Zaffiro’s began in 1956 when the family took over a former barbershop. Little has changed inside over the years except for the staff. The pizza and other Italian dishes are made with the same recipes as the original. Zaffiro’s had just announced that week that a Milwaukee company, the Marcus Corporation, will be taking the restaurant through the franchising and syndication process, so we had the honor of feasting at the original.

During our meal, and in the following walk to the next stop, Theresa regaled us with historical vignettes of certain highlights in our walk. She told us about the origin of the “Margherita” pizza, the origins of the dish, the Midwest tradition of the square cut and cracker-thinness of the crust, some of the Prohibition and speakeasy tales that have circulated, as well as the origins of the area’s original Italian immigrants, which include Theresa’s own great-grandparents, who came from Sicily.

The next stop on the Brady Street tour included Sciortino’s Bakery, where we sampled cannoli. Sciortino’s has been in the same location for over 60 years, and was bought ten years ago by another Italian family, although the name has remained. Sciortino’s is a tiny shop, crammed full of homemade goodies, so we did our sampling on the street as Theresa gave us the history of the immediate area, which includes the charming story of how Three Holy Women Catholic Parish got its name. From there we passed a landmark that’s not included in the tour, Art Smart’s Dart Mart and Juggling Emporium.  Even if you don’t care much for darts and juggling, tell me how you can resist the place.

Just a half-block down the street is Glorioso Brothers Grocery, our next stop, where we sampled varieties of Italian olives. (Don’t tell anybody, but they also carry Greek olives.) Joe is the capo de tutti capi of the Brady Street Italian neighborhood. He’s been honored many times for not only his civic and business contributions to the area; Joe is also one of the founders of Milwaukee’s Festa Italiana and the Italian Community Center.

Joe was indeed in residence at his usual table in front of the grocery store, holding court with one of his brothers and a couple of local shoppers. Saturday at Glorioso’s is not for the faint of heart. Like most highly popular, small ethnic shops, it probably does as much business on Saturday as it does the other five days of the week they’re open combined. At Glorioso’s, we again congregated in the street due to space.

Farther down the street, nearing the end of what’s left of the Italian neighborhood is Regano’s Roman Coin, originally a Pabst Brewery tavern built in 1890. During that era, breweries sponsored taverns, and on this particular corner, there once stood a different brewery’s tavern on each of the four corners. During Prohibition, the four were secretly interconnected by unfinished, underground passageways, the remains of which still exist in some areas.