Welcome to Food/Drink Week at Milwaukee Record, brought to you by Third Space Brewing. From May 12 through May 19, belly up and enjoy adventurous, odd, and elaborate coverage of all things edible and drinkable in Milwaukee and beyond.

In Wisconsin Taste Test, two Milwaukee Record folks share their thoughts on two new-to-them “Wisconsin-y” food or drink items. Think raw beef sandwiches, Old-Fashioneds, and those giant bags of generic candy they sell at Fleet Farm. This week: a variety of Kwik Trip in-store items.

Cheese Curds

Tyler Maas: Excluding Milwaukee proper for some probably dumb reason, Kwik Trip is pretty much everywhere in Wisconsin (and Iowa and Minnesota, occasionally bearing the “Kwik Star” name). For many, Kwik Trip is part of a daily routine. In some small communities, it’s literally the place to grab groceries, coffee, beer, and hot snack standbys. I ventured out to West Allis to grab three different items from Kwik Trip’s vast arsenal of in-store foods and drinks.

Since the other two selections are little less standard when it comes to convenience store offerings, I figured it’d be good to try out a Wisconsin favorite to see how KT’s rendition compares to non-gas station fare. That’s right! I got some cheese curds. The Cheddar Cheese Nuggets ($3.49) were well-crisped outside, stuffed with gooey cheddar inside, and a surprisingly serviceable riff that I’d actually put above the curds at Culver’s and Cousins. Not restaurant quality, but better than anticipated. I could say more, but I’ll leave this one to you, Matt.

Matt Wild: Ah yes, the great “Culver’s vs. Cousins” cheese curd debate. As someone who’s written about this divisive issue before, I can confidently say that the Cousins cheese curds rule, and Culver’s cheese curds drool. It’s not even close! (Also, I just re-read that piece and forgot it was a COVID-era “stealth” thing where I start talking about one thing and then vent about people not wearing masks or whatever. Weird, shitty times.)

ANYWAY, that’s not why we’re here. We’re here to find out what I thought of these Kwik Trip cheese curds. And readers, I was not impressed. The breading was deliciously golden and crispy—super good!—but, to paraphrase a commercial that no one under the age of 50 will remember: where’s the cheese? Maybe I got some faulty curds, but what little cheese I could find was less-than-gooey and barely there. Did I still eat eight of these things in five minutes? Yes I did.

Tyler rating: A soft “Oh, ya.” (Fairly good)

Matt rating: “Yeah, no, but yeah, sure” (Not good, but I’ll eat them anyway.)

Pork Rib Sandwich

Tyler: Kwik Trip has really pushed its fried chicken lately. They also keep the “Hot Spot” well-stocked with things like well-executed breakfast sandwiches, pretty solid burgers for a gas station, passable pizza, and a rotating cast of savory side (including the curds). Instead of wasting your time and our money to essentially write “burger good,” I wanted to see how the Pork Rib Sandwich ($1.89) compared its Hot Spot counterparts.

I liked that the meat patty was shaped like a McRib. The bread it was served on was also soft and altogether okay. That’s kind of where my praise stops. It was lightly smeared with a league average BBQ sauce, though I should note other toppings and condiments can be added to sandwiches by customers in-store to elevate it a little. The meat was on the dry side, and I actually bit into a hard piece of…something. Like Foxy Brown, you can catch me at the Hot Spot, but I don’t think I’ll be grabbing a Pork Rib Sandwich again.

Matt: My pal Evan once described Rocky Rococo pizza as “one big loaf.” It was impossible, Evan said, to know where the crust ended and the toppings began. I don’t know why, but that (accurate) description has stuck with me for years. And it popped into my head once again when I bit into this Kwik Trip Pork Rib Sandwich.

For me, the meat and the bun tasted like they had been fused into a singular food item—not a Pork Rib Sandwich, but a Porkribsandwich. The meat tasted like bun. The bun tasted like meat. The BBQ did what it was supposed to do. It was kind of gross but kind of heavenly. I’m not a McDonald’s McRib guy, but I could see myself jumping ship to Kwik Trip’s take on the sandwich if I was. Or, hell, I could see myself picking this up every time I enter a Kwik Trip for the rest of my life. (Oh, have we done the thing where we dutifully mention that Kwik Trip has given a gazillion dollars to Donald Trump and various Republican groups over the years? Okay, now we have.) “One big loaf,” indeed.

Tyler rating: An unenthusiastic “Yeah, sure.” (Okay)

Matt rating: “Oh, ya!” (Good)

Chocolate Milkshake Flavored Milk

Tyler: I still eat dairy like a good Wisconsinite, but I don’t really find myself reaching for a glass of milk all that often at this point in my life. When I do, it’s certainly not Vitamin D milk that’s pumped with corn syrup in a futile effort to replicate the flavor of a thin, melted milkshake. So I wasn’t sure what to expect I cracked open a bottle of Chocolate Milkshake Flavored Milk ($1.79), produced by Kwik Trip’s “Nature’s Touch” brand.

Hey, I’m not exactly Jack LaLanne over here, but I must mention that a 16-ounce bottle has an astonishingly awful 610 calories, 104 carbs, and NINETY-FUCKING-ONE grams of sugar. For frame of reference, a 16-ounce bottle of regular Mountain Dew has 240 calories, 65 carbs, and 65 grams of sugar. Sure, this “limited edition” lactose libation could be treated as a rare indulgence like egg nog or a Brandy Alexander, but I honestly found it to be too teeth-tinglingly sweet to be worth it.

Matt: “Wow, that’s thick,” I said as I poured this into my cup. “Wow, that’s thick,” I said as I took a sip. “Wow, that’s thick,” I said as I poured most of it down the drain.

Tyler rating: “Yeah, no.” (Not good)

Matt rating: “Yeah, no.” (Not good)

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