3rd, edina grill, edina
17th- bunny's bar and grill, st. louis park
21st- papa murphy's pizza, st. louis park
24th- auriga, minneapolis
mrs. brk wanted the fish and chips, i told her she had that last time and i had the seafood stew. she doubted the veracity of my pointless information bank, but i was indeed right.
this time we had... a bad server. probably a newbie.
so let me put it this way... if it says on a menu that all salads are served with bread, and you order the special salad of the day off the specials board... you think it should either (a) come with bread, (b) say it doesn't come with bread on the list of specials, (c) have the server explain when someone orders it there's no bread with that one, (d) have the server least stop by the table at some point during the meal to inquire how things are so that the person who ordered it could ask about the bread, and/or (e) have the server be aware if it came with bread or not?
of course, none of these things happened. for that matter, after telling the server we wanted dessert, they forgot and just dropped the check off post-dinner.
as for the food, mrs. brk went with the salmon sandwich. she liked it, the salmon was a bit more done that i prefer. it came with cole slaw, which at first had too little dressing on it, and when mrs. brk asked for a little bit more, they drenched it with tons.
the salad i had was the saganaki, which was more or less greek salad with deep fried cheese on it. (how to feel slightly less guilty about eating fried cheese.... get it on a salad.) mrs, brk nicely gave over the top bit of her baguette, which the fried cheese was good on. the salad itself was average. the roma tomatoes were cold, squishy, and tasteless, the bagged salad greens needed a bit of picking over, and the whole thing could've used a bit more tossing. also featured on the salad, a few pitted 'greek' olives, red onion slivers, a hard-boiled egg, and tomato vinaigrette.
also had a bowl of the manhattan clam chowder, served with goldfish crackers. which was actually above average. it tasted like it was made in-house.
we split a huge 'bread pudding' for dessert. mrs. brk liked it as it was more or less a giant cinnamon roll, and she liked the crusty bits. i prefer a squishier pudding with more sauce (it had ice cream on it that was not melty enough), so i ate the inner bits. well, what i could. it was huge. she brought half of the sucker home.
17th- bunny's bar and grill, st. louis park (b)
thought i had the 'chicken mexi-nachos' here before but... nope, at least according to googling my own site and a dreamweaver search thereof. unless i spelled it differently. i'm too tired to care more. anyway, they weren't horrible, but not great, and didn't have lots of chicken. lots of lettuce, though, too much. tolerable. mrs. brk liked the reuben sandwich, which i think she's had before. service was quite good considering the busier than usual dining area.
21st- papa murphy's pizza, st. louis park (a-)
the mediterranean chicken they introed into their delite line is even better than the others i've tasted (after the first mention, i've had mixed results depending on the person who makes the pizza). this is perhaps the best pizza from a national chain i've had in years, if not ever (though i am fond of cheese stuff crust, crust does not a pizza make).
it tasted better the next day, with the leftovers reheated on the stovetop in a pan- crisped the crust even more. this one has spinach, feta, chicken, and sun dried tomatoes with a garlic and olive oil saue. i added a bit of cheddar on top and a few olives (which would've been good on the original pizza, but the whole point of the delite it the 'lite' part, so....
24th- auriga, minneapolis (a+)
it would be unfair to compare the pizza i had at auriga with the delite pizza above. the delite's grade is based on the realm of take out pizza. auriga's pizza, however, is compared against the best pizza i had thought i had in my life, and boy, it's close if not the... some things don't change here, like the overall goodness. this was our kickoff solefood restaurant, for that matter. we revisited it about a year later... apparently i always get pizza here, and i always mean to come back sooner than i do.
so this pizza... tomato, percorino cheese, best of both, but what kicked it to the top of the heap was... like the cuke on the previous one, something you wouldn't think to see on the pizza. truffle honey. who knew? damn fine. the server said they thought it was the best they've done. i wouldn't argue. i was so taken with it i couldn't think of the correct superlative.
before the pizza, i had the antipasto plate, which was... mostly spanish foods. ok. figs, machengo cheese, asparagus tips, and a tiny, savory almond tart. we had bread on the table, which i used for some of the fig and cheese bits. i liked the parmesan bread, mrs. brk liked the guiness wheat with raisins. though it was all good.
mrs. brk ordered an oyster off the amuse bouche bit (you pay a little for a bite or two of stuff), but she oversalted it at the table. oh, well. with it she went with a catalan saffron seafood stew. i've had similar at the edina grill, but it's more like a comparison with the delite pizza to aurigas... you can't really compare the two as they're working on such different scales.
aurgia's kicked ass. it had... grouper or flounder, i can't recall, shrimp, clams, veggies, bread floating in it, in a spicy, rich, saffron-infused smoky tomato broth of goodness. she had ordered a half-portion, but they ended up sending out a full but charging for the half.
for dessert, we went with the 'apple' dessert, featuring a warm almond cake, apple 'confit,' and calvados ice cream, and 'apple chips.' yum. (i would've gotten the cheese plate, but having had a cheese app and cheese for dinner, and mrs. brk not so much into cheese, well...)
service was excellent, the food was served quickly but not overly so, everything was a perfect temperature. heck, even the restrooms are improved (though still could be even better).
i am slightly confused regarding one thing here... the nine course 'spontaneous' degustation menu has to be ordered at least 48 hours in advance. anyone want to explain that to me?
now i'll just rub this part in. we had a tco gift certificate. and even though we weren't in the bar for the half-price pizza at happy hour (still one of the best values in town, if not the best), the whole of the check didn't come to the whole of the gift cert. so i'll have to go back soon... this time for sure.
it's all good.
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