Musings in Calhoun Square

Calhoun Square is located in the bustling Uptown intersection of Hennepin, Lake, and Lagoon. It houses Dogwood Coffee, Kitchen Window, about a dozen other awesome stores/restaurants, and is often hosting some sort of celebration or fair. My gym, LA Fitness, is inside Calhoun Square, and on my way there yesterday morning I really noticed how much the shopping center has grown since I moved here three years ago.

I took an extra moment to notice all the glitz and glamor that has come into Calhoun Square, and this lead to a lot of wonderings.

Such as….

Were these eggs bought specifically for this shoe display?

Was the full impact of this shirt understood during design?

Would my life be better if I owned bejeweled capri pants?

How many people own an angry birds phone case?

Or proudly wear this Hello Kitty necklace?

Are there any human beings that look better in this dress than this mannequin? 

And, finally, would the world be a better place if we were constantly asking one another this question?

Calhoun Square. Check it out. Learn about yourself.

 

The Lowry and Lemon Kale Salad

This past week, I went for lunch at The Lowry. The Lowry opened in 2011 and has been a hot uptown spot ever since. It has great food for all three meals of the day, and by night it turns into an upscale bar that attracts those who want something a little more sophisticated than what’s found at the neighboring Liquor Lyle’s.

The Lowry has a fairly extensive menu of great looking breakfasts, appetizers, soups, salads, and sandwiches, so it was a challenge to decide what I wanted.

I settled on the grilled cheese sandwich because it is served with a shooter of tomato soup. And, really, that is just too adorable to pass up. My friend ordered a breakfast dish that came with eggs, hashbrowns, toast, and turkey sausage:

In addition to a great meal out, I also had some good food from my own kitchen last week. I had some leftover kale that I needed to use up, so I came up with a salad using a lot of extra ingredients from around the kitchen.

First, I chopped steamed a half bunch up kale until it just wilted:

After removing the kale from the steamer, I added three shredded carrots, 1/4 cup cooked couscous, 1/4 cup chopped pecans, and 1/4 cup dried currants:

Finally, I squeezed the juice of one lemon into the mix and served with baked thyme chicken breast and sweet potato slivers:

The chicken also was simple and fast to make. I topped the chicken with a little bit of olive oil and some chopped fresh thyme and cooked at 450º for 15 minutes. Cooking the chicken at a high heat for a shorter period of time makes it so much juicier (I’m so glad I learned that trick at Kitchen in the Market with Noah last summer!).

Where to get a watch battery?!

About a month ago, my watch stopped ticking. just-like-that

Since then, I have tried in vain to get it replaced. Okay, actually I only went to Target and was told they don’t replace watch batteries anymore (which presumably indicates they used to?). After Target was a no-go, I was at a loss. Where could I conveniently go? No where, it seemed, explaining why I have been watchless for nearly a month.

Then, one fateful day last week while getting my routine dental cleaning, I noticed this sign:

Could it be?!

Miraculously, this small sign a mere two blocks from my apartment indicated that help was near. With no indication of a store name, I followed the sign’s direction to Suite 206 and paid a visit to Marshall Ferster.

WOW. This was one neat experience. As soon as I entered the second floor, I found an older gentleman hanging about in the most clock-filled room I have ever laid eyes on.

The small office and workspace was filled with watches, stopwatches, clocks, and timepiece accessories. The overseer, Marshall, had a magnifying glass head set securely fixed on his head, and immediately reminded me of Maurice from Beauty and the Beast. He was extremely nice and friendly!

I told him that I saw the sign downstairs and decided to come up to investigate getting my watch battery replaced. He told me I was the first person that had mentioned the sign, also mentioning that his friends wanted him to put a larger sign up to attract business but he didn’t like the idea.

Well, I will certainly be coming back here for any future watch business! After some additional admiring around the room…

…I got my watch battery fixed for a mere $5!

So, to all of you with dead watches and no where to get it fixed, go see Marshall at 1406 W Lake Street in Uptown!

Out to Breakfast

A meal out for lunch or dinner with friends or a hot date (read: my fabulous and fun bf) is not so unique for me. Obviously, as evidenced by my extensive list of restaurants visited around the Twin Cities area. A breakfast out though…now that’s something special!

Over the last couple months I’ve gone out to breakfast not once, but twice! IT’S A RECORD!

My first breakfast out was at the Uptown Diner. 

Uptown Diner is – you guessed it – a staple of Uptown. It serves breakfast and lunch Monday-Wednesday and then stays open all night long Thursday-Sunday. Read: it gets the brunch crowd and the bar-close crowd. Because who doesn’t want a juicy burger and fries and a malt after bar-close? Really though, I wouldn’t know.

I do know, however, know that their hash browns are bomb.

As is the veggie omelette with fruit:

And the french toast with fruit and nuts that my friend got looked superb:

If you want large portions and hearty food, this is a good bet for any meal of the day.

The second breakfast out I enjoyed was at Hazel’s Northeast. 

Another restaurant with a neighborhood association, Hazel’s is an icon of the Northeast neighborhood, and weekend waits can climb to close to two hours. Luckily we went on a weekday and avoided a rush (but the restaurant was still almost full!).

We were seated near the open kitchen and were immediately overwhelmed by the multitude of good-looking options presented by the menu:

The choice was made for hot cocoa, pico omelette, and drunken banana french toast (warm bananas, rum soaked raisins, caramel, and toasted pecans).

Everything was great!

Both of these locations are top-notch breakfast eateries, and the lines out the door prove it. If you go on a weekend, go early or expect to wait.

Falafel Two Ways and PUMPKINS

I’ve tried falafel at two Minneapolis restaurants in the last few weeks.

The first was at the Uptown classic, Falafel King.

At the corner of Lake and Lyndale, Falafel King is right in the center of Uptown buzz and makes for a convenient lunch/snack/dinner stop.

It’s a simple restaurant with limited seating and a basic Mediterranean menu: falafel, gyro, chicken, hummus, and tzatziki mixed together in various combinations. I ordered a greek salad with falafel and my friend got the basic falafel sandwich:

Yum! The falafel was super crispy and flavorful. I liked the salad but would probably go for a wrap next time just to get more tzatziki mixed in.

The second place I ate falafel was Vitali’s Bistro Cafe.

Vitali’s opened fairly recently, and, due to the recent closer of Little Tel Aviv in Calhoun Commons, is now the only kosher restaurant in the Minneapolis area. Fun fact: Little Tel Aviv is being replaced by another Falafel King. whomp whomp

Vitali’s is in St. Louis Park at the former location of Bean Good Cafe. Service is at a walk up counter, but there is plenty of table space to sit.

They offer a full espresso menu as well as some baked goods, smoothies, ice cream, and shakes. For food, it’s a broad menu with blintzes, omelets, sandwiches, sushi, salads, soup, and bagels. I got the falafel plate which came with falafel, pita, hummus, tzatziki, and Israeli salad:

The primary difference between the falafel at Falafel King and Vitali’s is that the former is fried and the latter is baked. The flavor in Vitali’s falafel seemed a little strong in an ‘off’ way (maybe too much cumin?). If I went back, I would order something different from the menu – there were plenty of other items that looked appealing!

Enough about falafel….

Since we are squarely in the fall season now, you may have noticed a sudden spike in the ubiquity of pumpkins. We can eat it, drink it, decorate with it, and – best of all – carve it!

My pumpkin was a big old thing that we got at Malt Tees, and Noah had a smaller pie pumpkin. We scooped out the insides and set to work on internet-inspired designs.

The final products came out pretty great if I say so myself.

In the daylight they are not too scary…

…but get them in the dark and you’re in for a spook!

If you haven’t carved a pumpkin yet this season, GET TO IT! 🙂

Stella’s Fish Cafe

Even though I live only a few blocks from Stella’s Fish Cafe, I’ve never been there for a meal. One time I went for an event that offered appetizers (where I consumed a record-breaking amount of hummus and fish fingers), but I had yet to go for the sit-down-and-be-served experience. I like fish a lot, but for some reason fish restaurants are never on my radar when I’m thinking about places to eat out. I guess I’m too focused on burgers and pizza. Ummm, what?

Anyways…I finally went to Stella’s for dinner a few days ago. Since it is an A-plus beautiful summer, we sat on their rooftop. I liked that the rooftop tables had umbrellas, letting me enjoy the sunshine without getting sunburned.

The table started with salads:

And I ordered the red snapper special for my entree:

It came with roasted potatoes and a corn/zucchini salad. Others ordered pasta with shrimp and the swordfish with asparagus:

Everything was fresh and delicious! We decided to order dessert. WARNING: the desserts are humongous! The menu didn’t say anything about size, so we each ordered one. One probably would have been enough for the whole table though. We ordered red velvet cake, coconut cake, and creme brule:

Needless to say, there was a lot leftover!

Stella’s was very good, and if you’re a big fish or seafood fan, then I would definitely give it a high recommendation.

Uptown Eats

I tried a couple restaurants around Uptown that have been on my ‘to-try’ list for quite some time.

The first: Fuji Ya

Fuji Ya is a sushi restaurant on Lake Street between Lyndale and Garfield. I’ve seen it recognized as a top notch sushi joint on several occasions, so I decided to give it a try.

Their happy hour deals from 5-7pm are awesome, so I went with a couple friends during that time frame. I ordered the yakitorii (chicken skewers) and futo maki specialty roll (egg, tofu, squash, spinach, cucumber, and japanese pickles).

Everything was good, but I always seem to have the same feeling after eating sushi: I’m not full. I feel like I would need to eat several rolls to really feel full after a sushi dinner. Still, I thought it was good and would certainly go back here. I think I still prefer Wakame in Calhoun Commons though.

The second place I tried was Caffrey’s Deli.

Caffrey’s is a sandwich shop on Lyndale between Lake and 31st.

Caffrey’s is another place that had been highly recommended both by people I know and various Twin Cities food reviews (VitaMN just listed it as the #2 sandwich shop in the Twin Cities). That said, I was pretty excited to see what all of the fuss was about.

Caffrey’s has a pretty small interior, and you order at a walk up counter (they also deliver).

Besides the main event of sandwiches, there was a case with some nice looking desserts, and they also appeared to sell Sebastian Joe’s ice cream.

Their menu is pretty basic – sandwiches and soups. The specifics, however, are not basic. Rather than offering one or two soups, there are 8 to choose from. The sandwiches come on white or wheat, and they have the standards along with philly-style sandwiches and a make-your-own option.

I opted for the loaded chicken philly on wheat (loaded means it comes with peppers, onions, and mushrooms) and a side of cole slaw.

The sandwich was good, but I wouldn’t write home about it. I think all the hype got me thinking that I would take one bite and be thrown into an ecstatic frenzy yelling, “this is the greatest sandwich ever!” Needless to say, that did not happen. The sandwich was fine. I enjoyed my meal. But I don’t plan on running back to get another one any time soon. Disclaimer for all you Caffrey’s die-hards: I will admit I am not a big sandwich person to begin with. I much prefer other lunch time meals, so feel free to consider that fact when judging this post. 🙂

Food Grows in Trucks

Wikipedia, the source of all reliable information, defines a food truck as:

A food truck, mobile kitchen, mobile canteen, roach coach, or catering truck 
is a mobile venue that transports and sells food. Some, including ice cream trucks, 
sell mostly frozen or prepackaged food; others are more like restaurants-on-wheels. 
Some may cater to specific meals, such as the breakfast truck, lunch truck or lunch wagon, 
and snack truck, break truck or taco truck.

Food trucks are all the rage these days in Minneapolis. You can see my first venture into food trucking here. To celebrate mobile food, Uptown hosted the second annual Minneapolis Food Truck Fair a couple weekends ago. I did not attend the original food truck fair, but from what I gather on the internet, it did not go well. There was an entrance fee, lines were monstrously long, etc, etc.

This year’s fair was held in Uptown instead of downtown (where the first one was located), there was no entrance fee, and the lines were still monstrously long.

I can’t compare the lines to last year, but I waited about 30-40 minutes. Admittedly, I don’t think there’s much that could have been done to speed the process if people wanted their food fresh, but if you hate standing in line this probably would not be a good event for you. It also didn’t help that there is an unwritten agreement between Minneapolis and myself that whenever there is an outdoor festival that I attend the weather will be boiling hot. Thanks, MPLS, I ❤ U. 🙂

My first stop was at The Anchor Fish & Chips truck.

While waiting in line, I watched the kid next to me chomp on a hunk of meat:

I ordered the classic. Fish. And Chips.

yummm.

My friends had a slightly shorter wait at Holy Arepa. They got – you guessed it – arepas:

A chicken pot pie pasty from Potter’s Pasties was also enjoyed:

Overall, the Food Truck Fair was a lot of fun and a neat opportunity to get a better idea about what the food truck scene offers. If I could plan the event though, I would have the trucks offer sampling sizes of their most popular dishes. With all of the option, it would have been fun to get to do more sampling. But with such big portions it’s not realistic to get more than a couple things.

If this happens next summer though, I will definitely be there!

The Green Mill

The Green Mill is a restaurant chain in Minnesota and other midwest states. Known best for serving pizza, they also have a broad restaurant menu as well as a full bar. Today I went to the Uptown Minneapolis location with my roomies from breakfast brunch lunch (how does time fly by in the morning?!).

Yes, that is my finger in the picture. Just in case you don’t have enough of me as it is. 🙂

The meal started with the bruschetta appetizer and a strawberry smoothie:

The bruschetta was pretty impressive – cheese melted onto the bread, served with plenty of veggies, cheese, and an olive tapenade.

For the meal we ordered a thai chicken salad:

Veggie burger with fruit:

And a walleye sandwich with asain slaw:

I ordered the walleye sandwich. It was lightly breaded and topped with parmesan cheese. Delish! The asain slaw wasn’t the greatest…I was expecting something veggie based and was surprised to find it was more of a noodle dish.

The food was good, but nothing too spectacular. The menu was a typical ‘we do everything’ restaurant and was, quite frankly, a bit overwhelming to order from. Maybe I am just too indecisive at restaurants, but I have a lot of trouble ordering if there are a dozen sections in the menu! This is an okay spot for a quick meal in Uptown when the better restaurants are too crowded (we ended up eating here since there was too long of a wait at Uptown Diner), but I would put a lot of other places before it.

Muddy Waters and Food Trucks

This week I had two new food experiences.

The first new food experience was going to Muddy Waters for lunch. Muddy Waters is a bar/eatery/coffee shop in Uptown on Lyndale between Lake and Lagoon. I’ve been interested by the establishment for a long time, and I finally made plans to get food there. The atmosphere is pretty unique since it does seem to truly be a coffee shop, bar, and restaurant all rolled into one.

When you walk in the door, to your right is a full bar and to the left is a full barista bar. The restaurant (and patio, when it’s nice outside) are full of patrons enjoying booze, coffee, or some variety of good eats. For my lunch rendezvous, we stuck with food and coffee. I ordered a malted mocha (something I’ve never seen on a menu before!) and the black bean hummus plate:

The hummus plate came with carrots, zuchinni, parsley, jalapenos, queso fresco, and grilled bread. The hummus was amazing. I could have eaten it with a spoon. In fact, that’s exactly what I did once I ate all of the veggies/bread. My lunch date ordered a made-t0-order pizza with ricotta cheese and spinach:

It received high reviews. Although their menu in not that extensive, all of the food was great (and the dishes we saw being brought to other tables looked equally appetizing). I would say this is a fun spot for a favorite dish, but if you’re looking for a wide selection or large plates, then you would be better off going elsewhere. If you’re a coffee fan though, it’s worth noting that the coffee bar was a walk-up counter and several customers cam and got to-go drinks. Their coffee menu had some unusual choices. Besides the aforementioned malted mocha there was also a white mocha, thai coffee, cubano, and all the regular espresso favorites.

The second new food experience I had this week involved food trucks. Since it was the weekend, the workweek line-up of trucks downtown wasn’t an option, so we sought out a different location. We discovered that a few food trucks were gathered by Fulton Brewery.

The brewery seems to have a relationship with the food trucks, and beer-seeking visitors can bring their food inside to the bar. The food truck options were:

• Lulu’s Street Food: serving tacos and fries
• Cafe Racer: serving Latin American food
• MidNordEmpanadaTruck: serving, you guessed it, empanadas

Our primary business went to Cafe Racer. Noah got the Colombian hot dogs and I ordered the pulled chicken plate with carrot souffle and moduro (fried plantains):

We also shared an order of chicken empanadas from MidNord:

I loved my pulled chicken and Latin American side dishes. The empinadas were also very tasty (and came with a delicious lime sauce), but the fried exterior was a little much for me. Since an ill-timed bout of pouring rain began right when we got our food, we enjoyed our lunches inside the walls of the brewery.

The brewery offers tours every Saturday at 1, 2, and 3pm. Although we didn’t join a tour group this time around, we speculated that it could be a fun activity in the future. The brewery was especially full of Twins fans who were watching the game on TV (and possibly heading to the stadium later).

My first food truck experience definitely piqued my interest, and I would like to head downtown for lunch during the workweek to check out a more extensive selection of food trucks. If you’re interested in the Minneapolis Food Truck scene, make sure to check out Reviews on Wheels, another WordPress blog devoted to exactly that topic!