date: 8/30/11
location: minneapolis
grade: b (average for food), f for service (or lack thereof from me)

though this has been in uptown for 26 years or so, i've not been here. i made it to the wine bar once, that's it. when i was young and hung out in uptown more often, this was not the kind of place i ate at. it would be new, but there's always some place that seemed newer, better, shinier. cheaper. with better (and easier) parking.

the food at both the wine bar and the restaurant seemed to be the same kind of thing now done at a lot of places- fresh, seasonal local. i belive they change the menu weekly. they do get major props for doing all that before the trend, that much i will give them. but the best thing i ate all evening was the skin on the fish- it was crispier and tastier than i've had anywhere else, really. and the service was pretty awful. and with the prices they charge and the competition they have now, why would i go there again?

the dish with tasty tasty skin was the "pan-seared wild alaskan red king salmon with sweet corn pudding and marigold vinaigrette" ($24.95). the salmon was also cooked spot on, which is harder than it looks in restaurants. it could've used the vinaigrette, which was mostly on the handful of sugar snap peas and baby greens (not listed in the dish). it didn't read 'dandelion' or anything, just viniagrette. it needed something to complete it. more salt maybe? don't know. i do realize they wanted to spotlight the fish, but to me the fish tasted better when it had corn or greens in the same bite. so as a plate it worked.

as for the corn pudding, it was more of a corn gratin to me, down to the crumb layer on the outside. corn pudding evokes a more lush dish than this. this tasted clean and healthy. i was bound to be at least slightly disappointed with it as i had spied a sweet corn veloute dish that came with scallops. sweet corn velotue devotee that i am (in soup form), and i was hoping to get an allergy-free version of the dish... but no go on that. they made exactly enough veloute for the number of scallops they had. so the server said. they may have made it up though. and we had to ask several times just to find it out... but more on that later. i also think this was a thicker one than the soup i'm used to.

in the end, reading the menu description that enticed both of us at restaurant club to order the dish (vs. a decent sounding chicken and also a veg entree of leek fritters)... but the flavor didn't quite live up to the promise that the words had. again, it good, but it but it sounded better than it tasted.

but at least the food was acceptable, the service was a pretty big fail. i'm an early person, dining with a late person. i got there 5 minutes early and was seated and immediately asked for a drink order. being that i hadn't even had a chace to look at the menus, i said i'd like to think about it.... and the server wasn't even in eye contract range for 25 minutes i was waiting there.

i had no bread (you don't get that until after you order, and only two pieces per person for free, the rest they charge for, so major points off for that policy, especially as the bread was just ok and it was served cold, which always leads me to believe that's yesterday's bread. or the day before.). i had no drink (other than water, though no refills then), no appetizer, nothing nothing nothing and more nothing.

and couldn't order a single thing if i wanted to (and at one point i did, though after a while i was pretty sure even if i were starving, i wouldn't add anything to this person's check average and tip that wasn't my main meal). until the other person sat down. close to half an hour later.

this is not hospitality. this is me considering leaving... and knowing if i do stay, i will never ever come back. ever.

the server also had to be asked things several times before they were completed... once we gave up and asked the person delivering a plate to the table to get some sugar when it was clear after the third time asking it would never be anywhere near us at all if left to the server. the server should not be working in a restaurant at all. not sure how they ended up at a high-end place like this.

and the sad thing is? apparently this is not at all unusual for the place, according to the other restaurant clubber, who has been here before a few times. how they get away with this with ever-increasing competition not so far away i know not.