Krik's Picks

When I first started my career, 34 years ago, the company I worked for, Midland Cooperatives , was located at 2021 E. Hennepin Ave. in Minneapolis . Every once in a while, the publications department where I worked would go to Muffuletta for a special lunch. (I seem to recall that when we went there, the restaurant was called the Lamplighter Inn. Muffuletta’s web site says it’s been a St. Paul mainstay for 27 years. That would imply that it used to operate under a different name, probably different owners. But I couldn’t find anything online to confirm that.) Whatever it was called, one of the specialties that we all would look forward to was the beer cheese soup. Things change. Midland eventually moved out of the neighborhood to a new office in Fridley . Then, in 1982, it merged with Land O'Lakes , office located in Arden Hills. Muffuletta has changed a lot, too. The menu is much more up-scale with an emphasis on locally-produced food. But they still serve bee...

I’ve written before how my brother (whose birthday is in October) and I (birthday in November) have an annual lunch to celebrate. Well, we missed last year. And we almost missed this year. We agreed on a date, but I didn’t write it on my calendar. I would have totally missed it if he hadn’t had his assistant call and ask if we could meet a little earlier. Manny’s was an easy choice for this year’s lunch. It never used to be open for lunch. But a change of venue this year, to the swank, new W Minneapolis Hotel (located in the Foshay Tower ), also resulted in a few other changes – including, now they serve lunch (and breakfast, too). We both decided to order the Peppered Bar Steak with Bleu Cheese, Cabernet Butter. Wow! It was fantastic. The steaks were done to perfection. There was a generous dollop of a bleu cheese and butter blend with a hint of cabernet. The steak was a nice size for lunch. That is to say, it was a big steak. Not as big as the steaks they serve at Manny...

When we have dinner with my son and his wife and daughter, it’s usually at our house. And when it’s not at our house, it’s at theirs. But in late September, after Linda and I returned from our vacation in Greece , we decided to eat out with Ben and his family. He suggested Brasa . It’s reasonably close to their neighborhood, it has a good reputation, and he’d eaten there once before. It was a beautiful Friday evening. The weather was warm and still. The sky was cloudless. The trees in the neighborhood hadn’t begun to turn color yet. When we arrived at Brasa, we snagged the last remaining outdoor table and ordered a bottle of wine. (No struggling with a wine list here. The menu simply lists “Med. Bodied, Fruity, Red” or “Bold, Ripe Red.” We went with Med Bodied Fruity Red (which turned out to be a Pinot Noir.) The concept at Brasa is pretty simple and straightforward. Roasted meat – chicken, beef, or pork. Interesting sides. Lots of attention paid to quality and skillful preparation. On...

Our daughter ran the Chicago Marathon in October. This was the second time she ran it. She beat her first time, but she doesn’t run competitively. She’s one of the charity runners. She ran for the Leukemia/Lymphoma Society . After she completed the run, she went back to her apartment to rest. Then we met her for a dinner to celebrate her accomplishment. Gibson’s Steakhouse is less than two blocks from her apartment, and she commented that she’d always wanted to eat there. So as my wife and I walked over to her place, and as we passed Gibson’s, we stopped in to see if we could get a table. “Sorry,” we were told. “No tables are available until after 9 p.m.” We didn’t think that would work for Tovah. After all, she’d just finished running 26.2 miles. We figured she’d want to eat early and go to bed. As we turned to leave, my wife thought to ask about the outdoor tables. “You’ll have to check outside,” was the answer. Well, we did check outside, and much to our delight, we d...

Ok, I know that the host ‘cities’ for the convention were Minneapolis and St. Paul . I actually spent quite a lot of time during the RNC attending different events. I never got to St. Paul once. I think it’s noteworthy that while the business of the convention was conducted in St. Paul , 75% or more of the social activities were held in Minneapolis . Draw your own conclusion. The Star Tribune’s restaurant critic, Rick Nelson, wrote about the reception food at two of the events that I attended. For the delegate reception on Sunday, Aug. 31, he wrote: “ This red carpet seemed a bit frayed, thanks to generic, we-could-be-anywhere offerings along the lines of soggy duck spring rolls, drab commodity cheeses, fried and skewered scallops straight out of Mrs. Paul's and a mystery spread billed as olive bruschetta …” I agree with his assessment. Granted, it’s tough to serve a wide variety of reception food to thousands of people in a space as large as the convention center. But t...

When I invited the Strib restaurant critic, Rick Nelson, to attend AgNite, I said in my e-mail, “ I've gotta believe that the food and ag people will put on the best spread of the convention.” Being as objective as I can be, I believe my boast was partially true. AgNite was planned by the Minnesota Agri-Growth Council . It was intended to be a non-partisan celebration of the food and agriculture industry. A way to raise awareness among the visiting media and delegates (and a small handful of politicians) of the role of our industry in the American economy. AgNite was recognized as one of the major events of the convention, perhaps the major event on Tuesday, Sept. 2. We planned for 3000-4000 guests. Like the delegate reception, it’s a challenge to put on a party for that many people and still make the food special. In the main reception areas, there were several ‘butler-passed’ items. I didn’t try them all. There was a particularly unusual roast beef with horseradish canapé...

My wife and I went to Palomino after a reception. Food: 3 Service: 2 Ambiance: 3.5 Value: 1 When I set the 1-5 scale for KwikPick rankings, for ‘value’ I said a 1 means “they should have paid me.” For our visit to Palomino, they sorta did. We had a $20 gift card that we used on our visit. As I noted above, we had been to a reception earlier in the evening. There was plenty of food and drink, but we had planned to use the gift card anyway. We were surprised how vacant Palomino was at only 9:15 on a Saturday night. (Labor Day weekend, the waitress complained. She was bored and inattentive.) We each had a glass of wine and we split a salad and a pizza. My wife quite liked the salad; I thought it was ordinary. She didn’t so like the pizza, but I thought it was tasty. 4 items, $40. Not worth it. Take off the $20 gift card, and that was about right Recommendation: Keep looking. You can find better food, better service, and better value within a few blocks.