As many of you know we really enjoy food and wine so here is a pocket year-in-review of the restaurants we visited in 2014. Perron’s Sul Lago, Prior Lake, MN – The old favorite still pulls at the heart strings. The food is great and the service is relaxed but attentive. The menu has gotten a bit familiar but in a good way. Campiello’s, Eden Prairie, MN – I really enjoy eating here and the menu turns over constantly, clearly a trick to get me to go there all the time (which works like a charm.) The wine list is extensive but a bit repetitive. This is the only place in America serving Lugana Otella right now, of this I am sure. Parma 8200, Bloomington, MN – Campiello’s brother restaurant with a WICKED outdoor patio. Lunch oddly seems more complete than dinner. Fresh, well-prepared food with truly outstanding service. Butcher and the Boar, Minneapolis, MN – David E. Davis, Jr, said it best. You’ll remember this place like you remember your first kiss from a girl who really knew how to do it. I can’t imagine the effort that goes into the food prep here. A charcuterie on-site. Over – way over – 100 bourbons. I met the chef at an event last summer and I almost pulled his hand off of his arm while thanking him for this unique, funky, well-executed place. We celebrate a quirky holiday at the end of February called Open that Bottle Night and I am hoping that they waive corkage and deliver the goose liver pate that I am dreaming of right now, as I plot which bottle of Ice Wine to open this year on OTBN. Cioppino on the Wharf, San Francisco, CA – Being prairie bound means many things, not the least of which is that for every well-turned-out fish chowder, there are about 100 pot roasts. Sitting in a place named after my very favorite dish was a thrill. Taking that all in with those I hold dear was a bigger thrill. The freshest seafood ever over a fennely-tomato-fish stock broth won’t be topped soon. Oddly, this wonderful thing is so commonplace that the service is almost too casual. The wine glasses were a disservice to the impressive wine list in this place (and a detail that always catches my eye… C’mon!!) Morimoto, Napa, CA – Breathtaking in more ways than one. Totally innovative cuisine with a familiarity that makes it all very comfortable. With all of the wine and food in this area, it is a bit of an arms race. Fried rice with shredded duck, fercrissakes! Don’t plan a quick meal here – you will never get it. And the wine glasses must cost more than a King’s ransom and are unique to each wine varietal… Yay! Pinstripes, Edina, MN – A fun place to eat and the host of OTBN 2011. Well-prepared food and a reasonable wine list; good service. I have one client that has a monthly meeting that I attend frequently. It usually ends just in time for a terrific, quick dinner, about 8:45 (and following a very determined 20 mile dash.) Since I eat lunch at about 10:30 am most days, these days can REAAALLLLLY stretch out so this is almost like finding a lifeboat after the ship has sunk and the sharks are circlin’. Ann and I met the owner at a wine event a while back and he was flabbergasted at our collective knowledge of food and wine. I have a feeling – but in the good way - that the cash register meant more to him than the wine list or menu. Smack Shack, Minneapolis, MN – Nearby the beloved Target Field (and the crummy Minnesota Twins) is a… lobster joint. Truly excellent food featuring an ingredient about as foreign as the rings of Saturn in these parts. It is not lost on me that this place started as a food truck, then shazam! Ab Initio, here I come!... Here at home in Prior Lake, we served grilled swordfish, smoked beef brisket, poached cod, barbequed rib roast, Cincinnati Chili, slow-roasted pork shoulder, corn chowder with Andouille sausage and bacon, lobster rolls, hand cut fries, many, many cole slaws, wood-roasted turkey and so many more. Reading this it seems a bit snotty – but I really, really like to eat. I’m probably lucky that I don’t weigh 350 pounds. But it’s a bit like my Porsche 928. I don’t own that car because it was expensive or rare or envied. It just fascinates me. It’s unique and interesting and complicated and simple and cockroach tough while being a pain in my neck, fussy, expensive, complicated and fragile. So for every bowl of fish stew, there are a couple of sandwiches. For every time the Big Green Egg lights off and fascinates me with its aboriginal cleverness, I hit “Add 30 seconds” on the microwave about 25 or 30 times. So… Eat well in 2015!
Posted on: Sun, 28 Dec 2014 01:57:25 +0000
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