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Back to the Creek

Couple reopen the sports bar they sold

Two longtime restaurateurs in the Hortonville dining scene are back at it after leaving their business last year.

Mickey and Tim Guyette, founders of Otter Creek Sports Bar and Grill, 110 W. Main St., took over their operation again Aug. 17. Previous owner Mike Zelencik bowed out of the business last month to return to military work.

The Guyettes founded Otter Creek in 2010 and sold it to Zelencik in 2015. They still owned a majority of the building during Zelencik’s tenure. When he left, they returned in order to to keep the building in use as well as retain the restaurant’s customer base.

“We built it up and we didn’t want to see it close,” Mickey Guyette said of the restaurant. “It was very successful when we owned it, and we just wanted it there again.”

In early August before the Guyettes returned, Otter Creek had closed for a couple weeks. When the Press Star contacted Zelencik in mid-August, he declined to answer questions besides saying, “They’re going to be reopening soon. Don’t worry about it.”

The Guyettes were back in business as of Aug. 17.

“It’s a little overwhelming right now because we’re trying to get stuff back to where it was before we sold it,” Tim Guyette said.

The couple brought back their original menu and recipes and lowered the prices. They kept some staff and hired some new faces. They still seek two more cooks.

The main change under the Guyettes’ ownership is they do not serve breakfast. The restaurant opens at 10 a.m. and serves food until 9 p.m. Its bar remains open until bar close.

“People in town are very happy we’re back,” Mickey Guyette said. “Apparently they missed us as much as we missed them.”

Restaurant ownership runs in the Guyette family. Tim Guyette’s parents Leo and Phyllis Guyette bought the Black Otter Hotel on Nash Street in 1972. They sold it in 1985 to one of their sons before Tim and Mickey Guyette bought it in 1989. The couple converted it into a restaurant and ran it for some time, sold it to one of Tim Guyette’s sisters, then bought it again. In 2003, they sold the Black Otter to their son Bob Guyette and his wife Geri, who run it today.

Tim and Mickey Guyette took a seven-year break before buying a former carpet store downtown, renovating it and opening Otter Creek in 2010.

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