Typical bakers start the magic way before you or I (the average human being) even think about getting out of bed. We asked Pastry Chef Sarah Botcher how she keeps up with the craziness.

“I have been on baker’s hours up until recently. This is one of the few jobs that I’ve ever had where I work daytime hours. I’m lucky right now to have that opportunity but I do love early mornings and the quietness and the solitude to work. So I work with Peter my husband, we work daily daytime hours and we’re in production all day long my assistant comes in at 6 so I work at eight so I have a little coffee time in the morning before I get to work…”

So when did you actually start working at the restaurant?

“It was a little haphazard I ended up working here a week before we opened the restaurant so I didn’t really have much time to prepare so you always have to jump and think on your feet when you work in a kitchen and it’s just that reflex of just go and using your instincts and your skill you have to put it to the test but it’s been a really great fit working with Jack and Peter and the really wonderful team we have so far.”

At Butcher & the Boar, just about everything here (when we can manage it) is supplied locally. As a high volume restaurant, we want to give our customers the taste of really high quality and fresh ingredients.

Fresh and locally sourced ingredients happen to be a passion of Pastry Chef Sarah Botcher.

“We use a lot of local purveyors and small farms, Dragsmith which is a co-op out of Wisconsin, Goats and Gardens, which is also out of Wisconsin, and they bring us beautiful produce on a weekly basis and what’s in season fresh tomatoes fruits I’ve had some beautiful Rhubarb from Welcome farms and strawberries that I’ve picked up at the farmers market over the season too and it’s just it’s a really great way to support businesses and to give customers a real sense of really what it tastes like to have good quality fruits vegetables and meats because as Jack in the kitchen they use all of the local meats and then some from Texas, Nebraska so on and so forth…

…It’s very inspiring for me to work with local ingredients. We try to use what is in season as much as possible. We’re a really high volume restaurant so sometimes we can’t always get as much as we’d like from the farms themselves because they are still on a smaller growing scale but I love to be able to have that relationship and cultivate it so they can grow as well.”

Along with delicious desserts, Pastry Chef Sarah Botcher is also in charge of coming up with the fresh (baked daily) bread selection at Butcher & the Boar.

“Making focaccia for a garnish that’s more baked and crisp in a really thin tuile like preparation that’s different but it does require all of us to have our palates committed to bringing the best product together…

…Making the breads in house and doing the pastry is a full production here in the kitchen and we do a lot of bread especially with the foot long hot dog and the beer garden has been selling extremely well. I do natural yeast products and commercial yeast products as well with the breads…

…I make eight dozen foot long hot dog buns every day. So you’re thinking, well that’s anywhere from five to six hundred a week. So we have a lot of output that we do for the beer garden and the restaurant so it’s been a really great experience for me because the more you work with your product the better you understand your product and what you’re working with and the nuances of time and temperature and everything else in between, so I really enjoy the process…

…We make everything every day fresh. Actually it’s not as much work as it sounds. It’s very manageable within production but it’s still very full production there’s never a dull moment downstairs we stay busy, yeah.”