2nd- india palace, eden prairie
3rd- el loro, burnsville
7th- famous dave's bbq, minnetonka
15th- mainstreet bar and grill, hopkins
18th- salut bar americain, edina
22nd- szechuan star, edina
2nd- india palace, eden prairie (b+)
been a while since i've been here. i hoped for palak paneer at the buffet, but nope. i keep getting disappointed. you'd think at some point i'd go in for lunch or dinner somewhere and order it, but that... would be logical.
they had some of the same things as last time, though. spinach with chickpeas (chana saag), for instance. along with dal, pakora, chicken tikka, a potato dish (forgot what kind), basmati rice, and fried rice (that seemed odd), and probably a few things i forgot, along with the lettuce, cuke, and tomato salad, mint and tamarind chutneys, and raita. still all good.
a few things were less smooth than last time... they ran out of naan halfway through, and took ages to restock. (or at least it seemed like ages). desserts were not all that. fruit cocktail is odd in mango pudding, and i prefer my kheer to be not like soup with rice floating in it, but thicker, and sweeter than they had it.
while paying, they seemed taken aback at the coupon i printed off their web site, which turned the whole of the interaction into something odd and kind of cast a pall on the whole thing. the price without the coupon is about nine and a half bucks, which seems high for a lunch buffet.
most of the reviews i saw of this place touts its (relative in minnesota) authenticity. when i got the chips with my meal, i get salsa, ok, fine, but... ranch dressing? huh? it's quite good salsa, especially hit with a bit of hot sauce, but the ranch dressing is somewhat perplexing. is burnsville so wimpy they must have it's fire-quenching properties served with mild salsa? ranch dressing and tortilla chips. i don't get it.
there are three levels of 'nachos' here. one appears to be chips and cheese, the other two are the same except one appears to come with sour cream and guacamole (that's the one i got, of course). very tasty guac, and the best chicken i've ever had in nachos, sure. i have to hunt for chips in the nachos, though... there's maybe 10 chips on the whole plate. there's no salsa on the pile, so i use the leftover from the previous chips (i should've asked for more, i realize).
instead of the usual cheddar (or faux cheddar), there's a nice queso blanco on the pile. so that part's good, though the lettuce and tomatoes are the usual sad minnesota winter veggies. i'd like to try more things from their menu. i do realize nachos probably can't be authentic, as i think that's one of those american inventions, i'd like to see what they do with other things.
the savage location may be fun to do with others (margarita and mariachi night anyone?), but i think the burnsville location is decent for dining alone. they were nice enough to put me in a booth rather than a table for two that's kind of awkwardly set in the middle of aisles, service was good, but on the slow side. my guess that's because the place was packed. maybe when it's less busy i'll ask about the ranch dressing.
7th- famous dave's bbq, minnetonka (a-)
this afternoon i fixated on bbq chicken and corn bread. so to a bbq place mrs. brk and i went. i thought i had been to a famous dave's more recently, but i guess i've been to other bbq places instead. i find things improved in my standby meal- the chicken was meaty, the generous helping of fries warm, the coleslaw tastier. the corn muffin is still not quite there, and i did remember to avoid the corn, so i am not sure if it was sad or not but didn't look too happy.
the service was quite good, and when i asked to try the pickles, i did get quite a few (though alas, the person didn't hear the word 'fried' pickles... that's what i wanted to try... i got the spiced pickle chips instead, which either way i thought would be dill, but were sweet and sour). mrs. brk was also into the food, too.
15th- mainstreet bar and grill, hopkins (b-)
the cajun chicken alfredo wasn't the best thing i've had there. i should've known better than to get it, but it was a last second call on a quickly put in order and i wasn't sure what i wanted. it was decent enough, not the worst i've had, not the best. the breadstick it came with was nothing to write home about (or anything else other this, really), the salad it came with was passable. service was quick. thanks to mrs. brk's discount card, dinner (pre-tip) was about $11 for her reuben and my dinner. for $7.95 for mine (before discount), it still isn't a bad deal.
alas, when i walked in, i smelled smoke. i was going to check to see if they had a smoking ban exemption before we went, but there was no time to do so. so we may not be back for a while. there wasn't a lot of it, but it was there.
18th- salut bar americain, edina (c-)
well, at least the fries were still good.
after a meal that was iffy and bad in parts, we came upon the key here- don't eat anything that requires real cooking. frying, sure, composing, you bet, slicing, right on, but cooking... not so much.
the baguette and butter hit the table, all was going well.
we started with the aforementioned fries. still quite nice, with a quite decent bernaise sauce. then... i don't know. as we were low on bread, i asked for more. it never came until i requested it again.
they wanted to take the fries away before we were done, as the entrees were already at the table. (we didn't let them).
they refilled the water glasses- which i usually don't complain about- even though they put a carafe of water at the table and we had already refilled them ourselves. they kept doing that.
so the entrees. the person i was with got the beet salad she had last time, which was still quite good (though not the best she's ever had). but the potato soup she chose, well, it required cooking, so....
provencale, they called it. it was a chicken broth base with dill and spinach besides the pototoes. doesn't sound like provencale to me. it conjures up perhaps a cream based soup or a something with tomato. it was a letdown after the great soup from the last time here.
as for my selection... brk kicked in. the salad was good. the omelet. not.
in a quasi-french place, i expected the folded over, smallish, frenh omelet. that's what i was in the mood for. i should've asked, as the monster that came out overflowing on the plate was at least a four egg, american-style omelet, all puffy and such. it was not at all good. the eggs were tough, rubbery, and really not something i wanted to eat, so i pretty much didn't. they may have made a good bendy type of toy. so i opened it up to just eat the smoked salmon and chevre out of the middle.
psych- the interior had a sprinkle of salmon, cheese, and such hidden away in the cavernous egg-folds. disappointing. so not worth the $12 or so they charged for it. they did take it off the bill after inquiring about how it was and my reply (a more polite version of what you see here... tough, rubbery, disappointing). for that price i expect something pretty close to omelet perfection, not something that makes perkins look good. fyi, that's just one of the many places on the menu where the food seems pricey, though the priciness is inconsistent.
the black cherry truffle ice cream looked appealing on the dessert menu. it was supposed to be served with red velvet cake, but we asked if we could get it without. sure, we'll do that, they said. it was about four scoops worth, and the flavor was not cloyingly sweet like some ice creams can be. they had a variety of truffles textures in it (crunch, squishy, liqueur filled) along with black cherry bits. for me it was a bit too much chocolate for my taste, but hey... still worth it.
the place was less loud than before, it was more family groups than ladies who lunch and random businesspeople and it made it a bit less distracting for conversation. service, as mentioned, was... well, weird. this time i checked out the restrooms, they were the best i've seen in a while. but really, that's not enough to make up for the meal.
22nd- szechuan star, edina (a-)
weird, it seems like any problems we had last time we were here... gone. the buffet was cheaper ($9.95), food was hot and plentiful, and mostly tasty. lots of non-pork or beef items (including vegetarian), including an interesting dish with sole. though they still had the orange cake-stuff, which i remembered to ignore. service was still good. though i still felt on the young side, there was more of a mixed crowd there today.
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