The Usinger Family has been making sausage in Milwaukee for over 130 years
MILWAUKEE -- Brian Kramp spent the morning at Usinger’s Famous Sausage -- where he got a behind the scenes look at the kitchen.
About Usinger’s Famous Sausage (website)
The Usinger’s story began in Wehen, Germany where young Fred Usinger, an apprentice sausage maker, learned from the best wurstmachers. He came to Milwaukee in the late 1870’s with a pocketful of recipes, $400 in cash and his favorite sausage recipes, which he had learned as an apprentice "wurstmacher" (sausage maker) in Frankfurt. He had ambition, dreams of a better life and the willingness to work hard for it. He went to work for Mrs. Julia Gaertner, a widow who operated a small butcher shop on Third Street. Within a year or so, Usinger had bought out Mrs. Gaertner, married her niece Louise and moved into living quarters above the store.
The young couple worked sixteen to eighteen hours a day making and selling their sausage. Their best customers were saloonkeepers whose trade depended on the quality of their free lunches. As long as their customers relished Usinger's sausages, the saloons paid Usinger's premium price.