Schnip's Trips: My first Wisconsin supper club at a glance 🥃

Hobnob is a historic Hollywood throwback in Racine about to celebrate its 70th anniversary, and it serves me my first Brandy Old Fashioned

Photos by Matthew Schniper

“I’ll be in Wisconsin next week,” I said.

“You have to go to a supper club,” Krista said. She’s Director of PR for the Broadmoor — she’s never wrong about food/drink advice.

I’m staying near Racine and the local haunt is the Hobnob, a spot that’ll celebrate its 70th anniversary on Aug. 11. It came under new ownership earlier this year, purchased by a Kenosha area restaurateur who also operates a few other eateries, including another supper club situated farther north in state.

I get up to speed on supper club culture via the apparent expert on the topic, author Ron Faiola, who’s penned several guidebooks on the topic. I thumb through a copy of his 2013 hardcover Wisconsin Supper Clubs: An Old-Fashioned Experience while sipping a cocktail at Hobnob’s bar. His micro history of the clubs boils down to them being a product of late 19th century London's theatrical society. During Prohibition they “began to flourish in the United States” and by mid century they had spread across the U.S. “They were adult playgrounds where dining, dancing, and drinking, reflected post-war prosperity and abundance,” he writes, calling them nostalgic and historical.

The main dining room, bar view of the lake, and a couple of the carpet patterns at Hobnob.

The classic menus tend to feature weekly services like a Friday night fish fry and prime rib specials. The regular menu at Hobnob mixes shared apps like oysters and shrimp cocktails, a lengthy steak and seafood list and classic chophouse dishes like Chicken Oscar. Dessert spotlights absurdly oversized, “hand-muddled and -stacked ice cream drinks” that serve 2-4 people. I’m told by the staff that the treats are composed with 13 scoops of ice cream topped in liqueurs like crème de menthe and crème de Cacao. They’re sold out by the time I arrive late on Sunday night so I’m directed to their Facebook page to find photos (like this one).

Since the menu is pretty much read-as-written classic, I don’t feel like I’m missing too much by only making it by for a cocktail. Just in scanning the wide dining room overlooking Lake Michigan, I can easily imagine the gustatory experience I’d have, slow-dining (by design) through the soup and salad courses (included with meals, along with a choice of potatoes done multiple ways) then a hearty main like balsamic-braised lamb shank. Actually, I’m just making excuses here because my schedule prohibited me from making it in for a full dinner as I’d have loved to. So I undertake the one thing I can authentically accomplish: I drink a Brandy Old Fashioned. In November, 2023, Wisconsin state lawmakers passed a resolution declaring it the state’s official cocktail. It’s sometimes also called the Wisconsin Old Fashioned.

Brandy Old Fashioned drinks; image courtesy Hobnob’s Facebook page.

My bartender Randy has been at Hobnob for 29 years, with 10 years in the industry prior. He tells me he’s worked for all three owners of the supper club, and his oldest son now bartends alongside him. He says he’s amused by the fact that some of the earliest drinks he learned how to make went out of fashion over the years but have now seen a resurgence that has him regularly making them again. He informs me that Wisconsinites drink more brandy than anyone else in the U.S. And after going through a few options for my Old Fashioned, including a sweet, sour or seltzer version, he helps me decide on the Brandy Old Fashioned “Press,” which he explains is short for Presbyterian.

To make it, he starts by muddling orange slices with sugar and Angostura bitters. Then comes ice and Christian Brothers Brandy. Next, seltzer and a splash of 7 UP. Last: a bright red Maraschino cherry and triangular orange slice garnish. (Some articles note additional garnishes like cheese curds — of course you would, Wisconsinites.) Just as bourbon lands pretty forward in the traditional Old Fashioned, the lightly fruity brandy punches first in this version, which definitely finishes on the sweet side. It drinks easy and approachable.

Bartender Randy and GM Leslie.

I take my drink on a tour through Hobnob’s multiple dining rooms courtesy General Manager Leslie, who’s been at the supper club nearing nine years. She doesn’t give me her last name, and it’s even absent on the business card she hands me. She’s shy about having her photo taken, but she and Randy graciously allow me to snap a pic anyway in one of the opulent spaces outfitted with chandeliers and wide, curvy, tufted-back booth seats. Leslie tells me the original owners based the decor — ostentatious if I could choose only one adjective — off what they saw during a trip to Hollywood in the early 1950’s. There’s even a Moroccan Room outfitted like the interior of a desert tent. It’s all gaudy in the very best throwback, campy way.

Diners in the Moroccan Room.

I return to the bar with Randy to finish my drink. He insists on me trying a side splash of a New York Sour he’s just made for another patron. For it, he floats of pour of Malbec atop a Four Roses Bourbon with lemon juice. It’s boozy, sharp, acidic and notably oaky. In its own way, unique from the Brandy Old Fashioned, it tastes totally appropriate for the setting. Classic and stodgy compared to the complex modern cocktails of today’s era. I sip and savor the last of the lake view and supper club’s vintage vibe, then step out into the night — seven decades added back to my clock as I pull back out onto the rural highway, the glow of red neon light fading in my rearview.