603 State Street · Madison, WI
History of State Street Brats
This corner in Madison has been serving brats since 1953. We've carried it forward since 1989.
1953 · The BratHaus opens
It started as the BratHaus
In 1953, two men named Seymore "Shorty" Kayes and Warren "Lammy" Lamm opened the BratHaus at 603 State Street. Brats and cold beer, a block off campus. That was the whole idea, and it was enough.
For more than thirty years it ran on the rhythm of the university. Students came in before the game, after the game, and between classes when they should've been somewhere else. Lammy and Shorty fed them all the same brat.
The building hasn't moved an inch since. Same corner, same address, same reason people walk through the door.
The world-famous
History of The Red Brat
This is the bratwurst that put State Street Brats on the map.
The Red Brat came from a Madison butcher named George Bishop. From the early '50s into the late '60s, Bishop made one recipe for one customer — the BratHaus. Nobody else could get it.
The brats showed up once a week, packed in old shoe boxes. Then the staff carried them down to the basement to smoke and split them by hand. The people who own State Street Brats today did exactly that work, in that basement, while they were putting themselves through college in the late 1970s.
When George Bishop passed away, his recipe became part of his estate. Shorty and Lammy bought it outright, so the Red Brat stayed where it belonged.
Over the years it's been made by a handful of Wisconsin meat companies. Today it's made by Bakalar's Sausage in La Crosse, a partner we've trusted for a long time — and the same Red Brat ships anywhere in the country.
What's a Red Brat?
Red Brat vs. White Brat
Most Wisconsin brats are all pork, Sheboygan-style. That's the White Bratwurst. The Red Brat is different: beef and pork, smoked, and split down the middle. Butterfly grilled face-down to make for a good snap. The beef is what turns it red. That's the whole name, right there.
Red Brat
White Brat
1989 · A new name
In 1989, the BratHaus became State Street Brats
The name on the sign changed. The address didn't, and neither did our job. Game days, late nights, and a brat that tastes the same as it did under the old name. The Red Brat recipe never changed a thing.
This is also when the White Brat finally joined the menu. The BratHaus had never served one in all its years, along with a longer lineup of food. Since then, thousands of UW students have worked these grills and walked out alumni. A lot of them still come back. That's kind of the point.
Saving you a seat
2026, We're still here.
We're at 603 State Street, where the BratHaus stood in 1953 and where State Street Brats has stood since 1989. Students, alumni, parents, first-timers, people who graduated decades ago and want one more — we feed all of them.
The Red Brat is world-famous now, which still feels a little funny to say about a brat that was delivered in shoe boxes. But that's the story. Part restaurant, part Madison history, same corner the whole time.
A taste of Madison
Take a little of it home
The Red Brat ships from Madison to anywhere you've landed. Same brat, just packed a little better than a shoe box.