No pizza, no pasta. What kind of Italian restaurant is Terzo Vino Bar in Minneapolis?

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Actually, Broder’s Terzo Vino Bar isn’t an Italian restaurant. It’s an Italian wine bar, with a 1,000-bottle all-Italian wine cellar, and more than 40 wines by the glass (or half-glass.) The kind of place where you might stop for a glass of Amarone and a small plate or two, after putting your name in for a table across the street at Broder’s Pasta Bar. I’m a big fan of the Pasta Bar, and so are lots of other people—I’d go there more often if it weren’t for the no-reservations policy. (Which I understand—I just don’t like to wait.)On first view, Terzo is stunningly romantic. The windowless whitewashed walls and exposed incandescent bulbs encased in glass carafes give the ground-level restaurant the feel of a wine cellar in Tuscany. Continue Reading

Hidden in plain sight: Indian cuisine at Malabari Kitchen, Winner, and Hot Indian Foods

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A tiny storefront without a sign. A food truck. A gas station. Indian cuisine is showing up in unexpected places.The Malabari Kitchen has been in operation since last December, in the tiny storefront previously occupied, in quick succession, by Korean, Thai, and multi-ethnic Southeast Asian restaurants. There’s no sign above the door, just an awning that says Asia Kitchen, left behind by the previous tenant. Continue Reading

Twin Cities foodie checks out the dumplings at Din Tai Fung, Asia’s best restaurant

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Our motto here at the Daily Planet is “Local News for Global Citizens,” but sometimes we get things backwards, and send a local citizen to cover a global story. Like when The Daily Meal announced their 2013 list of the 101 Best Restaurants in Asia. The #1 restaurant on the list is Din Tai Fung, a Taiwan-based chain with branches in Australia, China, Hong Kong, Indonesia, Japan, Malaysia, Singapore, South Korea, the United States, and Thailand.(By the way, people who love fine dining or journalism should never see how these “best” lists get created. It is interesting to note that the top restaurant on The Daily Meal’s list of 101 Best Restaurants in Asia didn’t even make the list of Asia’s 50 Best Restaurants organized by Restaurant magazine, while the restaurant that topped the Asia’s 50 Best list, Narisawa of Tokyo, didn’t rank in The Daily Meal’s top 101.)So when I learned that Jim Harkness, president of the Minneapolis-based Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy was headed to Beijing on a work trip, I asked him if he could pay a visit to the local branch of the award-winning restaurant.Turns out that Jim, who travels to China regularly, was already familiar with Din Tai Fung. “I know it well. Continue Reading

Royal Bangkok: Twin Cities’ best Thai? Maybe. Best deal? Definitely.

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Arguing about which is the best Thai restaurant in the Twin Cities is a favorite foodie pastime. Each of the Uptown Thai restaurants — Chiang Mai, Roat Osha, Amazing Thailand,  Tom Rup Thai — seems to have its fan base, and so do Sawatdee, True Thai, Ruam Mit and all the rest. If you have an opinion about which Thai restaurant is best, I have a poll for you – click here to vote for your favorite, and share your comments about local Thai dining options. (This is a bit of an experiment for me, since I have never used the Daily Planet’s poll tool before.) To be perfectly honest, I’m not really qualified to say which Thai restaurant is best, because I haven’t been to most of them in years. A few years ago, I got a tip from a reader who had lived in Thailand, recommending the Bangkok Thai Deli, and when I visited, it was love at first bite. The flavors were lively and fresh, and the fact that the restaurant always seemed to be packed with Asian customers, seemed to vouch for its authenticity. Continue Reading

Shabelle Grocery’s secret Ethiopian restaurant now offers a lunch buffet

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The little Ethiopian restaurant hidden away inside the Shabelle Grocery used to be one of the best-kept secrets in the Seward neighborhood—until recently, there was no sign outside to indicate that Shabelle was more than just a grocery store. Finally, last week, they put a sign in the window announcing their new $8.99 lunch buffet, served Monday to Thursday from 11:30 a.m. to 2 p.m.This is not one of those 100-item strip mall mega-buffets. When I visited, there were only about half a dozen items to choose from, mostly vegetarian: red lentils, yellow split peas and stewed black-eyed peas, collard greens, linguine in a beefy tomato sauce, seasoned rice, a Greek salad and injera, the traditional spongy sourdough flat bread. What struck me was how fresh and flavorful everything tasted.There’s lots more on the a la carte menu, ranging from kitfo (Ethiopia’s version of steak tartare) and rice with goat meat (both $10); Middle Eastern dishes like felafel, gyros, and chicken kabobs; and even a Buffalo chicken wrap and a hamburger (most items $5.99). The breakfast menu includes foule (refried seasoned fava beans, $6), scrambled eggs ($4.99), sambousas (stuffed pastry triangles, 50 cents apiece), and fatira (pita bread cooked with eggs, green peppers, onions in olive oil, $5).Also read Ethiopian flavors spice up Shabelle Grocery and restaurant in Minneapolis (Stephanie Fox) Continue Reading

Eat for Equity dinner May 25 to support Friends of the Boundary Waters Wilderness

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Eat For Equity is a wonderful volunteer-led organization that organizes fundraising dinners. Every month, they pick a different worthy cause to support, and for this month, they chose the Friends of the Boundary Waters Wilderness. (The Twin Cities Media Alliance had its turn last year.)  Eat for Equity events draw a fun group of people, mostly in their 20s.The menu for Saturday’s dinner, to be held at a private home in Plymouth, includes woodfire pizza, a spring salad and a surprise dessert, plus homebrew and more. (Wine and beer are usually available.) To see the address for this Saturday’s event, go to their Facebook event page.The cost is very reasonable: a suggested donation $15-$20. Because all of the labor and most or all of the food is donated, most of the proceeds go to support the beneficiary organization. Continue Reading

Fun food stuff to do this weekend: Fiesta Fantastica, farmers’ markets, and more

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Lots of food fun this weekend. Weather permitting, I’m going to jump on my bike on Saturday and do a gastronomic circuit, starting with the Mill City Farmers’ Market, where May 18 has been proclaimed Backyard Bee Keeping Day. Lots of spring produce and bedding plants for sale, plus a cooking demo by market chef Heather Hartman, using honey from Beez Kneez, a local non-profit that delivers fresh local honey by bike. Beez Kneez will also be on hand at the Community Booth, providing information about the vital role that bees play in our food system. Music by the Cactus Blossoms, a terrific local country-western trio.Next stop, the Fulton Farmers’ Market, 4901 Chown Ave, S., Minneapolis, which opens for the season on Saturday. Continue Reading

Big Marina Grill & Deli in Columbia Heights: Middle Eastern and more

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The buffet offerings are as varied as the clientele at Big Marina Grill & Deli, 4755 Central Ave., Columbia Heights—mostly Middle Eastern, with lamb shanks, chicken kabobs, kofta kabobs, stuffed grape leaves, grilled eggplant, felafel, hummus, tabouli, soups, samosas, baklava, and Greek and Middle Eastern salads and pastries. But there are lots of other dishes to choose from as well—shrimp, fried chicken, fish, barbecued beef ribs, pasta, veggies, and more. The price is a very reasonable $11 for lunch, and $14 evenings and weekends. An a la carte menu is also available, with salads, burgers, sandwiches, dinner entrees and combination platters for two, four or six. Here’s a video segment about Big Marina and its owner, Shaker Hegazy, produced last year by Ahmed Tharwat for BelAhdan, the Arab/Muslim-American TV show that airs on TPT’s MN Channel:  Continue Reading

The Pig Ate My Pizza—and I ate the pig

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Did you ever wonder what would happen if the wild and crazy guys behind Travail Kitchen & Amusements opened a pizzeria? Would they, like, create a foie gras pizza? Or a Mussels from Brussels pizza, as a tribute to Jean Claude Van Damme, topped with mussels, brussel sprouts, and chorizo? Or maybe an appetizer made from pig feet and cheeks, and call it hoof-n-mouth?Yes. Travail, which put Robbinsdale on the foodie map with its innovative combination of molecular gastronomy and short order cooking, closed last month, and is scheduled to reopen in August in a new location nearby. Meanwhile, the original space has been turned into Pig Ate My Pizza, a pizzeria with a lot of the same what-are-these-guys-smoking panache as its predecessor.When I visited last Sunday, their third day in business, we were only able to sample a few dishes, but I came away impressed. Continue Reading

Something’s missing at the New Bohemia Wurst & Bier Haus in Northeast Minneapolis

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I stopped by recently for a brat and a beer at the New Bohemia Wurst & Bier Haus, 233 E. Hennepin. It’s a popular place, with more than 30 different local, regional, and foreign beers on draft and another nearly 50 different beers in bottles and cans.The wurst selection is nearly as impressive: more than 15 different kinds of sausage, ranging from classic German-style ($6)  and savory Italian ($6) to Cajun andouille ($6.50) and even exotic varieties made from wild game  including alligator, rattlesnake,  rabbit, wild boar and pheasant (all $8). I opted for the garlicky and very tasty Filipino Maharlika pork sausage ($6.50) slathered in grilled onions and peppers, and washed it down with a glass of Summit Bohemian Pilsner ($4.75). But it’s what they don’t serve that caught my attention. I mean, just imagine that somebody opens up a restaurant and calls it Golden Dragon Chinese, and when you open the menu, it’s all meatloaf and mashed potatoes and spaghetti and meatballs, with maybe one Chinese item, like eggrolls, somewhere on a back page.It would be an outrage.So, here’s a place that calls itself the New Bohemia, after the homeland of the world’s greatest beers, and has a sign on the sidewalk, inviting people to come in and “Czech Us Out.” And there isn’t a single Czech beer on tap, or a single Czech sausage on the menu. (Okay, they do have Staropramen, a pretty good beer from Prague, available in bottles, but Czechs drink bottled beer only in emergencies. Continue Reading