Western UP

Edk and I are headed to the Ontonagon area for a couple days of hiking. I have been to the UP in the dead of winter, and I recall the food as sub-supper club level. I'm hoping there is something else up there.

Any recommendations for the Western UP/Porcupine Mountains area? I believe the larger towns somewhat nearby are Bessemer, Ironwood and Houghton.

The indispensible Hunt's Guide doesn't list restaurants when you click on the map on the home page. But if you go to this page you'll get all their recommended restaurants in the U.P., arranged by region and city. Of the cities you mention, Houghton will have by far your best eating--a combination of a substantial number of relatively wealthy tourists and a diverse faculty and student body at Michigan Tech. Do be sure to stop by one of the Finnish bakeries for toast or rolls flavored with cardamon.

That being said, the Hunt's tastes are not far off your basic supper club level. Like many guide book writers, they tend toward the enthusiastic. But it's rare that they leave out the best place in town, and they give enough of a description that you should have a pretty good idea of what you're getting when you choose a place.

It's been nearly a year since Kasia started this thread, and there doesn't seem to be any other info on the Western UP anywhere on LTH.

My partner and I will be spending a week in Silver City towards the end of August. I anticipate packing groceries and cooking most of our meals, but was hoping for a few meals out. From what I've read elsewhere, "dining" seems to be out of the question, but that's OK. Anyone out there have an update on this part of the world?

I don't know exactly where Silver City is, but I've done a fair amount of bicycling around the Watersmeet/Marensico area, and the best advice I can offer is cross the border into Wisconsin. I don't know why, but the inner UP - away from Lake Superior - seems like a wasteland - as if Lansing just doesn't care. It's amazing the difference in the economies once you cross the border into Wisconsin, and that translates to dining options, too.

Silver City is at the entrance to the Porcupine Mountains, on the Lake Superior shore not too far from Ontonagon. Don't know the towns you mentioned, but then I'm not familiar with the area.

Yeah, I don't expect any culinary marvels, I've been to resort communities/beauty spots before and realize that they're generally wastelands when it comes to food. Still, it would be nice to have a few decent lunches/dinners other than what we cart in.

Some tips about my hometown:

Heading to Hurley (just across the Wisconsin border from Ironwood) takes you to the Bell Chalet (aka The Liberty Bell aka Fontecchio's Bell Chalet), my choice for eating in the region. The thin-crust pizza is marvelous (the sausage is a local recipe), the pasta and gnocchi are generally homemade and tasty (if you don't mind Italian-American style w/lots of red sauce), and the supper club-style food isn't bad. The drinks are well mixed (brandy manhattans are a local favorite), and it's a very friendly joint that brings together locals and vacationers. If you're there in winter, though, be prepared for long lines of out-of-towners.

For lunch you should consider the Joe's Pasty Shop in Ironwood on Aurora Street. One of the older pasty joins in the UP (1946), and they're VERY good -- entirely legit. I've been known to bring coolers full of their frozen pasties back to Chicago....

Hurley is an old red light district, with many bars along Silver Street and an old Chicago mob-prohibition history. The Hurley Coffee Company, on Silver Street in the old Trolla's Market (I believe that Mr. Trolla was the source of the aforementioned sausage recipe) is a nice place to have a good coffee (not so common in the area), relax under the old tin ceiling, and consider what the town might have been like in its glory days.

Bell Chalet
109 5th Ave S., Hurley (just off Silver Street)
(715) 561-3753

Joe's Pasty Shop
116 W. Aurora St., Ironwood
(906)-932-4412

Hurley Coffee Company
122 Silver Street, Hurley
715-561-5500

I should add that Hurley is my natal town, not my current hometown, and as such I didn't discuss any of the newer restaurants (e.g., Kimball Inn) that might be worth exploring (I tend to return to old favorites instead). But if anyone is curious I can always check with my parents, who are reliable sources and who run a roadside vegetable/maple syrup/jam stand that has sold fresh produce to some of the restaurants in the past.

Thanks for the suggestions, jcat. Our drive up will take us through Ironwood, so we'll take a look. Maybe pick up some pasties to keep at the cabin in Silver City for the week we'll be there. Hurley sounds interesting and worth a visit, too.

Where's your parents' roadside stand?

Enjoy those pasties, Omnivore. Joe's is extremely modest, as you can tell from the pic on their website (that they have a website is remarkable): http://www.joes-pasty-shopp.bigstep.com/. Like many of the western UP pasty shops, Joe's is owned by an Italian family, the Barbaras. You can try the classic UP rutabaga pasty, though I'll stick w/potato myself. There are other pasty shops along US2/Cloverland Drive in Ironwood, but by comparison the spicing of the meat isn't as complex and the pastry is less flaky.

And Hurley is just a few blocks from there, so you might want to drive the extra mile to see the old Silver Street strip (continuous w/Aurora -- the street name changes at the state border).

My parents' roadside stand is out of your way, alas -- about 3 miles west of Saxon, WI on US 2. There's no produce now (they're under a blanket of snow), but it's a nice spot to stock up in summer, and they are just about to bottle their first batch of maple syrup of the year. If you're ever headed that way, it's the Jopac Farm Market, and they're at 715-893-2278 (call ahead off season).

I think that even non-Italians would agree that the many Italians in the region have contributed most to the commercially-available food (good butchers, pizzas, produce, etc.), though if you see a bakery along your travels you might check for Finnish cardamom bread.

Happy travels!

So re: pasties, you recommend potato over rutabaga? I'll have to try both and decide for myself.

It seems your folks are in the opposite direction of the route we're taking -- 90 to 39 to 51 to 2 (this would be in Ironwood, I believe) to 28 to 64 to 107.... a pity... maybe we'll get lucky and take a wrong turn in Ironwood?

And did you say Finnish cardamon bread? *DROOL*

August seems so far away right now.

Rutabaga, Rutabaga, Must have Rutabaga

You understand, it's not potatoes vs. rutabaga. It's potatoes with or without a small amount of rutabaga added. Just as cabbage is the secret to a good vegetable soup, rutabaga is the secret to a good pasty. And if you insist on ordering it without rutabaga, I don't want to hear any complaints about how bland it was!

One more note. Many pasty shops now sell Toivo and Eino's Really Secret Pasty Sauce a/k/a catsup with a small kick to it. I recommend it.

Despite what my mom says, trust me: Pasties with rutabaga are still bland. Ask her why the pasty sauce she has in her fridge has a bit of a kick to it.

I go for potato, but the blandness question is yet another matter. It's not simply whether or not to add or substitute rutabaga for some of the potato: some cooks add more onion to their potato pasties than to rutabaga pasties, and the blandness factor varies in part relative to the proportion of onion. Needless to say, various combinations have fan bases, as do different meat blends.

I prefer hot sauce with pasties, though most folks up there eat them with ketchup. Pasties are bland in a meat-and-potato-and-pastry-and-onion kind of a way, to be sure, but if the ingredients are good then it's one of those childhood tastes that I enjoy nonetheless.

As for Finnish cardamom bread, it's tasty with strong coffee though perhaps best appreciated on a freezing January morning.

Most of the foods in the region that offer more robust flavors are found on the home dinner table, not in restaurants -- antipasti including salami and salamini, porchetta, various ravioli recipes, anchovy-basil pastes, etc.