Milwaukee Christmas Lights and Desserts Tour Strolls Through Once Again

“Who doesn’t love dessert?” was the thought in Joni Stefanczyk’s head when her mother brought up the Christmas Lights and Desserts Tour. Her mother, Joanne Grych, invited both Joni and her sister, Jill, to celebrate the two of their birthdays.

The three of them get together every year because the sisters have since moved out of their mother’s who still lives in Whitefish Bay. Joni lives in Kohler,Wisconsin now and has two boys that recently graduated college.

This year, Joanne decided to take her daughters on the Christmas Lights and Desserts Tour that strolls through Milwaukee, stopping at various places to taste desserts and view Milwaukee’s holiday light displays.

“With busy lives, it’s hard to get everyone together,” says Grych. She was intrigued and thought it would be a nice way to look at the Christmas lights around the city with her children.

Both Joni and Jill recall older times. “When they were younger, I would take my kids on walks at night to look at Christmas lights,” says Stefanczyk.

The Milwaukee Food and City Tours Company offers various tours and trips throughout the year. Some in Milwaukee, others in Wauwatosa, Cedarburg, and Racine and they also offer trips outside of Wisconsin. “Currently we have a group on a culinary vacation to Poland, and have plans to offer a Cigar & Culinary Lovers trip to Cuba,” says Theresa Nemetz, founder and CEO.

Milwaukee Food and City Tours started in 2008, with their first tour being the Brady Street Lunch Tour, which still exists today. “I chose that neighborhood as it was one in which I grew up in,” says Nemetz. She also “wanted to show visitors the great places to visit such as Zaffiro’s, Glorioso’s Deli and Peter Sciortino’s Bakery.”

After much feedback, suggestions and requests from customers, Milwaukee Food and City Tours started adding more and more tours, ones like the Christmas Lights and Dessert Tour. Other Holiday Tours include: a Blissful Bites & Bubbles tour for Valentine’s Day, a Lenten Friday Night Fish Fry, and Ghouls and Spirits Adult Trick-or-Treat. To see a list of all available tours or trips visit their calendar.

The Christmas Lights and Desserts Tour offers dessert from four different places: Caffe Deco, Greige Café, Classy Girl Cupcakes and Maders. It also makes three stops at places where guests can get out and take pictures of all the Christmas light displays Downtown Milwaukee puts up every year.  

As you ride on the bus from stop to stop,the tour guide tells a little history lesson of Milwaukee. One of the lessons was the history of Fredrick Pabst and Phillip Best as we passed the Pabst Mansion which is extravagantly lit up at this time of year. Do you know how the Blue Ribbon came about? It was so people could distinguish the beer between others.People would shout out, ‘give me the one with the blue ribbon’. It was all a marketing scheme.

Other topics of history discussed was Marquette, the world’s first co-ed catholic university, The Wisconsin Club/Mansion, which was once Alexander Mitchell’s mansion which occupies an entire block downtown, as well as how Walker’s Point was named, along with the Christmas history of BMO Harris Bank and among other fascinating information.

The tours are guided by native Milwaukeeans who enjoy good cuisine, our city and its history. Nemetz says that “Each tour route has a unique hook such as neighborhoods, sweets, cuisine, history, photography and even song. We match our guides with passions in these areas to lead those tours.

In the case of the Christmas Lights and Desserts Tour, Morgan was the Guide. She’s been a tour guide for two years now and has a background in choir. Throughout the bus ride, Morgan would sing, or shall I say carol, to some traditional holiday songs like Jingle Bells and Santa Clause Is Coming To Town. And by all means, riders are encouraged to sing along.

“I guide a few tours,” says Morgan. “I by far like this one the most. And if I can guide the Taco’s and Tequila Tour and still say this is my favorite, then there’s something to be said about that.”The tours are meant to be light-hearted, fun, and yet still informational and satisfying, both hunger and socially wise. “It’s my favorite because it gives you a reason to stop all the hustle and bustle in life and helps you really enjoy the season.”

The tours attract many lifeforms and from all over the state of Wisconsin, maybe even outward. Along with the two ladies enjoying their Birthday outing with their mother, there were two other couples who joined them that night, Dec. 7^th, on the first Christmas Lights and Dessert Tour of the season. The tour runs every Friday, Saturday, and Sunday from now until Saturday Dec. 29^th.

One couple was from Oconomowoc and are expecting their first child in three weeks. They’re excited and warmly welcomed the advice from the fellow ladies as they ate their Apple Strudel from Maders restaurant. The other couple who joined was from nearby, on the East Side.

Even though adults were the only ones on the tour that night, the Christmas Lights and Dessert Tour is also child friendly.

Children can opt to write Santa a letter in the beginning of the tour at the Ambassador Hotel where the whole journey starts. Once the group is ready to head out, the children can put their letters in Santa’s mailbox at Cathedral Square, which showcases their holiday display called “Christmas Spirit”. For the last ten years, they reach out to over 20schools in the Milwaukee area, over 75,000 students participate and they all make ornaments to hang on their class’ themed tree.

Most of the tours last about two to two and a half hours. The walking tours host up to 16 guests, and bus tours host up to 28 guests in their signature green buses.

Ever since news broke that a streetcar would be installed in Milwaukee, the company has been planning to launch a Streetcar Food Tour. “With over 50 locally owned bars and restaurants within a block of the streetcar, it makes sense to use yet another mode of transportation to explore the city,” says Nemetz.

Even more futuristic, Nemetz dreams of being the first tour operator to bring self-driving technology to tourism in Wisconsin. Let the Milwaukee Food and City Tours ride on.