Be MKE: Growing Power dissolved, satisfying your wanderlust and the best desserts in Milwaukee

Who we are. Where we go. What we need to know.

Be MKE friends,

We're now more than 500 strong. Yay! Cheers to Meghan Wleklinski, the 500th subscriber since this newsletter started last month.  

Sarah Hauer here acting as your city guide. Each week in this newsletter, I share stories about Milwaukee, its people and what's happening around town. The big deal this week: Growing Power is gone. Also in the newsletter is how to economically satisfy your wanderlust, where inventors grow up, healthcare mega-system mergers and the best desserts in town. 

Sign up for Be MKE and have it delivered to your inbox every Wednesday. 

This week in adulting

This might be only pseudo-adulting. A growing number of companies are helping remote workers travel the globe to satisfy their wanderlust. One of them is Waukesha-based Venture with Impact. It's sending globetrotters to Peru, Colombia, Portugal and Thailand in 2018. The idea is to keep your day job, and its paycheck, while making all your Instagram follower insanely jealous. 

*Holiday travel warnings*  As it nearly always seems, there are new security rules at airports. Avoid holding up the line and know you'll need to put any electronics larger than a cellphone into a bin for the X-ray machine. Fun Fact: You can take a ham on a plane during the holidays. Who knew?

Let's talk business

Reginald Baylor — one of Wisconsin's best-known artists — has stopped painting. Why? Economics. His paintings would take months to create and he couldn't sell them for enough money to cover the time and costs. Instead, he'll soon start selling his images on coffee mugs, pillows,counter tops, rugs and other household goods at a retail shop in Walker's Point. He plans to open the store in March. 

Madison and Milwaukee are among the top 10 cities for children who become inventors, a new study found. Researchers looked at patent filings and the inventor's hometown. They concluded that exposure to innovation during childhood has "a significant causal effect on a child's propensity to become an inventor." 

Last week it was Aurora Health merging with an Illinois company. Now, it's Ascension — the parent of Columbia St. Mary's Health System and Wheaton Franciscan Healthcare — that's in merger talks. The Wall Street Journal reported this week the companies could come together to form the country's largest health system. 

In the need for the perfect gift for a Wisconsin ex-pat? These candles smell like the good land — kringle, beer and Lake Michigan. Some are even hand poured right here in Milwaukee. 

Don’t go hangry

Dandan's pastry chef is opening a bakery and cafe, Batches, early next year. The Third Ward spot will pair house-made ice creams with its own waffle cones. Pies and cakes will be sold whole and by the slice. If you don't spoil your appetite, it'll have salads, wraps and potato tot casserole (or to Minnesotans like me, "hot dish"). 

Our dining critic put out her picks for the best desserts in Milwaukee. I haven't eaten any of them and that's just wrong. A dacquoise from Le Rêve Patisserie & Cafe is in my future.

Beer and doughnuts are a solid combination. But doughnuts in beer — that's something you have to try. Two breweries in Tampa, Fla., are making beer with Krispy Kreme doughnuts (and a 12.5% ABV). Happy holidays. 

Here’s the talkers

Growing Power — Milwaukee's darling nonprofit focused on urban agriculture — has dissolved. This comes after its founder, Will Allen, said he would retire. The nonprofit also has a slew of debts to pay. A veterans group says it will take over the mission of Growing Power. 

The owner of an arcade bar with a Milwaukee location on the way clapped back against "alt-right hate speech." The owner of Up-Down posted to Facebook about an incident at the chain's Minneapolis location. "We cannot and will not allow this sort of alt-right hate speech in our establishments," he wrote. Up-Down has plans to open a bar on Brady St. 

A City of Milwaukee contract worker brought a cooler embellished with Ku Klux Klan and Confederate flag stickers. That employee was fired. This happened just days after a photo of gun-wielding workers from the company circulated. The owner of the contract company is being called to appear before the city's Common Council to talk about it. 

If you wanna reach me, email shauer@journalsentinel.com or connect with me on Twitter @SarahHauer. Follow along with all my escapades, especially those with my dog, Nala, on Instagram @HauerSarah.

I'll be trying out some of the winning cookies from our annual contest ASAP. Drunken Breakfast Cookies? Yasss. (Christmas Morning Cinnamon Rolls and Buttered Rum-pa-pum-pums are also on my list)

Be MKE, 

Sarah

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