Meet the Pabst chef who cooks for the stars

I’m Hope Karnopp, and this is the Daily Briefing newsletter by the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. Sign up here to get it sent to your inbox each morning.
It’s going to be quite a rainy week in southern Wisconsin. The most rainfall is expected tonight into Tuesday morning. The National Weather Service recommends clearing leaves from storm drains and gutters to avoid water ponding.
Dining critic Rachel Bernhard talked to Pabst Theater Group executive chef Kevin Sloan about what it’s like to cook for some of the world’s biggest stars, from Bob Dylan to Yo-Yo Ma. Most of the cooking happens in the green room-adjacent kitchen on the eighth floor of the Riverside.
The menus change every night at each venue. Sometimes, Sloan researches the band, pulling influences from their hometown region or creating dishes the artist may have mentioned along the way in an interview.
The planning pays off. Esmeralda Sambar, director of artist hospitality at the Pabst Theater Group, said she consistently hears high praise from the touring artists after they’ve tried Sloan’s food.
“We hear all the time, ‘This is the best catering in the country,’” she said. 
Public Investigator looks into who bears responsibility for emerald ash borer infestations. Jeanne Somers said she spent thousands after trees from a neighbor’s yard crashed through the roof of her garage and fell across her driveway.
Somers said she tried contacting her alderman, the Oak Creek mayor’s office and her county supervisor. After Public Investigator reached out, a representative from the Department of Public Works came and counted nearly 10 ash trees on the neighbor’s property, but reiterated the city would likely not be able to help cut them down.
Experts say the burden of tree removal almost always falls on property owners. For homeowners, the financial burden of removing trees can be high — approximately $1,200 to $2,500 per tree depending on the size of the tree and the complexity of the environment surrounding it.
Hope Karnopp can be reached at [email protected] or on Twitter at @hopekarnopp.
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