If the mouth-watering view through the front windows doesn’t catch your eye, the name certainly will.
Cedarburg’s latest culinary treat stop, at W62 N601 Washington Ave, is, after all, called The Creamy Pig.
Opened by Daryl Kranich and Jeremy Schultz in April, the shop – which sells housemade frozen custard, ice cream and sausages – occupies a storefront that has a tradition of meats.
“The shop that we are now in has been a butcher shop for about 100 years,” says Schultz. “(It was) Hoffmann's Market for about 90 years and then Schwai's Meat & Sausage for almost 10 years.
Kranich owns Downtown Pizza in Thiensville, which Schultz helped open and run for its first year, and the Catering Craftsmen, on which the two collaborate.
“We learned how to make and now sell sausage to keep that tradition going,” says Schultz.
And there’s a deli case full of examples – traditional and less so – that attests to the duo’s speed at picking up the skill.
In addition to standard brats, Italians and jumbo quarter-pound franks, they also do thing like reuben brats, caribbean chicken sausage and jalapeno cheddar brats.
You can buy raw sausage by the pound to take home and cook yourself, or you can buy them cooked, served with a side of chips, for a quick, $7 lunch.
If you do that, you might want to either grab a pint of custard or ice cream to take home or eat your sausage nearby so you can return for a cone or dish.
Like the sausage, creating these treats required studying, says Schultz.
“Daryl has always wanted to make his own ice cream and custard,” he says, “so we learned how to do that, so he could cross that off his list.”
A dipping cabinet contains 14 rotating flavors – some custard, some ice cream, all housemade – including butter pecan, Milky Way, Brownie Sundae, key lime pie, Mint Oreos and many others.
The cooler holds pre-packed pints of (sometimes) different flavors, too.
The Creamy Pig, despite its name also makes a few vegan frozen treats, too. The day I visited there was a vegan mint chip, for example.
The shop makes its own waffle cones and also serves hot ham and rolls on Sundays. It has nearby Rebellion Brewing’s beloved blonde root beer on tap.
It currently offers smoked bones for the pups and is planning to add a few other treats for them, too,
If you’re wondering about the name, Schultz says, “The name Creamy Pig came after we knew we were focusing on sausage and ice cream for the store,” which makes sense.
And it seems to be doing the trick. Check out the shop’s Facebook page and you’ll see that they sometimes sell out of product before the end of the day.
So get there early.
The Creamy Pig is open Thursday-Saturday, 11 a.m.-10 p.m. and Sunday, 11-3.
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.
