Krik's Picks

Here’s a ‘first’ for Krik’s Picks. I’m writing a post about a restaurant that’s closed. I’m sure that several restaurants that I’ve reviewed in the past are closed now. But this is the first one that I’ve written about knowing that it’s already closed. My  wife and I went to Primebar at Calhoun Square in Minneapolis only once. It was exactly one week ago as I write this. We really liked it. My wife had a great burger, one that she described as being one of the best she’d ever had. I had a barbecued beef sandwich, which I also thoroughly enjoyed. We both had a glass of very good beer. The cocktail menu also was pretty interesting. The décor and ambiance was friendly and comfortable. Our server was attentive and helpful. And yet, a few days later, we both were shocked to read that Primebar had closed. No explanation why, just suddenly and abruptly closed. The day after we were there, the Star Tribune had an article on nightlife in Uptown, and included a call-out of Primebar. ...

I can’t believe it’s been almost two months since my last post on Krik’s Picks. There’s a paradox about my motivation for writing this blog. Because I travel for work, I get to try restaurants in different cities. So the more I travel, the more variety I find in the places where I eat. But, the more I travel, the less time I have to write about the places I’ve been eating. (Or to be more precise, the more I travel for work, the less I feel like using my down time writing.) The first three months of 2013 have been particularly busy with travel. It may have been the busiest period of travel in my career. Since January 1, I have been to Washington DC four times, Topeka KS three times, and one time each to Key Largo, Phoenix, San Diego, Madison WI, Sioux Falls SD, and Austin TX. Delta tells me I’ve already logged 22,702 miles, and I’m only 2300 miles from reaching Silver status. There have been years when I’ve barely reached silver by December. I have to admit, it’s been somewhat stres...

In the previous post, I explained that I faced a travel delay on one of my trips to Washington in early March. So I decided to treat myself to a nice dinner. I was staying downtown (at the Donovan House , a Kimpton hotel) rather than near Capitol Hill. I’d eaten at Equinox before and was sure that I’d get a great meal there. So after a day on the Hill and a few hours working in my room (including the incident of computer abuse described in the previous post), I walked over to Equinox. (You can read about some of my previous meals at Equinox at these links: July 2012 and August 2006 .) On the menu for this particular Wednesday night, they offered two tasting menus. Both looked good, but even though I was treating myself, they were a little pricy, so I looked at the regular entrées instead. I’ve had lamb at Equinox before and liked it. They had a saddle of lamb roasted with rosemary that looked good so I ordered that. (It was excellent.) I was having trouble deciding on a starter. I...