It turns out the rumors are true. Milwaukee Public Schools cafeterias won't be serving mock chicken leg for the foreseeable future.
The dish, made of pork and other ingredients, is both beloved and despised.
I wrote about it in this article a few years ago.
The breaded entree, which was typically served monthly, often on Thursdays or Fridays, is popular in my house and while the kids were attending school remotely during the pandemic, we never missed picking up mock chicken leg meals (as well as the amazing produce bags!) at our neighborhood school.
A few years back, I even took part in an extremely informal education "summit" at Cooper School on the South Side, which we held in the cafeteria over a lunch of mock chicken leg.
Recently, I'd heard that the district was dropping mock chicken leg and I reached out to MPS' Media Relations Manager Earl Arms asking if it was true.
"It hurt me too when I heard it," Arms told me. "It’s an all-time favorite."
"Sounds like it’s a matter of finding a vendor that will sell the product to us."
Arms said a vendor is being sought.
If a vendor is found, I'd bet MPS will bring back mock chicken leg, because there are going to be a lot of disappointed kids (and teachers/staff, who also often love it) when school starts again.
By the way, early start schools return to class on Monday, Aug. 16. Traditional calendar schools resume on Thursday, Sept. 2.
Born in Brooklyn, N.Y., where he lived until he was 17, Bobby received his BA-Mass Communications from UWM in 1989 and has lived in Walker's Point, Bay View, Enderis Park, South Milwaukee and on the East Side.
He has published three non-fiction books in Italy – including one about an event in Milwaukee history, which was published in the U.S. in autumn 2010. Four more books, all about Milwaukee, have been published by The History Press.
With his most recent band, The Yell Leaders, Bobby released four LPs and had a songs featured in episodes of TV's "Party of Five" and "Dawson's Creek," and films in Japan, South America and the U.S. The Yell Leaders were named the best unsigned band in their region by VH-1 as part of its Rock Across America 1998 Tour. Most recently, the band contributed tracks to a UK vinyl/CD tribute to the Redskins and collaborated on a track with Italian novelist Enrico Remmert.
He's produced three installments of the "OMCD" series of local music compilations for OnMilwaukee.com and in 2007 produced a CD of Italian music and poetry.
In 2005, he was awarded the City of Asti's (Italy) Journalism Prize for his work focusing on that area. He has also won awards from the Milwaukee Press Club.
He has be heard on 88Nine Radio Milwaukee talking about his "Urban Spelunking" series of stories, in that station's most popular podcast.
