It's time for Dining Month, presented by Deer District and its spooky Halloween-themed alter ego, Fear District. Throughout the month of October, we'll be serving up fun and fascinating content about all things food. The signature dish, however, is our 2019 Best of Dining poll, with winners getting dished out all month long. Get hungry, Milwaukee!
Do you think Danish immigrant Christian Olesen, who arrived in 1924, and started the O&H Danish Bakery 25 years later, would’ve thought that Wisconsin (and beyond, thanks to the magic of delivery) would still be craving his incredible kringle 70 years later?
Now run by the third and fourth generation of the American branch of the Olesen family, Racine’s O&H makes amazing kringle in an astonishing array of flavors, selling them out of five locations in Racine, Sturtevant and Oak Creek.
This year is the bakery’s 70th anniversary and O&H is celebrating with a birthday bash and fall festival on Saturday, Oct. 19, from 10 a.m. until 3 p.m.
There will be live music, free activities for the kids, mascots, photo ops, samples and sales of kringle and the like. Street-Za will be on hand, too, selling pizza from 11:30 until 1:30.
But what you really want to know is that not only will O&H bring a ginormous kringle shaped like the number 70, it will also bring back its brandy old fashioned kringle for one day only!
"Four generations of Olesen’s have made Racine their home and built a bakery centered on the great customers in the Racine community. We’re beyond honored that we are able to celebrate this milestone and we can’t wait to celebrate our anniversary with friends, family and customers," said Eric Olesen, co-owner and president of O&H Danish Bakery.
"As we look ahead to the next 70 years, we are excited to continue to build on our strong legacy of a quality bakery with outstanding service that our parents and grandparents taught us."
These days, O&H makes nearly two dozen varieties of kringle and, during the holiday season, bakes upwards of 7,000 kringle a day. That’s a lotta tasty Racine goodness, right there.
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.
