BY DEBRA KEEFER RAMAGE COVID-19: Both cities implement vaccine, test result checks On Jan. 12, both Minneapolis and St. Paul, reeling from the high rates of new COVID-19 omicron variant cases, announced mandates for restaurants and bars to check either vaccine status or a negative COVID test within two days…
BY DEBRA KEEFER RAMAGE Owamni is everywhere The January issue of The Dish may strike a discordant note. Written, as per the iron deadlines of local journalism, in the dying days of a year too full of dying, it still strives to strike a note of hope for 2022, and…
BY DEBRA KEEFER RAMAGE Restaurant news Have you heard of Goldbelly? I first heard of it last week, when I did a search to find where I could get good latkes without having to make or cook them myself. Of course, I meant to be searching for a local deli…
BY DEBRA KEEFER RAMAGE Restaurant news – BIPOC owners on the rise In New York City and many other major metropolises, pizza sold by the slice is more common, and “slice shops” abound. They are pretty rare in the Twin Cities. Becoming less rare, but still a definite minority, are…
BY DEBRA KEEFER RAMAGE More great cider! Last month The Dish 2.0 covered a couple of innovative cideries in Minneapolis, and we didn’t even mention Sociable Cider Werks! I apologize for that, and I am going to make up for it by telling you all the cool things Sociable has…
BY DEBRA KEEFER RAMAGE New eating places and concepts and “new to me” Amazingly, new restaurants and cafes and food service “concepts” keep on opening. Three fairly recent openings, in descending order of grandness (which pretty much relates to price and that pampered, entitled feeling, but not necessarily to actual…
BY DEBRA KEEFER RAMAGE Dining rooms reopened and indoor café returns The Seward branch of Pizza Lucé has opened its dining room. Quite a few other Lucés have been open for indoor and patio dining for a while now. But this one doesn’t have a patio, so that may have…
BY DEBRA KEEFER RAMAGE Where I get information about restaurants In case you wonder where I get information about restaurants, either to pass on news of the restaurant world here or to decide what to review next, I mostly get it from the same place I get a lot of…
BY DEBRA KEEFER RAMAGE What I did during thepandemic I didn’t fare badly at all. I never ran very low on food, and didn’t even run out of toilet paper, no thanks to my goofy fellow Americans. Delivery services were a lifeline to me, as amped-up food shelves and pop-up…
BY DEBRA KEEFER RAMAGE Tiny Diner 1024 E. 38th St. Minneapolis This is my relationship with the restaurant “empire” of Kim Bartmann—it started way before I had ever heard of her. In 1992, my teenage daughter came back to live with me for her last year of high school. That…
BY DEBRA KEEFER RAMAGE I grew up in a suburb of Atlanta, Ga., and then at age 17 set up as an independent young woman in a neighborhood as close to downtown Atlanta as possible. (Atlanta famously had and still has almost no residential downtown.) I have always loved food—cooking…
BY DEBRA KEEFER RAMAGE Gatherings Cafe 1530 E. Franklin Ave. Mon.– Fri. 8 a.m. to 3 p.m. 612-879-1753 The Dish has had virtual lunches from Japan to Sweden, Ethiopia to Mexico, and from Korea to the British Isles. To finish out the series, we are coming home to Minnesota, to…
BY DEBRA KEEFER RAMAGE Sonora Grill 3300 E. Lake St., Mpls. 55406 Open 7 days from 10:30 a.m. (9 a.m. on Sunday) sonoragrillmpls.com Sonora Grill started out in the Midtown Global Market incubator as a from-scratch and innovative Mexican/South American food place with no booze and run by real Mexicans—two…
BY DEBRA KEEFER RAMAGE Himalayan Restaurant 2910 E. Lake St., Mpls. 55406 612-332-0880 www.himalayanmomo.com Himalayan Restaurant—Nepalese, Tibetan, and Indian cuisine—has been in South Minneapolis for about 10 years. It started out in the Seward neighborhood and after about six years, at the end of 2014, moved to its present location…
BY DEBRA KEEFER RAMAGE K-Bop Korean Bistro 425 13th Ave. SE, Mpls. 55414 612-331-4993 k-bop.com K Bop is a casual “Korean bistro” in Dinkytown, in the ground floor anchor spot of the Chateau apartment building on 13th Avenue. It’s more designed for foot and bicycle traffic, and not surprisingly, given…
