Road Tips

Old Capital Tavern - Sauk Rapids, MN

I spent the night in St. Cloud last fall because all of the affordable hotel rooms were filled in the Twin Cities for an event going on in the area.  I wanted to try someplace that was unique to the area and I found a place over in Sauk Rapids just across the Mississippi River from St. Cloud that sounded interesting.  I ended up going to the Old Capital Tavern for dinner that evening.  

Adam Salzer was an information and public relations officer in the U.S. Army who had a love for craft beers and old style taverns.  After getting out of the Army, he wanted to run a throw-back bar and restaurant but he didn't want to just open it in any building.  Searching around central Minnesota, he found a building in downtown Sauk Rapids that had been built in 1915 as a tavern.  When Prohibition came about a few years later, the place was shuttered.  Over the years, the building had been a car dealership and a flower shop, but was empty when Salzer found it.  Salzer and a couple of partners gutted the building and recreated a 1920's-style tavern in the spot.  They opened the door to the Old Capital Tavern in June of 2013.  

Now, I can't quite figure out why Salzer and his partners named their place the Old Capital Tavern.  St. Paul is and has been the state capital since Minnesota was established as a territory in 1849 before becoming a state in 1856.  I couldn't find anywhere the St. Cloud or Sauk Rapids was any type of a capital other than a local seat of government.  So, the Old Capital Tavern name is a mystery to me as to why they named it that.  (It may have been the name of the original tavern, too.)

It was about a 15 minute drive to Old Capital Tavern located at the corner of Division and Benton Dr. in downtown Sauk Rapids (see map).  I found parking on the street near the the side of the building and went in.  The interior definitely made it look like you were stepping back into the 1920's.  From the tin ceiling to the old style light fixtures to the hand crafted bar, the attention to detail was remarkable.  

I took a seat at the bar and was greeted by the bartender/server that evening, a nice guy by the name of Ian.  He gave me a menu to look over and gave me a time to take a look at what I wanted to drink. 

The line-up of beers on tap was impressive, to say the least.  The light blue spigot of Kona Big Wave Golden Ale stood out among the 50 beers they had on tap.  Happy to see Big Wave Golden Ale on tap anywhere, I ordered one of those from Ian.  They also had an equally impressive selection of bourbon, rye, Scotch and Irish whiskeys - over 130 different varieties.  This was my kind of place.  

The food on the menu was also seemingly a step up from your typical bar or pub food.  Appetizers included smoked duck legs in a Thai orange ginger sauce; Thai lettuce wraps with a choice of either Sriracha salmon or a Korean-style Bulgogi beef; and a smoked salmon dip with spinach and artichokes, topped with a baked asiago cheese and served with pita bread.  

Entrees included a Mac and Cheese dish that featured cavatappi pasta in a spicy cheese sauce with pork, bacon and broccoli mixed in.  There was also the pot roast - slow-roasted beef short ribs with potatoes, carrots, onions and mushrooms cooked in a bourbon/stout sauce.  They had jambalaya on the menu, as well as a 14 ounce ribeye and a 12 ounce strip steak.  They had a lamb burger, as well as fish tacos (I saw that they were deep fried cod pieces or I would have signed up for those), and something called the "Four Alarm Pig's Ass Masterpiece" - a pulled pork sandwich served with a house-made spicy stout barbecue sauce, and topped with giardiniera, pepper jack cheese, red cabbage and served on a garlic baguette.  

I was in a quandary - I was hungry, but I wasn't.  I thought about getting the meatloaf - topped with pepper jack cheese and caramelized onions, and served with garlic/parmesan mashed potatoes.  Then I saw the  Old Capital reuben sandwich that featured house-smoked corned beef, topped with a house-made 1000 Island dressing, Swiss cheese, red and green cabbage sauerkraut, and giardiniera served on pumpernickel bread.  And the Cuban sandwich sounded good as it came with house-made mojo pork, ham, smoked provolone, sliced pickles and yellow mustard on pressed Cuban bread.  The "Cuban bread" part caught my eye because I feel it's the sweet Cuban bread that makes a great Cuban sandwich, not the pressed panini-style Italian or French bread that nearly every other place in the Midwest has for their Cuban sandwich.  

When Ian came over to take my order, I quizzed him on the Cuban sandwich and asked him if it was truly Cuban bread.  "The real stuff, the sweet Cuban bread," I asked.  He assured me that it was.  Against my better judgment - mainly because I was really interested in the reuben and/or the meatloaf - I ordered the Cuban sandwich.  

And Ian oversold me on the Cuban sandwich.  It was on a pressed panini Italian bread and not the sweet Cuban bread that he assured me it would be.  And why would I have thought any different?  I haven't had a good Cuban sandwich since I was last in Miami 18 years ago.  Still the sandwich on its own was good.  The sweet and sour taste of the mojo pork - marinated in a combination of orange juice, lime juice, garlic and other spices - was very good.  The pork was shredded and tender, and the smoked provolone was a nice complement to the meat.  I got passed the fact that it was pressed Italian bread and enjoyed the sandwich as much as I could.  

Along with the Cuban sandwich came a side of seasoned fries that were actually pretty good.  But there was so much meat in the sandwich that I probably only had a handful of fries with my sandwich.   

I'm sort of wavering on how much I liked the Old Capital Tavern.  The food offerings were definitely a step up from regular pub food, they had a great craft beer selection and an overwhelming number of whiskeys to choose from.  I'm still somewhat kicking myself for getting the Cuban sandwich, even though it was better than most Cuban sandwiches I've had at other places around the Midwest.  And other than steering me wrong on the Cuban sandwich, Ian's service was top notch.  Given some of the other interesting things they have to offer on the menu, I have Old Capital Tavern on my "Restaurants to Visit" list just to be able to try something else next time. 

Spitfire Bar & Grill - West Fargo, ND

I was driving between western North Dakota and the Twin Cities last fall and decided to stop at Fargo to get some lunch.  I was sort of hungry for barbecue, so I did a search of barbecue places in the area and one place - Spitfire Bar & Grill - caught my eye.  I set my GPS to the address for Spitfire Bar & Grill and headed there for lunch.

Like many places, Spitfire came to be because the owners got their start on the barbecue competition trail.  Tim and Mary Olson were chiropractors in Fargo, but they loved barbecue ever since Tim sampled some of the best smoked meats he'd had while he was living in Oklahoma and Texas before settling back in his home state of North Dakota.  Knowing that he couldn't get Texas-style barbecue in Fargo, he ended up having his own smoker shipped up from Texas and placed in his backyard.  Soon, he was feeding friends and neighbors who raved about his barbecuing prowess. 

In April of 2007, an Uno Pizzeria & Grill location closed in West Fargo.  The Olson's along with managing partner Gordy Ferkul then turned it into a barbecue place.  They procured a Southern Pride SPK-500 industrial smoker and installed it in the kitchen area.  Spitfire Bar & Grill opened with a soft opening in the summer of 2007 to help get the kinks worked out before they had their grand opening in the fall of 2007.  

About the same time they opened Spitfire Bar & Grill, the Olson's came across a television program one evening that showed the highly competitive barbecue circuit in parts of the United States.  The barbecue bug had hit him hard and he was determined to get into competitions around the Upper Midwest.  Nearly from the start, the Olson's "Team Spitfire" began to win the competitions they entered.  More wins meant bigger and better equipment and they got their big competitive smoker trailer in 2011.  

The Olson's continue to run the competition circuit around the U.S. and have participated numerous times in two of the biggest barbecue competitions - the Jack Daniels World Barbecue Championship in Lynchburg, TN; and the American Royal Barbecue Championship in Kansas City.  Team Spitfire garnered a sixth place overall finish at the Jack Daniels WBC in 2009 and his ribs earned a third-place finish in that category the same year.  

Spitfire is technically in West Fargo along 13th Ave. E.  (see map)  It was around 1 p.m. when I pulled into the parking lot and went inside.  The main dining area had a cozy contemporary look and feel to the place.  The focal point of the dining area was the large wood burning cooker for Spitfire's wood-fired steaks, seafood, and spit-roasted chicken.  Many of the trophies the Spitfire barbecue team has won in competitions were on display in the dining room.

I ended up taking a seat at the bar.  The bar area was spacious and bright with a number of flat-panel televisions hanging on the wall.  My bartender server that day was Ambar, a pleasant blonde-haired lady who dropped off a menu for me to look through.  I saw that they had my favorite beer - Kona Big Wave Golden Ale - on tap and I ordered one of those.  I like places that have Big Wave on tap.  

As I alluded to earlier, there's more than just barbecue on the menu at Spitfire.  In addition to wood-fired steaks, seafood and chicken, they also feature flat bread pizzas, pasta dishes, sandwiches and wraps, wood-fired burgers, soups and salads.  But I was there for the barbecue that day and I wanted to sample a little bit of everything.  The only problem is that they didn't have a sampler platter at Spitfire.  They only seemed to have sandwiches with pulled pork or brisket.  And the only rib combo they had on the menu came with either steak and ribs or chicken and ribs.  

I finally found a beef brisket platter they had on the menu and I ended up ordering that.  The only problem is that it was expensive - $19.95 for the platter with two sides.  I figured there must be a lot of beef that came on the plate.  

There really wasn't.  Oh, it was probably a little over a half pound of brisket on the plate, but I still didn't think it was that good of a value.  For my sides, I got a bowl of the Spitfire baked beans and some fries.  

The brisket was tender, but it was dry.  It almost tasted like cafeteria-style roast beef.  I didn't get much of a smoky flavor to the beef.  It was somewhat disappointing.  

To add to the disappointment of the brisket, they gave me a small 2 ounce container of barbecue sauce.  It was a vinegar-based sauce that was just all right in my book.  And because the beef was so dry, I had to use a lot of the sauce to help get the beef down.  I needed a couple of the containers to help out the beef, but I quit once I ran out of the first container of sauce.  And they didn't have any sauce in bottles.  Being a sauce guy, I like to try different types of sauce on my barbecue.  The brisket needed all the help it could get.   

The fries were also sort of "meh!", but the baked beans saved this meal from being a complete dud.  The beans were great - thick and meaty with chunks of pork with nearly every bite.  Even the sauce they used in the beans was very good.  The beans were - unfortunately - the only saving grace for what was otherwise a forgettable meal.  

I don't know if Spitfire is known as much for their brisket as they are for their ribs, but I was disappointed in the brisket I had on my visit.  The baked beans were the highlight of what was otherwise a bland-tasting meal.  While the service as attentive and prompt, I thought the barbecued brisket was underwhelming.  Spitfire wins local awards for the best barbecue in Fargo and has won a number of regional barbecue competitions, but the barbecue I had was not what I would call award winning. 

Kelly's Irish Pub - Davenport, IA

I've lived in the Quad Cities for over 25 years and I've made a number of great friends during that time.  One of the more well-known families in the area are the Kelly's whose patriarch Jerry Kelly was the long-time owner of one of the more popular watering holes in Davenport, the Circle Tap.  I've known Leo and Bob Kelly for about 15 years working festival stages with them in their band Wicked Liz and the Bellyswirls.  From the friendship with the brothers, I've gotten to know their mother Nancy, as well as their other brothers Dan, Dave and Jerry, Jr. pretty well over the years, and I've met their sister Kate a handful of times.  Unfortunately, I never really got the chance to know Jerry Kelly, Sr. as he passed away in 1999.  

Two of the sons - Dan and Dave - followed their father into the restaurant business.  Dave managed and owned restaurants in northeast Iowa before moving back to Davenport to help start Van's Pizza (click here to read the Road Tips entry on Van's) and Dan opened the family namesake restaurant - Kelly's Irish Pub - in 2006.  Dan got hold of me sometime last year as he knew I had a blog and he wanted me to come in and try something new on his menu - the audaciously named Quad Cities Best Burger.  I told him I would, but it was months later before I was able to make it in one evening to give it a try.  

Dan Kelly was working in the Quad Cities not really knowing what he wanted to do in life when his wife Elizabeth landed a job in Dallas as a registered nurse.  The Kelly's moved down to Texas and he found work in number of bars and restaurants including a barbecue restaurant that did about $5 million in annual sales.  Dan learned from his father that if you do something that you really love, you'll never work another day in your life.

Pictured right - Dan Kelly.  Photo courtesy Quad City Times.   

Dan started to get the itch to run his own place and he and Elizabeth moved back to the Quad Cities around 2004.  With the help of long-time friend Marc Van Severen - the "Van" in Van's Pizza, as well as the owner of a handful of other bar/restaurants around the Quad Cities - and a couple three silent investors, Dan was able to open Kelly's Irish Pub in August of 2006.  Dan Kelly eventually bought out Van Severen and the silent investors and is the sole proprietor of Kelly's Irish Pub today.  

Kelly's Circle Tap, as it was known when Jerry, Sr. ran the place for 21 years, was famous for their baby back ribs.  The fall-off-the-bone ribs were the favorites of many people in the Quad Cities.  Dan does the same ribs at Kelly's Irish Pub, but I don't particularly care for the way they prepare them.  They either parboil or bake the ribs - possibly both - then they put them on an open fire grill to char the outsides before they slather them with a sweet smoky sauce and send them out to the masses.  There's no smoker at Kelly's Irish Pub, nor is there one at the Circle Tap which continues to make the same style of ribs to this day.  And both places continue to serve dozens of racks of ribs each week.  (I will say that I do like the barbecue sauce that both Kelly's and the Circle Tap uses.)  It's sort of like Quad City-style pizza - people who grew up in the Quad's like that style of pizza, just like people who grew up in the area like Kelly's and/or the Circle's ribs.  Me?  Well, let's just say I don't care for either.  

Kelly's Irish Pub is also famous for the large party they throw on St. Patrick's Day.  Carrying on the tradition of his father's place, Dan Kelly only does it on a bigger scale.  He has large tents put up in the parking lot to house tables for people partying and enjoying corned beef and cabbage (they go through over a ton of corned beef over the St. Patrick's Day period), they have live bands in the tents, and they have skydiving leprechauns.  Well, actually, they're skydivers who dress up in green suits, but it's still quite the sight.  They'll easily have over 10,000 people at Kelly's on the day of the Grand Parade held the closest Saturday to St. Patrick's Day.  

I had stopped into Kelly's Irish Pub a couple three days after St. Patrick's Day this year and I tried to order the Quad Cities Best Burger.  But I was informed that Kelly's was still serving off of its St. Patrick's menu and the Quad Cities Best Burger wasn't available.  I didn't stick around for corned beef and cabbage or a grilled pork tenderloin sandwich, but I did finally make it back after I got home from a recent three day trip.  My wife had gone to an art exhibit in downtown Davenport with our neighbor, so I decided to head up to Kelly's on 53rd Ave. for dinner.  (see map)

Kelly's Irish Pub is located in a strip mall and the space its in is spacious enough.  However, my former neighbor - who is of deep Irish heritage - sniffed at Kelly's calling themselves an Irish Pub saying that putting up a couple Irish flags and serving Guinness on tap doesn't necessarily make a place an Irish bar.  While I tend to agree with him, Kelly's is still a nice place on the inside.  It features a large bar area, a couple of dining areas, and a number of flat screen televisions throughout the place that offers any number of sporting events.  If I couldn't categorize Kelly's as an Irish bar, I'd call them an Irish/sports bar.

There weren't many people in Kelly's when I went in around 7 p.m.  Dan Kelly is usually there, but he wasn't this evening - which sort of relieved me since I really just wanted to see how the kitchen would deal with a person coming in off the street ordering the Quad Cities Best Burger, rather than Dan overseeing the preparation.   I saddled up at the bar and got a menu from one of the bartenders.  The cover of Kelly's menu is drawn by Leo Kelly, who - in addition to being a very good guitar player - is an outstanding caricature artist who draws at events and festivals, and who has become the Sunday Editorial Page artist for the Quad City Times.  The menu cover changes regularly and features caricatures of celebrities - both pop culture and local celebs - as well as some of the regulars of Kelly's and a few creatures from time to time.  

The food served at Kelly's is your typical pub fare.  In addition to their signature ribs, they also have a number of appetizers, sandwiches, burgers, wraps and salads.  It's nothing fancy and the food is all right.  They have a good beer selection at Kelly's Irish Pub and I ordered up a large mug of Sam Adams OctoberFest.  

I did order the Quad Cities Best Burger and I got a side of cole slaw to go along with it.  The burger was presented to me with a steak knife sticking out of it - one of my largest pet peeves at a restaurant.  If you need to keep the bun on top of the burger, do it with a long toothpick.  

The burger was on a toasted bun topped with Swiss and American cheese, mayonnaise, bacon, shredded lettuce, sliced tomato, red onions and pickles.  The 1/2 pound patty was thick and chargrilled to a medium temperature.  

And the burger was good, as in well above average good.  The burger had a nice beefy taste, it was juicy and flavorful.  The key to a good burger is the bun and the bun on the Quad Cities Best Burger was light, spongy and held up very well with all that was going on with the juiciness of the meat and the condiments on top.  Could I call it the best burger in the Quad Cities?  I would probably put it up over many other similar bar/pub burgers I've had in the area.  But I'm not certain it's the best in the area.  

I've been apprehensive doing a review on Kelly's Irish Pub as I'm a friend of the Kelly family, but Dan invited me in to try his Quad Cities Best Burger knowing that I'd give it a fair review.  And the burger was good, probably not the best I've had in the Quad Cities, but it was still in the mix with some of the better ones I've tried.  Kelly's Irish Pub is quickly becoming an iconic watering hole in the area, and with their annual St. Patrick's Day festivities it gains more popularity each year. Their food ranges from OK to good, service is always friendly and prompt, and it's a great place to meet up with friends.

(Update - I was informed that after 13 years of business Kelly's Irish Pub closed their doors on or about August 21, 2017.  They've taken down their web site and have taken down their Facebook page.  No word on why they closed, but a number of people in the Quad Cities are bummed that they'll no longer have a place to celebrate St. Patrick's Day.)

The Walrus - Bismarck, ND

On my annual trip to North Dakota last year, I got into Bismarck a little early to go see my dealer there.  I decided to look for a place for lunch and did a quick search on my smart phone for a good lunch place.  A couple three suggestions came up, but I opted for the one with the fun and unique name - The Walrus.  

The Walrus has been around for 20 years, but for a little over the last 10 years a lady by the name of Jill Sanford has worked there.  She started out working part-time at The Walrus supplementing her income as a music teacher in the local school district.  One day in 2009 she was talking with the owner and made a joke about selling the place to her one day.  It turned out the owner was looking to get out of the business and more conversations ensued.  The next thing Sanford knew, she was quitting her teaching job and buying the Walrus.  

Going from being a part-time waitress/music teacher to the owner of an established restaurant was a big stretch for Sanford.  I read where she felt the first 18 months were excruciating for her as she was learning the business on the fly.  But Sanford has settled in nicely as business has steadily grown over the past seven years.  One of the things Sanford has implemented over the past few years has been a focus on offering a wide selection of craft beers at The Walrus.  The place offers over three dozen beers on tap with an ever-changing line-up of seasonal beers to choose from.  From the on-line description I found, The Walrus sounded like my kind of place.  

Pictured right - Jill Sanford.  Photo courtesy Bismarck Tribune.

It was the heart of the noon rush when I pulled up to The Walrus which is located in a strip mall not far from the North Dakota State Capitol building.  (see map)  There was plenty of parking available in the parking lot in front of the building.  The Walrus is a long and narrow space in the strip mall with an two levels of seating as well as a bar area near the rear.  The walls were full of beer signs - both lighted and non-lit - with some natural light coming in from the large windows in the front.

I took a seat at the bar area in the back of the restaurant near the open kitchen.  Though I didn't recognize her at the time, Jill Sanford was standing near the server's station by the bar choreographing the food orders between the kitchen and the servers.  I was greeted by the bartender/server Britnee who asked me what I wanted to drink.  One of the beers on tap at The Walrus was my current favorite - Kona Big Wave Golden Ale.  Any place that has Kona Big Wave on tap, I immediately like.  

Britnee had dropped off a lunch menu for me to look through.  It featured a number of salads with house-made dressings, a number of sandwiches to choose from, as well as pasta dishes and pizza.  Curiously, they only had one burger on the menu - the Bailey Burger - that featured a 1/2 pound beef patty topped with lettuce, tomato and onions.  I saw the price and thought that it had better be a damned good burger because it was $12.99 - and that was before you could get add-ons such as bacon, sautéed mushrooms and a choice of five different types of cheese which would have added about $3.75 to the overall price of the burger.  

I wasn't really certain that I wanted a burger, anyway.  A lot of the pasta dishes sounded wonderful including the Spicy Rock that featured fettuccine with shrimp and jalapeño slices, but I just thought that would be too heavy, considering I was taking my dealer in Dickinson out for a steak dinner that evening.  I was still undecided what to have when Britnee came back and told me about the lunch special that day - three carnitas tacos with chips and salsa for $14.99.  I thought that was a little high priced for three tacos and chips and salsa, but I figured the tacos were pretty good sized.

Uh...  They weren't.  They were three small soft-shell tacos with some basic pulled pork that didn't taste like it was seasoned, some chopped lettuce greens and a sprinkling of Chihuahua cheese.  The chips tasted like they came out of a bag of Doritos and the salsa tasted like it came out of a jar of Pace salsa.  I was absolutely stunned that they had the gall to charge $14.99 for this plate of food.  I mean, the tacos were all right - not the best carnitas tacos I've had.  But this was a situation where I just could not believe that I was getting charged $15 bucks for this plate of food.  I know that margins in restaurants aren't all that great, but the profit margin they made off me that day had to be substantial.  

I really wanted to like The Walrus.  I really did.  I like the owner's back story of starting to work there as a server and working her way up to owning the place.  I like the fact that they have a great selection of craft beers on tap.  And I liked the varied choices for food they had for lunch.  But the price of $14.99 for three small pork tacos, some bagged chips and bottled salsa was just absolutely outrageous.  I know prices can be a little higher in North Dakota and maybe I got a little bit of a sticker shock for the cost of the tacos.  But compared to similar places I've found around the Midwest, The Walrus is a horrible value. 

Jameson's Public House - Waterloo, IA

I was driving through the Waterloo area coming back from the Twin Cities last fall and it was around the lunch hour.  I was thinking about going to a brewpub or a similar type of place for a couple beers and a sandwich.  I did a quick search on my GPS to see what was around and I saw a place called Jameson's Public House come up.  I thought that sounded sort of interesting, so I took off to see what Jameson's Public House was all about.  

It turns out that Jameson's has been around since February of 2006 (it says it was established in 2005 on the logo, but it didn't open until a couple three weeks before St. Patrick's Day in 2006) and features a combination of American and Irish dishes along with a number of beers and whiskey available.  I mean, any place named after the famous Irish whiskey should have a good selection of whiskeys on hand and Jameson's Public House features over two dozen different types of Irish whiskey to choose from.  

The pub is housed in a building in downtown Waterloo that was built in 1890 and originally housed an Odd Fellows Lodge.   By the 1980's and 90's, downtown Waterloo had seen an exodus of businesses and many of the buildings had been vacated and run down.  That's where a local civic leader by the name of Buck Clark came into the picture.

Buck Clark had been a Waterloo police officer for 18 years before retiring in 1998 and getting into private business.  In 2001, Clark successfully ran for local office as he was elected to a four-year term as an alderman to the Waterloo city council.  While on the city council, he saw opportunities in the downtown area and after his four-year term was finished, he opened places such as Monica's Cigar Bar, Cu and the Cellar, and Jameson's all within a couple of years.  In 2009, Clark ran for mayor of Waterloo and won in a close three-way race.  Clark was easily re-elected to two more terms in 2011 and 2013 before he decided in 2015 not to run for a fourth term as mayor.  

Clark changed Monica's from a cigar bar to an upscale piano when anti-smoking laws were becoming more common place about 10 years ago.  The concept never caught on and Monica's closed in 2008.  (Monica's reopened as the Volks Haus German pub in 2010 under new ownership.)   Clark sold Cu and the Cellar - right next door to Jameson's Public House - last summer, but the place hasn't reopened.  

Jameson's Public House is located on E. 4th St. in downtown Waterloo.  (see map)  I was able to find parking on the street in front of the Volks Haus (I almost went in there, but decided I'll have to go back at some point.) Jameson's was easy to spot with the bright green facade over the brick front of the old building.  

The decor at Jameson's is what I would call rustic.  It's not like some places that put up a couple Irish flags and call themselves an Irish Bar.  It had sort of an old world Irish feeling to the place.  The Irish greeting céad míle fáilte is over the entry way from a small front dining area to the larger dining area in the back.

The long narrow space features a number of high-top tables and standing bars with a number of pictures and maps of Ireland.  The ceiling features exposed wood beams and there is an upstairs area in the back of the place.  It was cozy and inviting.  Jameson's also hosts live music on Friday and Saturday nights.

I sat at the bar and was greeted by Shaylin, the bartender/day manager for Jameson's Public House.  She dropped off a menu and asked if I wanted anything to drink.  They have nearly 20 beers on tap at Jameson's and I ordered up a Smithwick's.  Unfortunately, it was pretty flat in taste.  Shaylin tried the Smithwick's out of the tap and she said, "Hmmm...  Doesn't taste that flat to me."  But it was flat - I know how Smithwick's is supposed to taste.  She offered me another beer and I took and IPA they had on tap.  That, too, tasted a little flat for an IPA, but I just decided to keep it and move on.  I got to wondering after a bit if possibly they needed to clean their lines out, but I didn't say anything.  

The menu at Jameson's is a mix of American and traditional Irish fare that includes sandwiches, appetizers, burgers, soups, salads and entrees such as a traditional Shepherd's Pie, a home-style meatloaf platter, bangers and mash, baby back ribs, and an Irish stew in a Guinness gravy.  Sandwiches include a fried pork tenderloin sandwich, a meatloaf sub, and Jameson's signature Dubliner sandwich - roast beef and smoked bacon topped with Swiss and cheddar cheese, and a spicy English-style mustard all served on wheat berry bread.  They also featured a handful of burgers on the menu including the Buffalo burger that was topped with blue cheese, onion rings, jalapeños and a spicy cream sauce; the Hawaiian burger that had grilled pineapple rings, sliced ham, Swiss cheese, a fried egg and house-made sweet chili mayo; and the Mac - they fry up some of the house-made mac & cheese into a patty and top it with cheddar cheese, chipotle mayo and and applewood smoked bacon.   

I was thinking about getting their reuben sandwich when I walked into Jameson's - the place looked like it would have a killer reuben - but then something on the menu jumped out at me.  They had a hot beef sandwich on potato bread served with mashed potatoes with chopped scallions and topped with a stout beer/onion gravy.  Comfort food was just what the doctor ordered after being on the road for the prior four days.  

The sandwich was large, but cut in half with the mashed potatoes in the middle.  The beef was braised and shredded on the potato bread slices.  It was a full helping of potatoes with a generous pour of the stout/onion gravy over everything.   There was a lot of food on the plate, as well.  They definitely didn't skimp on the offerings.  

Not only did it look delicious, it WAS delicious.  The beef was tender and juicy, the mashed potatoes had a great down-home flavor, and the stout/onion gravy tied everything together with its rich taste.  Shaylin asked me how my lunch was and I told her it was a "spot-hitter".  

I always have great hope for the food at Irish pubs that I visit in my travels.  Walking into Jameson's Public House, I thought that the place had potential.  Other than the somewhat flat beers I was served, I thought the food I had at Jameson's was very good.  The hot beef sandwich was an excellent choice for someone needing comfort food at that point in the week.  It's nothing fancy at Jameson's, but it's cozy and friendly.  And that's all you should look for at an Irish pub like Jameson's. 

Luna - Fargo, ND

I was in Fargo early last fall on my annual trip across North Dakota to see my dealers up there.  One of my dealers in Fargo always has a great place in mind where to go out for dinner and one place was a small restaurant that was transformed from a coffee house into an upscale restaurant  in 2014 and was owned by some people that he knew.  We ended up at Luna for dinner that evening.  

As I said, Luna started out as a small coffee shop in a strip mall along S. University Dr. in Fargo.  (see map)  It was next door to Bernie's Wine and Liquors, a popular spot in Fargo for wine connoisseurs and was run by Bernie Ness, Jr. and his children, including Nikki Ness Burglund.  In addition to running the wine shop at Bernie's, Nikki Burglund also wrote food reviews for a small regional paper.  She bought the small coffee house that had been around for over 20 years in February of 2014 with the idea of transforming it into a unique restaurant that still brewed gourmet coffees in the morning, but would also offer a wide variety of cheese that could be paired with the wines sold next door.  But she also wanted an upscale restaurant with an ever-changing menu that featured fresh and locally-raised food.   

Nikki Burglund initially partnered with Peter Kelly, a local Fargo man I've met on a couple of occasions and the former co-owner of the popular Green Market Kitchen that featured farm-to-fork fresh foods that unfortunately closed in March of 2013.  Kelly helped Burglund with the Luna concept and eventually became the first cheese monger at the restaurant/cheese shop/coffee bar. 

But Burglund's coup was getting James Beard Award-nominated chef Ryan Nitschke to join her at Luna.  Nitschke was the long time chef at the Hotel Donaldson in downtown Fargo and won numerous local and regional awards including two AAA Four Diamond awards for his work in the HoDo kitchen.  A Fargo native, Nitschke went through the culinary program at Minnesota State Community and Technical College in Moorhead, then worked as a chef for corporate restaurants around the Fargo area, eventually hooking on with the Hotel Donaldson before leaving in 2013.  

The first thing you see when you walk into Luna is the large refrigerated case loaded with different types of artisan cheese.  While Peter Kelly is no longer associated with Luna, they still feature a number of cheese from local and Upper Midwest dairies.  

The coffee/alcohol bar is prominent in the larger of the two dining areas.  They have a nice wine list and their selection of craft beers was also impressive.  For coffee, Luna sources their organic beans from Peace Coffee and Up Coffee Roasters in the Twin Cities.  Luna also offers a wide variety of loose leaf teas they get from TeaSource also in the Twin Cities.

We sat in the dining room with bar area that evening.  Our server for our visit - Anna - came over to drop off menus and to take our drink order.  I got an Oskar Blues IPA to start out with, but I switched to a Decero Malbec wine when I got my main entree. 

The dining room was well-lit and I thought it was a little sparse on the atmosphere.  Other than the oil paintings done by local artists on the wall, the dining room seemed a little drab.  The tables and chairs were sturdy, but "plain-Jane" in their appearance.  Still, it was comfortable enough to enjoy the evening.

I also liked the sense of humor shown at Luna.  I got up to use the restroom and on the door of one of the restrooms was the sign shown above right.  I got a chuckle when I saw the sign, something I'd never encountered before.  

The first thing we had to do is get an appetizer plate.  They had three choices - a meat plate, a pickle plate and a cheese plate.  While I wish they would have been able to combine all three, we decided to go with the cheese plate that evening.  They had a camembert cheese from a dairy out of Mankato that evening along with an espresso smoked cheese that were both delicious.  Olives came with the cheese plate along with some outrageously tasty smoked almonds.  Out of everything on the plate, I think I liked the smoked almonds the best and I don't really care for the taste of almonds.  

After the cheese plate, I ordered up a bowl of Luna's lobster bisque.  It was a puree of lobster, crab and shrimp in a light cream sauce.  I thought I tasted a hint of squash in the bisque, but Anna told me afterward that it didn't have any squash in it.  It was very enjoyable.  

But the star of the start of the meal were the delicious chive and cheddar cheese popovers they make at Luna.  They were crispy on the outside with an airy center core.  The pronounced flavors of the cheddar cheese and the chives baked into the popovers was a great taste combination.

Anna brought three to the table and my dealer was gracious enough to let me have two.  "I get them all the time," he said as he waved the second one toward me.  "They're delicious!"  I couldn't have agreed more.  

Luna serves dinner from 5 to 9 p.m. Monday thru Saturday and the menu will sometimes change daily depending upon what they have fresh that evening.  For dinner that evening, they had entrees that included a buttermilk-fried Amish chicken served with a sweet and sour lemon sauce; baked walleye with a potato puree; braised beef lasagna; and a cavatelli pasta dish with lobster mushrooms in a spicy tomato sauce.  

My dealer went with the duck breast that Luna procures from Wild Acres Farms, a purveyor of farm-raised chicken, turkey, duck and pheasant located in Pequot Lakes in north central Minnesota.  The duck breast was sliced and served with a beet and crème fraîche, paired with sumac herbs, wild rice and a lavender honey.  He thought the duck was just outstanding.  

For some reason, I was thinking about getting the spicy cabbage and potato beef pasty - a true Upper Midwest meal if there ever was such a thing.  But I ended up getting the smoked New York strip steak that came with chanterelle mushrooms and a burrata cheese topped with squash blossoms.  They source their beef at Luna from the Prairie Rose organic farm located in north central North Dakota.  The beef was lean, juicy and very flavorful.  It easily cut with a knife and it had wonderful texture to the beef.  This was an outstanding dinner. 

My dealer's wife joined us late as she had a prior commitment and she had the apple and gruyere cheese crisp dessert as we sat and caught up on life.  When Anna asked me if I wanted any dessert, I told her that all I wanted was more of the smoked almonds.  She said, "I don't know if we have any more.  He doesn't make them every day and when he does he doesn't make a lot."  However, she later came out with a small bowl filled with smoked almonds.  "I'll have to charge you for them," she warned.  I think that they charged me $5 bucks for the bowl, but if she would have said they were $20 bucks, I would have thought about it for a moment and still taken them.  They were that good.  

Fargo continues to amaze me with the number of good restaurants in the city and Luna was absolutely no exception.  While the atmosphere didn't quite meet up with the level of the food that was served, it was still a fine meal.  The service we had with Anna was professional, friendly and competent.  Everything we had for food that night was thoroughly enjoyable.  I wanted to make it back to Luna the next morning for some espresso, but I didn't have the time.  But there will be another trip to Fargo later this year and I'll be sure to stop back in at that time.    

Tiny Diner - Minneapolis

I was in Minneapolis and got hold of one of my dealers to see if he wanted to get together for a breakfast meeting.  He suggested a place that I'd been to once before - The Lowbrow (click here to read Road Tips' entry on The Lowbrow - but I thought that they didn't serve breakfast through the week.  Once I confirmed that The Lowbrow served brunch only on the weekends, I texted him back to let him know.  He texted back another place that I'd heard about and wanted to try at some point - Tiny Diner.  I texted him back and said, "Perfect!"  We met there for breakfast a little past 9 a.m. on a clear fall day in the Twin Cities.  

Tiny Dancer is another one of Kim Bartmann's gems in her quest to be recognized as one of the top restaurateurs in the Twin Cities.  I've eaten at other Bartmann restaurants including Red Stag, Pat's Tap and Bryant Lake Bowl - all fun and unique dining experiences.   However, it took her over nearly two years from the conception of Tiny Diner to when she was able to open the doors.  Originally, she had hoped to open in May of 2013, but delays caused her to move back the opening date to the end of November of that year.  More delays followed and her anticipated opening by Christmas in 2013 came and went.  Finally, with everything in place, she was ready to open the doors to Tiny Diner in June of 2014.  

Bartmann is big on eco-friendly and eco-sustainable concepts for her restaurants and Tiny Diner is no exception.  Above a patio on the side of the restaurant is an array of solar panels that power the restaurant.  The 22 kilowatt panels are translucent and provide a light blue glow even on cloudy days.  

Tiny Diner also maintains two sustainable gardens where they grow vegetables and herbs for not only this location, but other Bartmann owned spots around the Twin Cities.  There is a small rooftop garden located at Tiny Diner, but a larger garden - nearly an acre in size - is located in South Minneapolis.  I read somewhere that the first harvest of the gardens yielded right at one ton of vegetables that were used in Bartmann's restaurants.  The rooftop garden at Tiny Diner also features beehives for producing honey.  The solar panels also act as a rain gathering mechanism for the rooftop garden at the restaurant.

I met up with my dealer just a bit after 9 a.m. on a beautiful fall morning in the Twin Cities.  Tiny Diner is located on the south side of Minneapolis in the Bancroft/Powderhorn neighborhood at the corner of E. 38th St. at 11th Ave. S.  (see map)  Inside the front door of the restaurant is a small dining area that features an open kitchen behind a small counter, and a number of small tables with chairs that give it a homey diner-type of atmosphere.

The back of the restaurant features a coffee/alcoholic libations bar and more tables for dining.  The counter at the bar area in the back is larger than up front and as more people came in for breakfast that day it turned out to be a popular place for single eaters.  During lunch and dinner, Tiny Diner features a number of wines as well as signature mixed drinks.  They also have a pretty impressive list of local and regional craft beers to choose from.

My dealer and I took a seat at a table in a little alcove in the front dining room.  We were greeting by our server for the visit - Citla - who dropped off a couple menus for us.  I immediately ordered up some orange juice and a double espresso.  My dealer - who actually had the day off - semi-joked about getting their signature bloody Mary, a cucumber-infused sake mixed with a house-made spicy tomato based mix.  He ended up with just getting orange juice as well.  

A quick note on the double espresso - I will sometimes order up a triple espresso, or if I need a sustained jolt in the morning I'll get a quad shot.  Well, the double espresso they served at Tiny Dancer Diner (you can NOT believe how many times I have written Tiny Dancer instead of Tiny Diner while doing this post) was a booster rocket of caffeine.  I'm seriously glad I didn't get anything more than just two shots.  

Sustainable and organically-raised foods dominate the menu at Tiny Diner.  Breakfast is served throughout the day and they have a small dinner menu for meals after 5 p.m.  Each month, Tiny Diner tries to feature a special regional food from around the nation, say something that is famous like Cincinnati-style chili, or Nashville-style chicken.  I didn't see what the monthly feature was on this visit.  

For breakfast, they featured such dishes as a crab cake eggs Benedict topped with a bacon/hollandaise sauce, three-egg omelets that featured either ham and cheese, spinach and chorizo, or a smoked whitefish stuffed inside.  And they even had the old Middle America staple of buttermilk biscuits and a mushroom-herb gravy.  I've never been a big fan of biscuits and gravy, but I know a lot of people who are.

My dealer and I decided to get the exact same thing - the breakfast burrito.  It was stuffed with organic scrambled eggs, Wisconsin cheddar cheese, fresh spinach, hash brown potatoes, chorizo sausage, a green chili sauce and sour cream.  However, we went for the step-up Red, White and Green breakfast burrito that adds a smoky chipotle salsa, Mexican crema, and more of the green chili sauce on top of the burrito.  Slices of avocado came on the side with the large burrito.  

And the burrito was very good.  There were a lot of tastes going on with the burrito, but they all worked very well together.  I enjoyed the thick green chili sauce they had both inside and on the one end of the burrito.  It was filling, but I didn't feel bloated when I got up from the table.  

Tiny Diner is another fun, unique, and eco-friendly restaurant under Kim Bartmann's umbrella of interesting Twin Cities-area restaurants that feature organic and sustainable foods on their menus.  The atmosphere at Tiny Diner is that of a cozy upscale diner, the service we received from Citla was friendly and efficient, and the Red, White and Green breakfast burritos we both got were very good.  I'm a big fan of Bartmann and her restaurants and Tiny Diner is good little place to get a home-style meal for breakfast, lunch or dinner.      

Mac's Tavern - Davenport, IA

When I first moved to the Quad Cities over 25 years ago, I was working at an audio video store in Davenport that used to do a lot of home theaters and projection television systems.  The owner of a local bar in downtown Davenport came in one day and wanted us to put in a projector in his place.  After my first visit to his bar, I immediately fell in love with the place that had been around since 1934.  For a number of years, Mac's Tavern was my "go-to" place for a beer in downtown Davenport.  Ownership had changed and I've since gravitated to other places in town to have a beer, but every once in a while my wife and I will still head to Mac's for a cold one.  One evening not long ago, we decided to have something to eat, as well.  

Bill "Mac" McLaughlin is the "Mac" behind Mac's Tavern.  He opened his eponymous tavern after Prohibition was repealed and owned it for 14 years before selling it to Dick and Bert Jensen.  The Jensen's owned Mac's for 32 years before they sold it to Rocky Eddleman and Wally Planner in 1980.  The partners owned it for a couple of years before Eddleman sold his interest to Planner.  Two years later Planner sold Mac's to the Oake family - Buzzy, Bev and their son Greg.  The Oake family ran the place for six years before selling it to Bill Collins in 1990.

Bill Collins was the one who entered the store where I was the G.M. looking for a projection television for Mac's Tavern in 1991.  Bill is a big, gregarious guy who held court at Mac's in the 1990's serving politicians, law enforcement officials and lawyers, all of whom worked at the nearby Scott County Courthouse.   I drank many beers one evening with a former Quad City area sheriff, got to know one of the local prosecutors over time, and made a number of friends hanging out at Mac's early on in my days in the Quad Cities.  Soon, Mac's was the place for me to hang out on Friday nights after work.  Or, well, really any night, for that matter.  

When Bill Collins put the bar up for sale in 2003, one of his regulars - Mike Lonergan - heard that a prospective suitor was looking to "modernize" Mac's Tavern.  Knowing that gutting and "updating" the tavern would make the place lose its appeal, Lonergan bought Mac's to keep it the way it was.  Well, I should say that when Lonergan took over, he actually did do some remodeling - but for the benefit of the old-style tavern.  Lonergan redid the ceiling to expose the original tin ceiling panels, he polished up the original tile flooring, he put in new booths replacing the uncomfortable ones that had probably been there since the 1930's, he bought the space just to the west of Mac's and has turned that into an overflow/events room, and he refinished the 45 foot long curved bar and the matching back bar.   And much to the approval of my wife, he remodeled the bathrooms that were small and dingy until just a handful of years ago.  (In 2014, Lonergan's longtime manager of Mac's Tavern, Gary Rowland and his wife, Sasha, bought an interest in the business.)   

It was an unseasonably warm weekday evening when we made it into Mac's for a bite to eat.  We were able to park out front on 3rd Street (see map) below the bright neon art deco sign hanging on the front of the building.   To me, Mac's looks the same has it did when I first walked in the place over 25 years ago.  The neon accent lighting along the soffit around the long narrow tavern as well as the soft lighting over the booths gives Mac's  an alluring and soothing glow.  

The bar where I sat many times is the prominent feature of Mac's.  There are a number of flat screen televisions interspersed around the tavern that are usually tuned to a sporting event.  We took a seat in a booth in the back of the place and our server came over to give us a couple of menus.  For some reason, Mac's was unusually packed for a weeknight evening.  There was only one bartender and one server.  And the server was overwhelmed.  

The decor at Mac's Tavern is pretty interesting.  Bill Collins was a big backer of the annual Grand Parade that is put on by the St. Patrick's Society of the Quad Cities in conjunction with St. Patrick's Day.  (Click here to see some pictures of the Grand Parade.)  It also turns out that the Grand Parade is the only Bi-State St. Patrick's Day parade held in the nation.  It starts in downtown Rock Island, it comes across the Centennial Bridge into Iowa and ends up in front of Mac's on 3rd Street.  It's usually a crazy time when the parade is going on and Mac's is ground zero for the festivities in downtown Davenport.  Bill began to collect the official posters for the Grand Parade when he was the owner in the 90's and Lonergan has carried on the tradition.

It's basically just pub food at Mac's Tavern - fish and chips, burgers, sandwiches, Irish stew, a pub steak and a slew of appetizers.  They have nightly specials from time to time and that's what Cindy ended up getting that particular night.  It was a pasta dish that had chopped chicken breast meat, asparagus spears and chopped tomatoes that were under a topping of melted mozzarella and grated parmesan cheese.  A small piece of toasted garlic bread came with the entree.  She was pleasantly surprised with how good the taste of the pasta dish was.  

She also got a dinner salad to go along with her meal.  Well, actually, it CAME with her meal as the waiter - who, as I said, was stressing out because he was the only server - completely forgot about bringing out her salad beforehand.  It was a basic salad with lettuce greens, sliced onions and chopped tomatoes.  It came with a basic Italian dressing.  

I went with the reuben that Mac's calls the "Mad Irish Reuben."  It consisted of house-roasted corned beef topped with Swiss cheese, sauerkraut and a sort of spicy tasting 1000 Island dressing.  The sandwich was on toasted marble rye bread.  The taste was also good, not great, but good for a reuben.  I also got an order of onion rings with the sandwich.  They were the frozen kind from a food purveyor, but they were still pretty good in taste.  I was happy enough with what I got for my meal that evening.

Our server continued to be overwhelmed and stressed during our time there.  I wanted another beer, but he was busting his ass waiting on tables and getting food out to patrons.  He never came back to our table once other than after we were finished and he wordlessly dropped off the check.  I can understand him being a bit surly because he was the only server, but it was sort of a puzzling predicament as to A) Why Mac's was so packed on a mid-week evening; and B) Why there was only one server.  

The service this evening - or lack of it - notwithstanding, it's always fun to go back to Mac's for just a beer or even for a sandwich.  The food isn't anything fancy - but it was good, the atmosphere is lively and welcoming, and other than the understaffing problems we had on this visit, the staff is usually friendly and accommodating.  Oh, yeah - we'll keep going to Mac's.  It's been a part of my life since I moved to the Quad Cities years ago and it's one of the more iconic places to visit in the area.  

RPM Steak - Chicago

My colleague John came into Chicago for a business seminar last fall and it turned out that I was going to be in Chicago at the same time.  We decided to get together one evening for dinner and he suggested that we invite along a couple guys from one of our dealers.  John was staying downtown and we all decided to have dinner somewhere in the River North area of downtown Chicago.  Our guests suggested a steakhouse that I'd heard about and had wanted to try for sometime - RPM Steak.  We made 7 p.m. reservations and all met up there for dinner.  

RPM Steak is another restaurant under the Lettuce Entertain You umbrella of fine and unique restaurants that are found all over the Chicago area.  The "M" in RPM signifies Richard Merman and his children - R.J., Jarrod, and Molly - who were joined in two restaurant ventures by celebrity couple Guiliana and Bill Rancic, the "R" in the name.  Guiliana was a co-host on E! Network's E! Entertainment show, as well as a host of the network's Fashion Police show.  Bill Rancic was the winner of the first season of The Apprentice and he was hired to be the project coordinator for the construction of Trump Tower in downtown Chicago.  The Rancic's also hosted their own reality television program a couple three years ago.  

Joining the Melman's and the Rancic's in the restaurant is Chef Doug Psaltis, the "P" in the RPM name. Psaltis is a New York native who got his start in the restaurant business by working in the kitchen of his grandfather's restaurant when he was just 10 years old.  He eventually worked in the kitchen in a number of Manhattan restaurants as a food stager until he was noticed by Chef Wayne Nish of the toney restaurant March.  Psaltis developed a philosophy of pairing the right foods in taste and texture while working with Nish.

From March, Psaltis was tapped to help open David Borley's 4-star Borley's Bakery in Manhattan, but he soon went to work for acclaimed chef Alain Ducasse's eponymous restaurant in the Essex House hotel.  The demanding kitchen work was exactly what Psaltis was looking for and he thrived in the chaos and pressure of Ducasse's kitchen.  Ducasse recognized Psaltis' skill in the kitchen, taking the young man under his wing and imparting Ducasse's philosophy that the simplicity and the integrity of the ingredients he's putting into his foods are the most important part of cooking.  

Pictured right - Doug Psaltis

Ducasse chose Psaltis to learn under his top chefs at his prestigious Le Louis XV restaurant in Monaco.  From there, Psaltis was chosen to run the kitchen at Ducasse's new Mix restaurant.  Psaltis was the first American chef to head a kitchen for Ducasse.  

Psaltis caught the eye of other restaurateurs, most notably Thomas Keller who asked Psaltis to come to Napa Valley to run his famous French Laundry restaurant.  But it turned out that Psaltis still had New York on his mind and only after 5 months of heading the French Laundry kitchen he went back east to work in chef Geoffrey Zakarian's new restaurant Country.  During the four years Psaltis headed the kitchen at Country the restaurant received great reviews and was awarded a Michelin star.

Psaltis left Country in 2009 and became a consultant in the restaurant industry.  While working as a consultant, Psaltis teamed up with the Melman family and the Rancic's to come up with a new concept Italian restaurant.  The group came together to open RPM Italian in downtown Chicago in March of 2012.   The group worked on a steakhouse concept after that and they opened RPM Steak in the summer of 2014.  (The group also opened an RPM Italian location last summer in Washington, D.C.)

I had picked up my colleague John at the airport earlier in the day and we spent a good portion of the afternoon calling on dealers around the Chicago area.  Since he was staying downtown for his seminar, our dealer set up the dinner at RPM Steak saying that he had wanted to eat there for quite sometime.  We were fine with that.

It was a 10 minute walk from John's hotel to the restaurant located on Kinzie just west of State Street in downtown Chicago.  (see map)  It was an unseasonably warm evening and we worked up a bit of a sweat when we got to the restaurant.  Our guests - the owner and his general manager - met us at the hostess stand inside.

The bar area is just to the left of the hostess stand.  It featured a large rectangular bar with contemporary seats and lights just above the bar.  It was spacious enough to be able to handle a large crowd waiting for a table to open in the dining room.

The dining area is a spacious room with two levels.   There is a private dining/reception room on the upper level along with windows that look out over the main dining area.  The restaurant was modern, classy and elegant, to say the least.  

We were seated at a table for four near the back of the restaurant and given menus.  Our server for the evening came over to greet us and to take our drink orders.  Even though they had an interesting and extensive list of artisan beers to choose from, I felt that a vodka and lemonade sounded good that evening.

Starting off with appetizers, one of the guys went with the Alaskan King Crab legs appetizer.  They were a half pound of crab legs and they looked big and meaty.  

We also got an order of fried calamari to start out for the table.  They had a light and somewhat spicy batter on them and they were very tasty.  

Also at the table was a large loaf of baked Parker House rolls that sort of looked like challah bread.  They were brushed with butter and sprinkled with parsley on the top.  Warm, chewy and flavorful, the rolls were a hit with everyone at the table.  

I ordered the small wedge salad to start off my dinner that evening.  The crips lettuce wedge was topped with sliced tomatoes, chopped bacon, chopped avocado slices and a Roquefort dressing that was creamy and forward in its taste.  It also had blue cheese crumbles, black olives, housemade croutons and two slices of parmesan cheese on it.  It was a very good wedge salad.  

For dinner that evening, they had a lobster risotto with lobster mushrooms as a special entree.  Our server did a great job of selling it and I damned near pulled the trigger on that.  But I ended going the beef route and I got the 8 ounce hand-cut USDA Prime beef filet.  The beef tenderloins they cut the filets from at RPM Steak come from Creekstone Farms, a well-known higher-end beef supplier located in Kansas.  I've had Creekstone Farms beef in the past on a number of occasions.  

My steak was seasoned with a basic salt and pepper mix and cooked to a cool red center. It was tender to the cut and had a rich and flavorful beef taste.  With the appetizers, salad, bread rolls and the sides that we got, I'm glad I only got the 8 ounce filet that evening.  It was simply an outstanding steak.

They also have an extensive wine list at RPM Steak.  All of the wines chosen by RPM Steak's master sommelier have been picked for their pairing with the steaks served at the restaurant.  There's an emphasis on American wines - some I weren't familiar with.  But there were also a number of French and Italian wines available as well as a wonderful Argentinian malbec that was available by the glass.  I ordered that to go with my dinner and it was a hearty and meaty red that went extremely well with the filet I had.  

Our dealer opted for the grass-fed bone-in ribeye steak.  The ribeye came from Rain Crow Ranch, an artisanal meat purveyor located in southern Missouri near the Arkansas border.   The bone-in ribeye was thick and juicy, and he said it had a lot of great natural flavor to the taste.   

His general manager got the 28-day dry aged 16-ounce New York strip.  He ordered it medium rare plus, but it was so thick that when they brought it out it was even more rare in the deep middle than my steak.  He called the waiter over and showed him the deep red color in the middle of the steak.  The waiter apologized profusely and took the steak back to the kitchen.  It was a semi-awkward moment as three of us continued to eat - on the insistence of our guest who was piecing on some of the sides that came out with the steaks.  When the steak came out, they had probably overcooked it by a couple three minutes.  The manager came over later on and our guest told him that he was disappointed in the temperature of the steak - before and after.  The manager said, "Well, we certainly understand and we deeply apologize.  We're just going to comp you your steak this evening, sir."  We all thought that was a classy and generous gesture considering the aged New York strip was well over $60 bucks.  

My colleague John went all out for dinner that evening and ordered up the 5 ounce Wagyu beef strip.  Now here's something that I didn't know about Wagyu beef - there are 5 different levels of Wagyu beef produced in Japan with 12 different levels of what they refer to as Beef Marbling Scale, or BMS, in the Wagyu beef.  RPM Steak has what they call A5 Wagyu beef meaning that the beef, itself, is rated as excellent with a BMS rating of 5 which denotes a beef marbling of anywhere between the 8th and the 12th level.  Of course, the more marbling, the more tender and flavorful the beef is.  It wasn't cheap - $85 bucks for the small 5 ounce strip - but when John's eyes lit up as he was taking his first bite, you could tell it would be worth every penny.  He cut up small pieces for each of us to try.  And it was unlike any steak I'd ever had in my life.  Oh, I've had Wagyu beef before and while it was good, it wasn't as good as the taste of this piece of Wagyu beef.  5 ounces was really all that you needed, as well.  John said the taste was very rich and very filling.  

Everything at RPM Steak is a la carte and we got a couple three sides to go along with our steaks.  One of the sides was a twice-baked Hasselback potato topped with chives and chunks of bacon.   I had a couple bites of that and I thought it was pretty good.

But the winner of the sides we got that evening were the bacon-wrapped button mushrooms.  These were not only sinfully great in the taste, but they seemed easy enough to make.  I'd never had anything like that before and the taste sensation of the earthy mushrooms and the bacon wrapped around them were a wonderful combination.  

RPM Steak was expensive - definitely an expense account meal that we get to have from time to time during our extensive travels on the road.  But the meal was worth it and our guests loved the food - maybe with the exception of beef temperature problems one of our guests experienced.  But RPM Steak's management took care of the problem and we were all satisfied with how it was handled.  Other than that, the overall meal was outstanding.  But you would expect nothing less from a place like RPM Steak.  And they delivered, big time.  (Picture at right courtesy Chicago Eater.com)