Former Lake Park Bistro chef de cuisine Miles Borghgraef will open Birch + Butcher a butcher shop and restaurant in a first floor retail space at the North End Apartments in downtown Milwaukee.
The restaurant, to be located at 459 E. Pleasant St., is described as “family-style contemporary Midwestern cuisine cooked in an open, wood-fired hearth and featuring an on-site butcher shop stocked with the best meats and produce from local farms.”
Borghgraef, who left Lake Park Bistro in 2015, will own Birch + Butcher will with his fiancee, Rebecca Zwiefelhofer, a real estate agent.
“When I left my last job, this was always the plan, but my expectations of what it took to build something and what it actually takes is a little different,” Borghgraef said.
Borghgraef had the exact restaurant concept in mind two years ago and was working with an architect in a different neighborhood of Milwaukee. He has known Barry Mandel, developer of the North End, for years, who asked him to look at the space and at the very least recommend another chef.
“I pretty quickly recommended myself,” Borghgraef said. “I got down here and it was love at first sight. The environment, the density, the people and the neighbors. It is surrounded by good eats. This area is more than awesome.”
The restaurant will serve breakfast, lunch and dinner. Menu items include Rocket Baby pastries, warm couscous salad with green chorizo, radish relish and sour cream; roast broccoli with whey, chia and sorrel; strauss lamb tartare; and beef glazed brisket, according to documents submitted to the city.
Borghgraef said the menu submitted to the city will likely change and include several fun surprises.
Borghgraef is expecting to open Birch + Butcher this fall.
At 32, he figured it was now or never to try his hand at his own place.
“I left the security of a reputable and a long standing company, but I don’t have children yet and very little depending on me,” Borghgraef said. “In five years that might not be the case. The window is here for us to try.”
