Steep & Brew, a Madison original, is well connected to its community

Photos courtesy of Steep & Brew

Keeping the well known Steep & Brew coffee house alive and well in the Madison area, Saad Khalifa bought the shop next door to his yogurt shop a dozen years ago.

Every thriving community needs their locally-roasted coffee, and Steep & Brew has been the go-to in Madison since the 1980s. Located in Market Square at 6656 Odana Road on the city’s west side, the coffee shop offers a wide range of coffee, tea and baked goods in addition to blended beverages and sodas. Saad Khalifa has owned the coffee shop since 2012 and is committed to making Steep & Brew West a warm and welcoming place for all.

Originally from Alexandria, Egypt, Saad Khalifa moved to Wisconsin to attend the University of Wisconsin-Madison in 1980. He has lived in the neighborhood that Steep & Brew is in since he first arrived in Madison and has observed the area’s transformation over the last few decades. “When I came here it was countryside, like a farmers’ area,” he remembers. “Now it’s all industry and huge buildings.”

Shortly after he moved to the US, while visiting Milwaukee one day, Khalifa tried frozen yogurt from TCBY for the first time and it changed his life.

“It was crazy good, I mean just incredible,” Khalifa recalls. “I studied the company for a little bit and went to visit them, and I applied for a franchise.”

After training at company headquarters in Little Rock, Arkansas, Khalifa opened a TCBY in Madison, which also happened to be the city’s first frozen yogurt shop. “I started it just from one cup of yogurt, as they say,” he laughs.

Khalifa ran TCBY for over 30 years, right next door to coffee shop Steep & Brew West. He and Mark Ballering, owner of the coffee shop, started around the same time in the same shopping center. 

Khalifa continues, “I was getting coffee and tea from them all the time.”

Ballering had been the first coffee shop owner in Madison to roast his own coffee beans. In 2012, he considered closing Steep & Brew but Khalifa did not want to see the place go. He bought it from Ballering, and for two years ran TCBY and Steep & Brew together before ultimately closing TCBY, running Steep & Brew full-time since.

“It’s a night and day difference,” Khalifa compares running the stores. “With TCBY, we dealt mostly with younger kids and high school students and families, but with coffee you deal with mostly adults and business people. Yogurt is a late business and coffee is an early morning business.”

The Steep & Brew coffee selection is vast, encompassing Colombian, Guatemalan, Sumatran, Costa Rican and Kenyan roasts, while their organic coffees come from Peru and El Salvador. Flavored roasts like Icing on the Cake, Toasted Nut, Italian Espresso and French Roast bring potent notes of fragrant, sweet flavors.

“Sumatra Dark is our best seller,” Khalifa explains. “The one to go with if you get confused and wonder what you’re going to get from all this, the Colombian roast is a safer bet.”

Steep & Brew coffee is also sold in a limited selection of Wisconsin grocery stores.

“There are people who have been coming here since we started,” Khalifa affirms. “A lot of business people come to use their laptops in the shop.”

In addition to their beans, Steep & Brew is locally renowned for their cappuccino, which is crafted with a perfected ratio of espresso, milk and foam. “Everybody who works here knows exactly how to make it,” Khalifa assures. “We take pride in having specific people training how to do that, no matter how long it takes.”

Steep & Brew also has a number of original creations such as the nutty, light-roast espresso drink White Zombie, the Indian Sunset chai latte, and the Caffeinated Cow concoction of chocolate ice cream and espresso.

“The Caffeinated Cow has a lot of caffeine, so we always warn people when they ask for it,” Khalifa notes. “We tell them that if they cannot handle caffeine, they should not have that, but if someone needs caffeine for the day with something sweet to it then that’s one they should have.”

Steep & Brew coffee is roasted locally and sold in select Wisconsin grocery stores.

“Sumatra Dark is our best seller,” Khalifa explains. “The one to go with if you get confused and wonder what you’re going to get from all this, the Colombian roast is a safer bet.”

Steep & Brew coffee is also sold in a limited selection of Wisconsin grocery stores.

“There are people who have been coming here since we started,” Khalifa affirms. “A lot of business people come to use their laptops in the shop.”

In addition to their beans, Steep & Brew is locally renowned for their cappuccino, which is crafted with a perfected ratio of espresso, milk and foam. “Everybody who works here knows exactly how to make it,” Khalifa assures. “We take pride in having specific people training how to do that, no matter how long it takes.”

Steep & Brew also has a number of original creations such as the nutty, light-roast espresso drink White Zombie, the Indian Sunset chai latte, and the Caffeinated Cow concoction of chocolate ice cream and espresso.

“The Caffeinated Cow has a lot of caffeine, so we always warn people when they ask for it,” Khalifa notes. “We tell them that if they cannot handle caffeine, they should not have that, but if someone needs caffeine for the day with something sweet to it then that’s one they should have.”

With over 20 varieties, tea that Steep & Brew serves comes from India and China as well as domestic suppliers. They offer both Italian and French soda, the difference between the two being French soda contains heavy cream. Other non-coffee beverages include hot chocolate, non-dairy smoothies and apple cider.

For their bakery, Steep & Brew receives fresh pastries from Madison Sourdough every single morning, as well as frozen options from Elegant Foods that they bake in the shop. Baked goods available range from muffins to scones to croissants to quiches. The shop also carries a limited selection of merchandise like French presses and Chemex pots.

Saad Khalifa is passionate about bringing community together, and years ago he initiated the weekly Coffee With Cops meeting at Steep & Brew on Thursdays at 9 a.m., where members of the public may come discuss issues, concerns or requests with local law enforcement.

“If the public has a problem, they can come meet and chat,” Khalifa elaborates. “They can ask about budget or hiring or the neighborhood, and they work it out together. The idea has gotten popular; now most coffee shops in Madison do it.”

He’s also involved in getting people from all faiths to know and work with each other, highlighting concerns of Jewish and Latino and Muslim communities.

Khalifa initiated the first community conversation with local police officers at his coffee shop.  Other cafes in the area have adopted this idea in their shops.

Since Ramadan of 2023, Steep & Brew hosts a monthly gathering called “Layali Nights” from 7 p.m. to midnight, where Muslim community members gather for Yemeni coffee and tea. During Ramadan, the event is held every weekend.

Khalifa is a trustee at Madinah Community Center, where he and fellow board members make decisions regarding Madison’s Muslim community. Through this role, Khalifa has been involved in various community projects such as opening a new soup kitchen, having a new mosque built, and purchasing a cemetery where funeral services are offered free of charge to ease the costs of burial.

Youths enjoying the “Layali Nights” a late night event especially for the Muslim community, hosted by owner Saad Khalifa.

Saad Khalifa enjoys many volunteer opportunities and community service, concluding, “I am thinking about getting somebody to manage the business and then I’m going to retire. That’s what’s in the coming years.”