A tempura crunch fire and forced renovation has led a west side restaurateur to bring a novelty to Madison: conveyor-belt sushi. Jeannie Ni, the owner of Takara Sushi Station on Whitney Way, had wanted to bring this moveable feast to Madison for years.

Yakub Kazi, co-owner of Ember Foods, has long wanted to have his own food business. He finally started to take steps to make that happen in 2019, signing on to be a vendor at the Madison Public Market. That project has been mired in delays and pushed back opening dates, but in the meantime, Ember has begun to thrive.

The philosophy at Savi Cafe, located inside the Dane County Courthouse, keeps things simple and unexpected.

“We're restaurant quality in a cafeteria setting,” said co-owner Eric Gavins. “It's good restaurant quality in a place that you wouldn't expect to find it.

Garth’s Brew Bar may be located just steps from Camp Randall, but the vibe on this stretch of Monroe Street is very different from the raucous crowds that flock to Badger football games in the fall.

Owner Garth Beyer himself got into craft beer during his college days, so he doesn’t discount that some of the clientele for his curated American craft beer bar may come from campus. But there’s one key thing about the college kids that like craft beer and frequent Garth’s.

Jessica Wuesthofen’s family business is baking. Her grandfather, Rolf, opened Clasen’s European Bakery in Middleton with his brother Ernst in 1959. Now, her mom, Michelle, runs the bakery. Wuesthofen remembers lending a hand during the holidays, packaging cookies and helping her grandfather with production.

“I've always thought that I was going to be in the food industry,” Wuesthofen said. “I didn't really think about doing anything else. I just loved it so much.”

Owning and operating a restaurant was the last thing Zamira Lumani wanted to do with her life. Lumani grew up in the restaurant business and saw how hard her parents worked. She wanted a different life for herself and her husband Gjyner, who goes by Gerry.

The first thing customers see upon walking into Le C’s Patisserie & Tea House on State Street is a pastry case full of Instagram-ready indulgences.

Layered cakes are filled with fluffy frosting, beside realistic-looking mousse fruits and decadent eclairs flavored with matcha and tiramisu. Around the corner there’s more, taro mochi buns, almond black sesame bread and coconut almond buns.

It’s this juxtaposition of sweet and savory, indulgence and sustenance, that makes Le C’s so enticing.

Restaurants along Park Street serve a range of Asian cuisines — dan dan noodles at Ichiban Sichuan, savory broths at Double 10 Mini Hot Pot, egg custard tarts at Asian Sweet Bakery. Kim Khouch, owner of the recently opened Sunny Pho at 602 South Park St., thought this was a place her pho could flourish.

Of Cambodian and Chinese descent, Khouch first came to Madison in 1983. She spent time in other cities around the U.S., including Minneapolis and Boston, and settled back in Madison in 2002. Until recently, she worked at a grocery store, mainly cooking at home. She’d often thought of opening her own restaurant, but hesitated on taking the next step.

Everything Aubree Saia does is connected to health and wellness. That includes her superfood-enriched, CBD-enhanced cacao truffles.

“This is not your ordinary chocolate,” said Saia, who founded Inspired Alchemy with her husband, Bohdan Nedilsky, about seven years ago. “It's all organic, it's dairy free, we don't use processed sugar. It's nutrient dense.

Three days after opening in a nondescript strip mall in DeForest, the new Mexican restaurant El Alegre was packed.

“I honestly never expected it,” said owner Brian Trejo, who opened El Alegre in this quickly growing suburb north of Madison just over three months ago. “That really surprised me, seeing how happy people are when they leave that door. That makes us want to want to do better things.”

Deb Hantke can’t remember a time when she didn’t work in food service. She started her career as a waitress but fell in love with the industry in the kitchen, where things “just felt right.” It was a natural progression that led her to own Deb’s Squeeze Inn on Front Street in Milton, a little town about 30 miles south of Madison.

The cafe at 100 Front St. downtown is a newer iteration of a Milton restaurant that served the area just a block away from this one for decades. Hantke started in the kitchen at that restaurant, called The Squeeze, and eventually took over the business. When the city bought the building in 2008 and turned it into a parking lot, Deb relocated her cafe to Newville. It wasn’t a good fit.

She reopened as Deb’s Squeeze Inn right back in downtown Milton a decade ago.