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This Just In...
Kevin Fischer is an award-winning veteran broadcaster who has been seen and heard on Milwaukee TV and radio stations for nearly three decades.
Kevin, who is a legislative aide to state Sen. Mary Lazich (R-New Berlin), can be seen offering his views on the news on the public affairs program, “INTERchange,” on Milwaukee Public Television Channel 10. He lives with his wife, Jennifer, in Franklin.
Culinary no-no #59
By Kevin Fischer
Sunday, Jun 22 2008, 03:46 PM
This is the fish fry served at American Serb Hall, quite possibly the most popular fish fry in all of Wisconsin.
Photo: Jack Orton, Milwaukee Journal/Sentinel, 2003
The Serb Hall fish fry costs $14.95. That is a rip-off and a major culinary no-no. Friday’s Milwaukee Journal/Sentinel carried a story about the predicament restaurant owners are finding themselves in. The rising cost of food caused by the ridiculous ethanol craze has restaurateurs debating whether to raise fish fry prices or keep them where they are to prevent losing customers.
The paper reported, “Serb Hall management is asking customers to swallow a nearly 60% price increase, from $9.50 to $14.95 for the standard fish fry.”
Quoted in the article is my good friend, Larry Meyer who runs Meyer’s Restaurant and Bar in Greenfield.
Regarding the 60% price increase at Serb Hall, Meyer said, ““I give them credit for being gutsy.”
I call it stunning.
A fish fry on a Friday night at Serb Hall is one of Milwaukee’s most storied traditions.
The fish dinner is good. Many would say very good.
I submit it’s not even close to being the best, making the pole vault in price from $9.50 to $14.95 about a month ago highway robbery.
In February 2007, then-Journal/Sentinel restaurant critic Dennis Getto wrote a piece rating the best fish fries. Getto gave the best fish fries a rating a four fish and the next best three and half fish. This weekend, I checked the restaurants rated by Getto as the best of the best to see if they too had no other choice but to raise the price of a standard fish fry to $14.95.
Here are those restaurants followed by the current price of their fish fries:
Four fish
Wegner's St. Martins Inn, 11318 W. St. Martins Road, Franklin
$9.25
Kegel's Inn, 5901 W. National Ave., West Milwaukee
$9.95
Karl Ratzsch's Restaurant, 320 E. Mason St
$13.95 beer battered
$15.95 broiled
Three-and-a half fish
Ron's Cozy Corner, N54-W35994 W. Lake Drive, Oconomowoc
$7.95
Polonez, 4016 S. Packard Ave., St. Francis
$9.75
Erv's Mug, 130 W. Ryan Road, Oak Creek
$7.95
Carleton Grange, 3807 S. Packard Ave., St. Francis
$10.95
Tanner-Paull American Legion Post, 6922 W. Orchard St., West Allis
$9.50
Bavarian Inn, 700 W. Lexington Ave., Glendale
$11.50
$14.00 all you can eat
Beerbelly's, 512 W. Layton Ave.
$7.25
The Country Squire Supper Club, S72-W16373 Janesville Road, Muskego
$11.95
It seems other restaurants, faced with the same increase in food prices as Serb Hall chose not to increase their prices by nearly 60%. In fact, they’ve stayed virtually unchanged since Getto’s February 2007 article.
Also, if someone, including Serb Hall management wants to argue that their $14.95 fish fry is ultimately superior in quality to the fish fries mentioned by Getto (He did not include Serb Hall), it’s going to fall on deaf ears.
Some of the fish fries that are close to Serb Hall’s $14.95 price tag, like Karl Ratzsch's serve the same generous portion, in a Sprecher beer batter and includes yummy potato pancakes. And there’s atmosphere along with live music.
Bartolotta’s Catering at Boerner Botanical Gardens has a fish fry that runs from November to just before summer when the fish fries are bumped by Friday night wedding’s and wedding rehearsal dinners.
Bartolotta’s charges $14.95 for their beer battered version. But they also include the best salad bar that goes on and on and on. And there’s atmosphere along with live music.
The atmosphere at Serb Hall where you’re herded in and out like cattle?
Here’s a photo of the room from roadfood.com that describes the “atmosphere” this way: “Cozy it’s not.”
 Serb Hall reportedly serves over 1,000 fish fries every week. Couldn’t they have raised the price of beverages or other items that clearly could have made up for the increase in fish and food prices the management claims it just couldn’t handle?
Other managers are, at least for the moment, rejecting increases that could kill their biggest night of the week and are switching to other styles of fish.
Serb Hall is taking the huge risk of losing customers by jacking up the price, not by .50, or one dollar, or two dollars, but by $5.45.
They’re not the best or the only game in town.
What once was the $9.50 fish fry at Serb Hall is now a big, fat, deep-fried culinary no-no.
NOTE: Kegel's Inn, rated with four fish by Getto in his 2007 article, is no longer in business.
To read previous Culinary no-no’s, please click CULINARY NO-NO under my TAGS section.
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