allie Fisher found a permanent home for her onetime cottage business Matilda Bakehouse – and its viennoiserie (pastries like Danish and croissant) – in a quiet commercial strip in Fox Point. The daughter of entrepreneurs, Fisher was over crafting desserts in male-dominated high-end restaurant kitchens.
“I don’t want to go work for another guy, right?” she says. “I just want to make pastries, which bring joy.” And not just pastries – cookies, muffins, cakes, seasonal tarts and so on. She likes being the “consistent part” of somebody’s day or week. Sweet rolls, with a side of humanity.
Festivus of Treats
Throughout December, all three bakeries are offering seasonal extras – sweet holiday cheer. Stop in early for the best selection; pre-orders are available for some items, too.
Poppy Bakery
A few things to look for are a Meyer lemon olive oil loaf, and a cherry cheesecake almond brioche bun (using preserved summer cherries from Michigan’s Mick Klug Farm). The catering menu has additional options, like a spelt flour coffeecake, an 8-inch almond financier with local cranberries, and various Christmas pies, including key lime and a vanilla bean and tart cherry cheesecake.
Matilda Bakehouse
The cold pastry case will hold croissant trees filled with chocolate peppermint cream, slices of chocolate hazelnut Buche de Noel (a yule log-shaped French Christmas cake), Black Forest entremet cake, peppermint French silk tarts (gluten free), eggnog cheesecakes, individual rounds of passionfruit pots de creme, and vanilla coconut cake slices (gluten free).
Fisher plans to have lots of cookies on the counter, too: chocolate peppermint, coconut macaroons dipped in chocolate, shortbread snowflakes and trees, and gingerbread (starting mid-December).
Midwest Sad
The festive things – just to start – are peppermint brownies, molasses cookies, eggnog panna cotta and cranberry orange shortbread, and Sandrin expects to offer a lot more. Check the shop’s Instagram for updates.
Poppy Bakery
2021 E. IVANHOE PL.
Hours: Thurs-Fri 8 a.m.-2 p.m.; Sat-Sun 9 a.m.-2 p.m.
Menu all-stars: brown butter miso cookie, dark chocolate cardamom knot, sour cream coffee cake
Midwest Sad
601 S. SIXTH ST.
Hours: Mon, Fri 8 a.m.-2 p.m., 5 p.m.-midnight; Thurs 8 a.m.-2 p.m., 5-10 p.m.; Sat 8 a.m.-midnight; Sun 8 a.m.-10 p.m.
Menu all-stars: almond matcha cookie, sage buns, pistachio pudding
Matilda Bakehouse
6874 N. SANTA MONICA BLVD., FOX POINT
Hours: Wed-Sat 7 a.m.-1 p.m.; Sun 8 a.m.-1 p.m.
Menu all-stars: cinnamon knot, kouign-amann, carrot cake
