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As the holidays neared, Gwen, her brother and her parents would spend a whole day in the kitchen. From the early morning hours to nightfall, they prepared lefse, a Norwegian flatbread made with mashed potatoes and flour, using Aunt Charlotte’s recipe. In that marathon, they would cook enough to last through Thanksgiving and Christmas.
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Gwen Katula, owner of Lefse Time in Fountain City, Wis., specializes in cookware and items for making lefse, a traditional norwegian flatbread she grew up making with her family.
(Photo by Melissa Carlo/Winona Daily News)
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“Lefse at the holidays was just a tradition in my family,” Gwen said.
Gwen and Bill Katula built their Fountain City, Wis., business Lefse Time on those memories, making the treat from the same recipe handed down through the generations of her Norwegian family. Their business appeals to those who view lefse as more than just another offering at a holiday meal. Lefse Time’s success comes from people seeing the product as a link to their own treasured family tradition.
The family started the business “on a whim,” Gwen said. Bill worked full time at Vision Design Group in Winona, and she was a stay-at-home mom wanting to earn some extra income.
“The biggest thing is I wanted to do something to make a little money,” she said.
The couple already sold lodge décor items and other products on another Web site they operated, so Bill suggested selling homemade lefse online. The site launched in late 2003. They cooked in a rented commercial kitchen and stored the products in the couple’s Fountain City home.
“We couldn’t have a Christmas tree one year because we had so much stuff everywhere,” Gwen said.
The Web site boomed, but it was nearly five years before they had a physical location. Lefse Time opened in July.
Both lodge décor and lefse-related items pack the store. Colorful fabric dolls dressed as chefs sit near displayed lefse grills and gleaming, metal potato ricers.
The approaching holiday season buoys lefse sales. Customers from as far away as Alaska and Hawaii order online, and visitors from miles around stop by the store to browse and buy. Quite often, they end up telling their own family stories as well.
One Wabasha couple who recently visited the store talked about lefse’s place in their family. When one of their uncles designed a new kitchen, he made sure to cluster outlets together on one wall while hooking them up on separate electrical circuits to avoid blowing fuses. The arrangement would allow the entire extended family to come to the house and make lefse together, the couple told Gwen.
Customers’ love of lefse is often more in that link to family tradition — to uncles designing custom kitchens and aunts passing down their prized recipes — than the food itself.
“People always say, ‘Grandma used to do it, but she’s gone now,’ or ‘Our sister always cooked it, but she never taught anyone else,’” Gwen said. “They all just want to get back to it, that tradition.”
Dustin Kass may be reached at (507) 453-3513 or dustin.kass@lee.net.
