Offbeat Eats

When I moved to Minneapolis, a block away was a fairly derelict building that used to contain Blue Ribbon Foods, a frozen food distributor that had fairly recently stopped operations. After a few years sitting neglected, the building was purchased and refurbished. One side became a location for Dunn Bros’ Coffee, which was basically my home-away-from-home for my PhD studies. The other side became Alma, which quickly became one of Minneapolis’ top-rated restaurants. I was one of their very first customers, having more or less accidentally stumbled on a soft opening while getting coffee next door, and able to enjoy a few nice dinners there before moving away in 2001.

When I lived in the Twin Cities, an occasional outing for me was Tavern on Grand, a somewhat divey tavern on St Paul’s Grand Avenue that was well known for the giant “Famous for Walleye” sign and a big neon walleye outline. I didn’t go there often (I’ve got a mild seafood allergy, although I’m quite tolerant to walleye), but it was always enjoyable, and the walleye was indeed quite good (they sold enough of it that they were probably one of the larger sellers of it). But after a run of almost 35 years, Tavern on Grand closed in the spring of 2024. After some renovation, the location re-opened as Russell’s, named after the building owner, Todd Russell

I do a lot of flying for both work and pleasure, and things generally go pretty smoothly. However, every once in a while I do have an event that reminds me how tightly woven and highly-subscribed our air transportation system is when something goes more than a little off. After a nice morning workout at my hotel in Minneapolis, I hopped on the light rail, got to the airport, and was about to board my 9am flight… “Your connecting flight’s been canceled. We’re going to have to rebook you.” The next flight they could get me was… 6pm the next day. Well, I’ve certainly had worse things happen than a spare day and a half in the Twin Cities. I spent most of it hanging around with friends out in Chanhassen, but this also gave me a chance to wander around Bloomington, MN looking for a righteous Sunday brunch before my flight, and that’s how I found Hazelwood Food + Drink.

Almost every time I’ve come through the Twin Cities, I try to get together with my PhD Advisor, Terry, for a meal. He and his wife Nancy are pretty good at finding interesting places to go, a mix of newer spots since I moved away from the area, and newer spots. In this case, they wanted to take me to one of their current favorite spots, Holman’s Table over in St Paul.

Starting with my last pre-Pandemic visit to Minneapolis in 2019, several of my food-loving friends that still live in Minneapolis all had one place they consistently wanted me to try on my next visit to the Twin Cities: Nixta tortilleria. Nixta quickly became known as an excellent source for both hand-made heirloom corn tortillas and takeout meals built around them (birria, quesadillas, chilaquiles, empanadas, tacos, tlacoyos, and tlayuda!), especially during the height of the pandemic… but Nixta wasn’t open every day of the week, and my visits in 2019 and 2021 weren’t able to accomodate Nixta’s schedule. Neither was my visit this spring, but there was a key difference this time: chef Gustavo Romero of Nixta got access to the adjacent storefront, and opened a full retail restaurant, Oro. My visit to Minneapolis happened just a few weeks after their grand opening.

This spring, I had another opportunity to visit one of my favorite low-key destinations, my graduate alma mater of The University of Minnesota. Between the various work events I was attending, I had a chance to explore a lot of the surrounding area, which has changed a lot over the 20+ years since I had lived there. While some stalwarts (like the excellent Al’s Breakfast) remain, much of the area, especially in the Stadium Village area SE of campus, has been almost completely torn down and been rebuilt. One of the building exceptions to that is on Oak Street. Oddly, it was one of those “cursed” restaurant locations when I lived there: I think in the years I lived there and since, it’s been almost a dozen different places, but for the last decade or so it’s had a tenant that seems to be able to persist: Kimchi Tofu House.

Back in December, I was invited to the University of Minnesota’s Department of Mechanical Engineering to give a talk on some of my autonomous drone development work. I always love these sorts of visits, since they are a chance to keep caught up with what the University is up to… as well as having an excuse to visit some old friends and favorite food haunts. Indeed, it’s become a bit of a running joke that on most of these visits I end up going to Al’s Breakfast, often multiple times. But they also take me out to dinner. Last time, it was to a new-to-me place, Cafe Biaggo, but this time, it was a return to a long-ago favorite of mine, W.A. Frost & Co in St Paul.

As we spent a few extra days around Duluth, one of my goals was revisiting an old favorite: Fitger’s Brewhouse. In this era of “craft beer” and seemingly even small towns sprouting microbreweries, Fitger’s is getting to be one of the venerable Old School places. Originally a 100,000 barrel a beer major regional brewery that opened in 1857, the original Fitger’s Brewing closed in 1972. In 1984, the old brewery complex get reopened as a combined hotel (where we stayed this visit) and shopping center crafted from the old building. In 1995, new owners of the complex, inspired by new craft breweries opening out West, decided to add the Fitger’s Brewhouse and Grille. At the time, the microbrewery thing was still in its infancy, and on various trips to Duluth I’d often enjoying stopping by Fitger’s for a pint of their Big Boat Oatmeal Stout (back in those days, the only other oatmeal stouts I regularly encountered were Samuel Smith’s Oatmeal Stout, and Oil Change Stout from Flat Branch in Columbia, MO.

After we returned from Isle Royale, our group picked up our vehicles and luggage and returned to Duluth, MN to shower up and head out for a celebratory dinner. While one of the features of our backpacking trip had actually been good food (especially by backpacking standards), most of us were ready for a proper celebratory dinner at a restaurant: good food, proper table service, and, almost as importantly, some good beer, wine, and cocktails. With that in mind, we headed to downtown Duluth (which, mid-2021, is a mess of construction detours) to west Superior Ave, to OMC Smokehouse.

After leaving Minnesota, we headed up to Duluth to meet up with fellow hikers from Fitpacking, the guides for our trip to Isle Royale. After meeting our fellow hikers and doing a gear shakedown, we packed up and drove up to Grand Marais, MN to spend a night at the Outpost Motel before heading out early in the morning to catch the boat to Isle Royale. It was a nice drive; it’s been 20 years since I’ve been further up Minnesota’s North Shore than Duluth, so it was nice to see a lot of the parks I used to explore when hiking and scuba diving. To get to know everyone in our hiking group, we headed into nearby downtown Grand Marais for dinner. Summertime Grand Marais is quire the tourist town, and actually has a pretty good selection of restaurants, but several of us all had one place in mind, the Angry Trout Cafe.