duplex

Visited on Saturday, May 17th

Ben's Review
Erin got an email from duplex with a coupon for a "buy one get one free entree" deal this past weekend. That answered the question of which restaurant we should go to next, so I made reservations for 7 on Saturday.

Duplex is named for its location; the restaurant is inside of a converted duplex house at 25th & Hennepin in Uptown. The location used to be a coffee shop that I remember driving by when Erin used to live near there. Being that it's inside of a house is cool, at the very least it's different from most of your restaurant experiences. They've cut walls out and added track lighting with hardwood floors throughout. They have outdoor seating on the street level and on the balcony upstairs; I would've loved to eat outside upstairs but it wasn't warm enough for that yet and ERIN DIDN'T HAVE A SWEATER! So we ate upstairs and indoors.

We got sat with a couple menus, the tap beer list is short - only three beers as I recall, and they were obscure. I think they had Boddington's, some random Belgian, and one other beer that I don't recall. Not being a Belgian fan, I went for the bottled beers, which they have plenty of. I got a Bell's Two Hearted but they have probably 20 - 25 different bottles of beer.

For an appetizer we got steamed mussels. I had never had these before (yep, we have a food blog and there are things we haven't tried, get over it) so I honestly didn't know what I was getting, but the ingredient list sounded fantastic - white wine, ginger, tomato, cilantro, Thai chili paste, scallions, butter. The mussels were good, and the sauce was excellent albeit pretty spicy; without the beer and bread it would've been way worse.

The special that night was a pan seared walleye that I wanted, but I couldn't justify the price, it was nearly double the other entrees. I opted for the shrimp spaghetti instead. The spaghetti had spinach leaves mixed in with the sauce and noodles which I had never seen before. There wasn't much sauce on the spaghetti but it was still delicious, and the portion was surprisingly modest considering that restaurants normally give you way too much to eat, this was a reasonable portion.

Our service at duplex was spot on, not pushy or annoying but they were there whenever we needed them. I love it when servers just leave you alone, you can tell by observing a table from a distance if they need anything. If they are eating and conversing, they probably don't need anything. If you see empty plates or glasses, head over, it's as simple as that.

We skipped dessert because we were full and we were meeting our friends over at Liquor Lyle's and had to get going. All in all a great meal for a reasonable price. Erin just got another email today with new deals for this weekend (a free glass of wine or beer I think).

duplex ratings:

• Service: Excellent service, prompt and not annoying.
  
• Food: The mussels were good, I actually liked the sauce better, and my shrimp spaghetti was great. The bread is also good.
  
• Drinks: Only a couple taps, but a good selection of bottled beer and wine. No bar as far as I could tell.
• Ambiance: The ambiance was different because it's a converted house, but I like the effect. It does make the tables kind of close together, which I don't really like. I don't want to hear everyone's conversations.
• Price: I think the bill was $55 with tip. It was cheaper because we got a free entree.
  
• Convenience: Amazingly we got a parking spot on Hennepin right in front of the place. Not usually available though, it IS on a bus line however :)

Erin's Review
I have been intrigued by duplex since I first heard about it maybe a year and a half ago. I remember making a reservation and then having to cancel it because something else came up. This must have been how they got my email address, because I now get occasional emails from them with deals. The one I got last week was particularly good - a buy one get one free entree. This to me does not speak well for the restaurant - are they on their way to closing or something? Whatever, we didn't read too much into it and went last Saturday.

I had been to Pandora's Cup, the coffee shop that used to be in this building, quite a few times in high school and early college. They have really made this place a lot nicer as duplex. I don't think they really did much to the layout, but it looks a lot nicer to me for some reason.

The service was very good - our waitress was always there when we needed her. She wasn't overly friendly or helpful but that is fine. We didn't ask too many questions. I loved how our water was refilled all the time. I drink a LOT of water when at restaurants and I hate it when my glass is empty - I'm guessing that someone filled my glass probably 10 times when we were there. They probably hated me.

As for the food, I really enjoyed the mussels. I think that I have had one or two at dinners before (back in the glory days when I got my meals paid for by magazine publishers), but I've never ordered these myself. The sauce was spicy, but surprisingly, I didn't notice it as much as Ben did. The bread was REALLY good - nice and warm with garlic chive butter.

For my main dish I got the house made fettucine with chicken confit, pancetta, shiitake mushrooms, capers, thyme, lemon juice (I copied and pasted that directly from the menu - no way did I remember all of that. I barely know what all of that even means!). It was pretty good, but slightly blah. I could have used some type of actual sauce - there was some I'm sure, but not much.

I also got 2 glasses of wine. After my recent trip to a few wineries in the Santa Ynez Valley, I am clearly a wine expert. One of the glasses I got was red, from Chile that was called carmenere. The other was white, from France. That's all I can remember. Apparently this place is a "wine bar" - I'm not sure how a place earns that title, but the wine list didn't seem that extensive to me.

We both enjoyed duplex - the atmosphere was nice. It wasn't busy at all (hence the free entree offers) so we could just sit there and enjoy our meal.

Deets

duplex
2516 Hennepin Ave.
Minneapolis

Recommended

CaliFORnia

Here comes another very long post unrelated to the Twin Cities! Last weekend, my 6 college roommates (in no particular order: Becky, Kimberly, Camille, Mindy, Chelsea, Laura) and I (Erin) flew out to visit Maria who moved out to sunny California to be an astronaut. Ok, not really, but that's what we all like to believe. Maria lives in Valencia, a suburb of Los Angeles, and we all stayed with her. Over the course of the 4 days we were there, much food and drink were consumed.

On Thursday, May 8th, we piled into our rented minivan and drove the 1.5 hours up to the Santa Ynez Valley to go wine tasting.

The first winery we went to was Sunstone. This winery features organic wines and is fairly small and cozy. Their Eros wine was particularly good - it is a blend of merlot, cabernet, and... something. Sunstone had a beautiful picnic area, where we sat for a good long time enjoying the sunshine and great food. Thanks to Trader Joe's for the food, and to the Bride & Groom Cookbook which provided Maria with the recipe for the Orzo Salad with Lemon, Feta, and Pine Nuts. Mmm mmm good.

(Outside of Sunstone)


(Sunstone Cellar - the pourer offered to give us a tour)


(The picnic area)


(My glass of Sunterra (Sunstone's "cheaper" line of wines) Syrah, and the Orzo Salad)

The next winery we went to was just down the road from Sunstone - Kalyra. We had no prior knowledge of this winery at all, it just looked cool from the road. We're very selective like that. It turned out that this winery was the place that Sandra Oh's character worked in the movie Sideways. The wines were alright, but not as good as the wines at Sunstone. The pourer was very friendly and personable.

(the view from the front of the Kalyra tasting area)


(These sort of count as food - the little cracker things to "cleanse your palate" or whatever)

Gainey was our next stop, because they had a 3pm tour. Once we got there, we learned that there was a private party doing the tour that day so we were SOL. Too bad. Gainey seemed slightly overwhelmed by the size of our party (8) and the pourer seemed distracted the whole time. His idea of explaining the wine was "this is the syrah" which was a very comprehensive explanation. Gainey was a little bigger and seemed a little more corporate than the other two places we had been. The wines were good, but the experience was just so-so.

(the pours were the smallest here of the 4 places we went)


(One bonus of going wine tasting in this area versus Napa is that you get to keep all of the tasting glasses)


(outside Gainey)

To round out the day, we made one final stop at Curtis Winery. This was a very pleasant experience. The pourers were both very nice and knowledgeable. I really liked their grounds and the artwork they had on the walls. By that time, I really couldn't remember much about the wines themselves, but Maria has been there a few times so if she keeps going back, they must be decent.

(the view from Curtis)


(Tasting room)


(one of the pourers)

For dinner that night, we stopped at State Street in Santa Barbara. Unfortunately, we did not do any research beforehand, so we ended up going to State and A, which was okay, but not great. They were very accommodating for us, and lit up some patio warmer thingies because it was getting a wee bit chilly outside. I had the nachos, which hit the spot. I didn't hear too many rave reviews about the food. It's pretty typical bar/grill fare.

The next day we stopped at In-N-Out Burger before driving to Hollywood. I wish I had captured on digital memory card the looks on my friends' faces as they waited in line. I had told them ahead of time that there were special ways to order things at In-N-Out, plus it was really busy at the time so I think they were a bit overwhelmed and confused. I got a cheeseburger, animal style, and it was tasty. I had a double-double animal style last time I was in San Diego which I remember as being better, but it's possible that I am romanticizing the memory. One great thing about In-N-Out is that they are relatively cheap. I got the burger, fries, and a drink for $4.25 which seems pretty good to me.

Our next couple meals were cooked at Maria's house, but after lounging by the pool on Saturday, a few of us headed out to the Valencia Town Center to see if Pinkberry was worth the hype. I enjoyed it, but I'd have to say that I wouldn't seek it out. I got mine with strawberries and I thought that was the perfect accompaniment to the taste of the "yogurt" or whatever it is.

(my Pinkberry, and the inside of the Valencia Town Center)

Our last meal was at Le Chene, a place about 25 minutes away from Valencia that Maria had been to before. I had the Filet Roquefort, which was quite tasty, but there was an excess of sauce. I heard great reviews of the salmon. I liked how every meal came with a salad that was pretty tasty and some warm bread. My only complaint is that each meal comes with 2 veggies, one whole and one pureed. I'd rather have one veggie and one starch of some kind.

(They give each table one chalkboard menu - kind of quaint, and also kind of annoying with 8 people sharing one menu)

My first and last dining experience were both at Wolfgang Puck Express. I had it at MSP before leaving, and at LAX during our 7 hour delay. I suppose that my real last dining experience was the Whopper that some dude bought with one of our 2 meal vouchers during the 3 hour wait on the plane while the pilot was accused of being drunk and they had to call in new flight attendants, but whatever. I won't count that one.

(MSP)

Anyway, in the battle of the Wolfgang Puck Expresses, I'd have to say that the LAX one is FAR superior to MSP. The MSP pepperoni pizza was much greasier. I noticed that LAX had a real wood burning oven so that could be why. If you happen to be stuck in LAX (and chances are good that you will) then the Wolfgang Express is highly recommended.

(LAX)

Update on 5/17 - I almost forgot one of the dining highlights of the trip - the IHOP down the street from LAX. It was a magical experience. I got the pancake combo, and it actually did hit the spot. Some others had some questionable items (such as brownish poached eggs) but my meal was pretty good.

Nami

Visited on Thursday, May 1st with Kyle and Kate

Erin's Review
Our visit to Nami was very spur of the moment, and followed a work happy hour at Drink (for the free taco bar) as well as the Brew 52 informal meet-up at Ugly Mug, so it wasn't really a clear dining experience for me at least, thanks to the few beers I'd had before we got there. I really wasn't even that hungry when we got there, having filled up on the free food at Drink before going to Ugly Mug (which seems to suck now - bad service, plus it was approximately 90 degrees in there).

Like Ben says below, Nami is really weirdly laid out, there isn't as much room as I thought there would be, unless I was missing something. We saw the bar area, a tiny dining area, and the sushi bar, and that's it. If there is more, someone please comment here to let us know.

(lounge)

I was pleasantly surprised to see the "First Thursday of the Month" happy hour deals that were available at Nami - a few different rolls, some other appetizers, and drinks. When the waitress came over, she was kind of odd. We had already been sitting there awhile, so we knew what we wanted. Once we ordered our drinks, we tried to order the food, but she stopped us and wouldn't let us order, and went away, only to return a long time later with our drinks. It was kind of busy in there, but I thought it was odd that she wouldn't even allow us to say our orders.

We got the few rolls that were on the happy hour menu (spicy tuna and Philadelphia), along with the eel and avocado roll. The rolls were fine, but did taste a little mass produced to me, which makes sense since it was a happy hour special that we ordered. Who am I to say though, as I wasn't exactly in the right state of mind to be criticizing much of anything.

I'm glad we tried Nami out and got the happy hour special. I don't know if I'll be back for awhile as there are several other sushi places on our list that I'd like to try first, but I'd go there again for the deals. The regular menu seemed to be quite expensive.

Ben's Review
Erin and I had plans to go out for the brew52 meet-up on Thursday night at the Ugly Mug (formerly Harvey's) downtown. We hung out at the Ugly Mug for a couple drinks (I only had a sip of the Black Helicopter and that's all I needed) with Becky, Rett, Kyle, Kate, and others. Eventually it was just Kyle, Kate, and us left and we were thinking that moving indoors, and food, would be a good idea, so we headed across the street to Nami.

I had seen Nami from the street before and it always looks huge from the outside. It occupies and entire corner of a block so it has tons of large windows that make it look expansive. After walking inside, however, you realize that in spite of the large size, its really poorly laid out inside. There is a lounge/bar to your left, the (small) dining area to your right and then directly in front of you as you walk in is just a lot of open space, with a sushi bar a little further back. It's a little strange.

(Sushi bar area)

We grabbed a table in the lounge which was pleasantly busy; you don't want a place to be dead, but you also don't want it to be so packed that you can't get service, we caught it right at the sweet spot. It was the first Thursday of the month, so apparently that means there are deals at Nami :) You could get select top shelf drinks for $4, (vodka, gin, etc. no scotch unfortunately) and they had some deals on select rolls.

I ordered a vodka tonic, Erin predictably ordered a bottle of "whatever light beer you have" and Kate and Kyle each got drinks as well. In spite of the bar not being packed it actually DID take a long time for my drink to make its way to my mouth, which was disappointing. When our server brought us our drinks we placed our food order: a couple rolls for the whole table, side of white rice for me, and pot stickers for Kate and Kyle.

Our food came out after a reasonable wait, albeit without my white rice (for some reason sushi places cannot remember my white rice order, EVER). To me, the white rice at sushi places is just as delectable as the sushi itself so I make a point to remind them of it. She brought it out right away, its not like they need to special order a batch of white rice.

The sushi was great, we got a variety of rolls, and the white rice was also fantastic. I put a little too much soy sauce in the rice, but that didn't stop Kate and Kyle from finishing it off for me, I'm glad it didn't go to waste :)

We ate, finished our drinks and left. We didn't stick around too long as I recall, as we had been out since 5 and it was now 9:30 or so. I think our bill was ~$25 before tip, not bad for getting my fill of sushi, rice, and vodka - I can't complain.

The ratings:

• Service: Service was average, our drinks took awhile for no apparent reason.
  
• Food: The rolls and rice were excellent. I can't speak for the pot stickers, but there weren't any left.
  
• Drinks: Mostly tap beers, as is common at sushi places, and a full bar. Good deals on the first Thursday of the month.
  
• Ambiance: The atmosphere was great for a Thursday night, it was humming - not rowdy, but active. I wonder if it's any different on weekend nights.
  
• Price: Our tab was around ~25 which was standard for some rolls and couple drinks. If we had to pay full price for all the items it might be a little spendy for what you get.
  
• Convenience: Nami is downtown in the warehouse district so if you drive, you gotta pay for parking, otherwise its near the light rail stop and the bus line. Even though we both work downtown, I still paid for parking over by the restaurant so we wouldn't have to walk fifteen blocks back to the car.

Deets
Nami
251 1st Ave N.
Minneapolis

Recommended for the happy hour deals.

Groveland Tap

Visited on Sunday, April 27th with Scott

Ben's Review
My co-worker Scott called us up to see if we wanted to get a late lunch at Porky's. It was a little chilly for Porky's so we settled on Groveland Tap instead. It was busier than I thought it would be for a Sunday afternoon. It's a small place but there were still around fifteen people eating and drinking.

I made the quick decision to get the Red Hook Black Hook (which sounds like a beer that Dr. Seuss would come up with) after learning that they were all out of the Rush River Bubblejack IPA. Erin got her usual diet coke and Scott pulled through and got a beer even though he was still under the weather from the night before. I was expecting the Black Hook to taste like a black lager, like the 1554, but it was more like Guinness. It's dry and malty, not a whole lot of hops to speak of. I doubt I'll order one of these again, but I'm glad I tried it.

In typical fashion, I couldn't decide what I wanted to eat. Erin was pushing the pepper jack juicy lucy, but I wasn't sure if I wanted a sandwich or a burger. The burger won out in the end, and I upgraded to get the fries as well ($2 extra, but I'm a high roller like that). Scott got the pork sandwich also with fries.

The burger had pepper jack cheese and jalapenos in between the meat patties, and it was pretty damn good. I had to give a couple bites to Erin, cause she got the bland American cheese on her juicy lucy :). The fries were also pretty good, albeit not a huge portion, but that's probably a good thing. I think I'll usually eat as many fries as they'll put on the plate so the less they give me the better, it's not like I went home hungry.

For dessert our server mentioned a deep fried PB & J sandwich that sounded tasty. Its kind of like a Monte Cristo sandwich but with grape jelly and peanut butter instead of meat. I thought it was a good dessert, but I don't have much of a sweet tooth to begin with so we didn't even come close to finishing it all. The one change I would make would be to use strawberry jelly instead of grape.

The ratings:

• Service: Service was average, Erin had to beg with her eyes to get a refill of soda :)
  
• Food: All the food was great, its a typical bar menu with burgers and sandwiches.
  
• Drinks: They have a great tap beer list with plenty of micro-brews. I don't THINK they have a full bar, but I could be wrong.
  
• Ambiance: Pretty quiet neighborhood bar, no loud music or anything, at least on a Sunday afternoon. All the people seemed friendly.
  
• Price: The price was right on - not cheap, not expensive. The burgers are $5-$6, beers are $4 or so.
  
• Convenience: Groveland Tap is right at the intersection of Fairview & St. Clair, so it's not really convenient to any major roads and there's no parking lot. We found a spot on the street with no trouble though.

Erin's Review
I thought Groveland Tap was a fine place for lunch, but certainly wasn't anything special. It is kind of hard to rate a bar on ambiance when you go there in the middle of the day - I have no idea what it would be like at night, but it seems like it would be quiet. There didn't seem to be any area for live music or anything like that. It was pretty much your average neighborhood bar. I think they only have wine and beer here, but like Ben, I'm not really sure.

I had heard this place had good Juicy Lucy's, so I knew right away that I'd order that. I am always kind of annoyed when a sandwich doesn't come with SOMETHING - chips, fries, whatever. I understand the upgrade charge if you are getting something more, but really - I think a burger should always have some kind of side dish. I figured since Ben got fries and I usually only eat about 1/3 of the amount I get that I'd be fine. Scott has an unnatural hatred for fries (and pancakes) so I also got to have a few of mine. I got what I wanted, but I felt slightly cheated by the lack of side.

(My burger looks so lonely)

I thought my Juicy Lucy was average. I've now had a Juicy Lucy at Matt's Bar (good), the Nook (great), and Tuggs (if you count their stuffed burgers as a form of Juicy Lucy - it was okay but way too expensive). I thought this one was better than Tuggs (in terms of value mostly), but worse than Matt's and The Nook. I'd probably order something else if I went back. The deep fried PB&J that Ben wanted was okay, but not good enough to ever want to order again. It was mostly the novelty that appealed to him, I think.

I know Groveland Tap also owns Edina, Longfellow, and Highland Grill, some of which are on our list, so it will be interesting to compare this place to their other restaurants when we go there. I don't have much else to say about our Groveland Tap experience - it was a quick lunch on a blah Sunday... nothing special really. I probably won't go out of my way to go back, but if someone else wanted to go there, I wouldn't try to convince them otherwise.

Deets

Groveland Tap
1834 St. Claire Ave
St. Paul, MN

Recommended if you're looking for a nice neighborhood bar that isn't grungy and has pretty good food.