The weekend morning ritual of many Marquette students involves making the Frodo Baggins-like hike to 20th Street and Wisconsin Avenue to eat a hangover cure in the form of breakfast from The Broken Yolk.
But in a few months, that treacherous walk will get a bit shorter.
Jim Gotta, owner of the The Broken Yolk, is opening up a second location on campus at 1617 W. Wells St., located two doors east of Real Chili. According to Gotta, the lack of parking at the original Yolk combined with the distance from the center of campus made the second restaurant necessary.
“We are a little bit too far up the hill,” he said.
Gotta, 62, is currently in the process of signing a lease with Marquette, which owns the property, and is obtaining quotes from contractors to renovate the inside of the building. If everything goes well with obtaining a city permit and Milwaukee Health Department inspections, Gotta expects construction on his new restaurant to begin in the middle of November.
The current plan for The Broken Yolk version 2.0 is to open sometime in the spring after 90 to 120 days of construction, he said.
Gotta said his business currently relies almost exclusively on walk-in customers and students who live in the 2040 Lofts apartment complex.
“Down in Campus Town is where all the activity is on campus,” he said. “That is a big marketplace we are too far away from.”
According to Gotta, a substantial portion of the Yolk’s business occurs from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. on Saturdays and Sundays, with as many as 700 breakfasts being made in that time period. Despite the second location, Gotta does not expect the wait time, which is almost the only complaint from weekend customers, to diminish much during those peak hours at either location.
“Everything is cooked to order; we don’t precook anything,” Gotta said, estimating the average wait time on a weekend morning to be 25 minutes. “There’s a reason people will wait here, and that’s because it is much better food.”
The new Yolk will not be open late on Thursday, Friday and Saturday nights, Gotta said, much to the disappointment of some students, including Joe Ryan, a junior in the College of Arts & Sciences.
“With Broken Yolk being in that spot and not open late on weekends, it’s like they’re teasing us,” Ryan said.
Gotta, however, has a practical reason for turning down the potential increase in business.
“I’m too old for that,” he said.
Students are pretty pumped up about the news of a second Yolk opening on campus.
Stephanie Walstrom, a junior in the College of Arts & Sciences, said she plans to dine at The Broken Yolk far more often once the new location opens.
“My roommates and I can’t afford to shell out a lot of money for breakfast, but luckily The Broken Yolk is both delicious and affordable,” Walstrom said in an e-mail. “We’re ‘egg-cited’ that they’re building one closer to where we live.”
