Northern Lights Rare Beer Fest makes a difference

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Sometimes drinking beer can make a difference. That’s the goal with Northern Lights Rare Beer Fest, which hits St. Paul for the second straight year on Sat. March 28. The festival is both a showcase for rare and limited beers that fans can’t get anywhere else, but it’s also a significant fundraiser for Pints for Prostates, a national charity that raises awareness and funds for prostate health.Chop Liver Craft Beer Festivals sponsors Rare Beer Fest, as well as St. Continue Reading

In the sugar maple grove, things are sweeter than ever

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Sugarbushing begins in February when the snow is still on the ground and the sap in the sugar maple trees begins to rise. At the the Wozupi Tribal Gardens’ grove in Prior Lake, that still means it’s time to get to work. But, it no longer means pulling out the metal taps, the stainless steel buckets and the kettles.“Buckets are for hobbyists,” said Rebecca Yoshino, the director of the Wozupi Tribal Gardens and the maple syrup operation for the Shakopee Mdewakanton Sioux Community. “The bucket system is very labor intensive. You had to put the buckets up and take them down every year. Continue Reading

Brewers Ball raises funds for cystic fibrosis

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The Brewer’s Ball, a fundraiser from the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation of Minnesota, isn’t your average beer festival or your average charitable fundraiser. Yes, it features 25 local breweries, a tasting glass, and a personal encounter with the recipe makers behind your favorite beers. But it’s also a fundraiser where your donation is certain to make a difference.The Brewer’s Ball name carries over from the group’s formal Fargo gala, but in Minneapolis it’s a more casual affair. With ticket prices set higher than other festivals, it A) raises more funds, and B), attracts a crowd that is truly interested in the event instead of degenerating into a drunk festival.“One of the things I really wanted to do was focus on creating an event that raised money but also celebrated the breweries and made it somewhat different for them,” says Development Director Matt Ling of the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation. “We got great feedback from the brewers [last year] that it was something they really enjoyed.” The smaller size of the event helps to foster that environment, and it still raises sufficient funds, collecting just over $45,000 in 2014 (a piece of over $3million in total funds raised during the year).Brewer’s Ball is one of 25 annual events from the local chapter, who manages fundraising in Minnesota, North Dakota, and South Dakota. Continue Reading

House passes lower minimum wage for tipped employees

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Some waiters and other tipped workers could earn a wage lower than the state minimum, under a bill the House passed 78-55 late Monday.HF1027, sponsored by Rep. Pat Garofalo (R-Farmington), would set a minimum wage of $8 an hour for workers whose combined tips and wages come to $12 an hour or more during a one-week pay period.Lowering the wage would preserve waiter jobs at restaurants offering full table service, Garofalo said. “Right now, businesses that are doing table dining, we are providing a regulatory incentive for them to move to fast-casual.”[Watch the floor debate]The proposed lower-tier wage is a dollar less than the new $9 an hour minimum that goes into effect Aug. 1, 2015, as part of a law enacted last year stipulating a series of wage increases. Employees whose tips amount to less than $4 an hour during a work week would make the higher minimum wage. The bill would repeal a part of current statute that prohibits the counting of employee tips toward the minimum wage. The bill now goes to the Senate, where Sen. Gary Dahms (R-Redwood Falls) is the sponsor. Rep. Jason Metsa (DFL-Virginia) called the bill “wage theft” and said Republican backers of Garofalo’s minimum-wage bill were adopting Walmart’s “rollback” pricing policy.“Freezing wages for waiters and waitresses will not make our economy stronger,” said Rep. Ryan Winkler (DFL-Golden Valley), calling the bill “a penalty on people who earn tips for their hard work.”Rep. Abigail Whelan (R-Anoka), citing her own experience as a barista as well as the service-industry work experience of her mother and sister, said the bill would help struggling restaurants and “keep as many people employed as possible.” After misguided minimum-wage increases, Rep. Glenn Gruenhagen (R-Glencoe) said HF1027 is “a step back in the right direction.”The House adopted Garofalo’s delete-all amendment 77-56. Continue Reading

Breakfast smoothies a hit at Cooper High School

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Students at Cooper High School were given a new option on the breakfast menu last week, and if the first few days are any indication, smoothies have hit the spot. The fruit and yogurt smoothies were first served on March 4, when 100 of the beverages sold out in the first eight minutes of serving. During breakfast on March 6, 175 smoothies sold out in less than 10 minutes.”This week is National School Breakfast Week, and it was our goal to serve the smoothies for the first time this week,” said Child Nutrition Program Assistant Michelle Sagedahl. “Cooper has worked hard to get the program up and running. Child Nutrition works hard to offer choices that are popular with students and that coincide with current trends. A wide variety of options were already being offered daily for breakfast, but smoothies offer one more choice for students.”The school is able to provide the smoothies due to a partnership with the Action for Healthy Kids, a national nonprofit that fights childhood obesity, undernourishment and physical inactivity by helping schools become healthier places. Continue Reading

What are the local Chinese Community’s favorite Chinese restaurants? Check the Chinese press.

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To stay on top of the Chinese restaurant scene, I check out the local Chinese-language newspapers – the USA China Tribune, and the Minnesota Times – whenever I get a chance. (You can usually pick them up at Asian grocery stores.)  I can’t read a word of Chinese, but I look at the ads, which have lots of color photos of the food, and at least the name and street address of the restaurant in English. I assume that the restaurants that advertise in these publications are trying to reach the local Chinese community, and are therefore likely to be the restaurants with the most authentic Chinese cuisine.  (You won’t find ads for Big Bowl or P.F. Chang’s.)A  lot of the ads in the current issues are for places that I would put on my 10 Best Chinese list: Mandarin Kitchen, Grand Szechuan, Tea House, Tian Jin, Yangtze (for dim sum), Cafe 99, Grand Shanghai (for Shanghai specialties), Peninsula (for Chinese/Malaysian) and Pagoda. But there are also a lot of ads for all-you-can-eat Asian buffets, like 98 Pounds in Bloomington, Ichiban Asian Buffet in St. Louis Park, Teppanyaki Grill in Minneapolis, Super World Buffet Chinese restaurant in Inver Grove Heights, and all-you-can-eat sushi at Sushi “X” in Golden Valley. This time around, I spotted ads for dim sum at a three restaurants I had never heard of before –  A&L Chinese Restaurant in Inver Grove Heights, the Sesame Cafe in Minnetonka, and the New Beijing in Eden Prairie, and checked out the first two last weekend. The A&L was worth the 25-minute drive from Uptown to Inver Grove Heights. Continue Reading