Road Tips

Turtle River Chophouse - Turtle River, MN

During our summer vacation to northern Minnesota, one of the things that I wanted to seek out was a good ol' fashioned northwoods supper club.  There were just a handful in the area and one of them that we checked out was sort of "iffy".  However, one that we did find was a steak house that was about halfway between Bemidji and Blackduck on the old US Highway 71 - Turtle River Chophouse.  We checked via phone one afternoon to see if they were open that evening and made reservations when we were told they were.  

Turtle River is really nothing more than a point in the road where there are a handful of businesses that cater to outdoorsmen and campers.  For years, the focal point of Turtle River was a small supper club by the name of Bar 71.  Bar 71 looked like a barn with an addition on the back and was locally famous for their fish fry's and their fresh walleye platters.  But in September of 2012, a fire that started in the kitchen wiped out the restaurant.  Owners had planned on rebuilding, but that never happened.  The property sat dormant for awhile before two brothers came to the rescue.

Derek and Brett Leach had bought the Bemidji burger joint Bar 209 in 2011 and were itching to do something a little more upscale for their next restaurant.  They purchased the property that Bar 71 sat upon in the summer of 2013 once it was determined that the owners of the old supper club were not going to rebuild.  Part of the original building was salvaged in the fire, but the brothers determined that they wanted to rebuild a larger space with a new foundation underneath.  Turtle River Chophouse opened in the early spring of 2014.  

We had driven up to Blackduck earlier in the day and decided to stop off at the Turtle River Chophouse before they were opened to make sure this place was legitimate.  Turns out that it was and then some.  (see map) The outside of the building was modern looking with a stone patio off to the side.  It was a beautiful evening, but we wanted to eat inside.  

Just inside the front door is a cross-cut section of a white pine tree that had fallen during a storm on a nearby property back in 2003.  It was lacquered and small arrow notes showed that the tree sprouted in 1825 and historical dates were marked along the rings of tree.  I noticed it immediately when I came in, but lingered a few moments to check out the information arrows on the cross-section of the tree when we left.  

As I said, we made reservations earlier in the day - we were told by one restaurant when we started to do some research on going to the Bemidji area a couple weeks prior that we had to have reservations according to the state mandate when restaurants across Minnesota reopened a number of weeks ago.  But the young lady at the hostess stand at Turtle River Chophouse said that most of the time people don't show up with a reservation, they would take their name and number just like it was a real reservation and still seat patrons.  My wife and I figured the names and phone numbers had to be in place in case a COVID-19 outbreak started in the restaurant on a given day.  

We were seated at a table in the dining area along the wall.  A couple menus were dropped off with us when we sat down.  The place wasn't fancy, but it wasn't a dank bar and grill, either.  We were dressed in casual clothing that night, but a table filled with a family celebrating a birthday on the other side of the dining area had a couple guys that looked like they had just come in from the fields to have dinner at Turtle River Chophouse.  Stone-tiled floors and a high-ceiling gave the dining area some roominess, and my wife immediately discovered the acoustical tiles attached to the ceiling to help lower ambient noise.  A couple three palm trees - we found out later they were real - were sitting in middle of the dining area.  

The bar area is attached to dining area.  Flat screen televisions hung on either side of the long rectangular bar.  The kitchen area with a large service window that looked out into the long room was just past the bar.  The only remnant of the old 71 Bar was the Pabst Blue Ribbon lighted sign that hung above the kitchen service window.  And they had a great selection of tunes playing in the background on their music system.  We heard recordings from Modest Mouse, Strumbellas, Lord Huron, and a great rendition of the classic Simon and Garfunkel "The Boxer" by Jerry Douglas backed by Mumford & Sons.  

Our server for the evening was a fun and effervescent young lady by the name of Cailin.  She was friendly and chatty all evening long.  She asked us what she could get from the bar for us while we looked over the menu.  I saw that they had Alaskan Amber on tap and I ordered one of those.  (Although, later, I wished I hadn't as it was a little flat.)  My wife got her usual Tito's vodka and cranberry juice.  

The menu at Turtle River Chophouse was not exactly what we were expecting.  It was more of an upscale steakhouse and not quite the quintessential northwoods supper club that we had hoped to find.  And that was not a deal breaker for us.  In fact, Turtle River would be a good place to eat if it were in any mid-sized Midwestern city.  It was just sort of surprising for the type of menu they had in middle of the sticks 11 miles from Bemidji, MN.  

At a supper club in the northwoods of Minnesota, you probably wouldn't see sesame-crusted ahi tuna on the menu, and you probably wouldn't see Korean barbecued ribs.  They also had interesting items such as shrimp with gnocchi, chicken and rice stir fry, and spinach-dip-stuffed chicken breasts topped with a garlic cream sauce.  In fact, they only had one steak on the menu - an 8-ounce sirloin steak with a gorgonzola butter topping.  Yes, it was not your typical supper club by any stretch of the imagination.  

Another thing you don't see at northwoods supper clubs are  sushi rolls.  But they had them at Turtle River Chophouse. Actually, my wife and I were a little hesitant, but also somewhat intrigued about them.  When Cailin came back, I asked her about the sushi rolls.  I apologized in advance for being so incredulous that they would have fresh seafood sushi rolls on the menu at a restaurant in the middle of the woods in Northern Minnesota.  "We actually sell quite a few of them," she said.  "They're actually pretty good."  What the hell - we had to give them a try.  

And our incredulity pretty much stopped after popping a slice of the spicy tuna roll that we had ordered into our mouths.  The tuna was fresh and not fishy in taste.  The spicy drizzle gave the roll a nice little "pop" in flavor, and they were certainly better than grocery store-bought spicy tuna rolls that I've had in the past.  The only thing was that they didn't give us enough wasabi or fresh ginger.  But we were more than able to work around that.  

Being that it wasn't a true supper club, we had a bit of a hard time digesting the menu.  When Cailin came back to take our food order, we still weren't ready to order just yet.  But my wife and I both determined that we were going to drink red wine with our meal.  I ordered up a bottle of the Jeff Runquist 1448, a blended Californian red.  We had been getting into blends lately and some have been very good while others have been sort of "meh!"  But with the 1448, we were both surprised and happy with the complex flavors the wine offered.  

After ordering our main courses, house salads came out beforehand.  The salad featured thick romaine leaves with slices of fresh tomatoes and cucumbers.  A very hearty balsamic vinaigrette came on the side as a dressing.  Everything in the salad tasted farm fresh and was a nice start to the meal.  

For her main entree that evening, my wife got the special that night - beef filet medallions topped with crusted gorgonzola sitting on a bed of mashed potatoes.  Some vegetables came with the medallions.  She was in the mood for steak that night, but since there were only two choices for steaks, she went with the medallions.  She was a little skeptical when it was served to you, but she was happy with her choice after a couple of bites.  

I went with the seafood linguine with Italian sausage and mussels in light red sauce - once again, not something you'd expect to see at a restaurants in the middle of the woods in northern Minnesota.  Parsley, sliced red peppers and basil were mixed in with the sausage, mussels and linguine noodles.  This dish, too, was surprisingly very good.  

For dessert - which we both really didn't need after all the food we'd had - we went with the creme brûlée.  It was good quality creme brûlée and it definitely appeared that they had someone back in the kitchen who knew how to make it - and make it correctly.  

We had been talking with Cailin about the Turtle River Chophouse.  We had been to the brothers' other restaurant Bar 209 a couple night's previously.  (They also own Red Stu Breakfast Bar and the Cabin Coffee House in Bemidji.)  We were asking her about the origin of Turtle River Chophouse and she was telling us the story of Bar 71 and the night it caught on fire.  "It started at 2:30 in the morning," Cailin told us.  "So, immediately, people around here thought it was suspicious.  I don't know if it was or not, but Derek and Brett came in after a while and bought the place.  The tore down what was left of the old building and built this."  

By now, most of the other people in the restaurant had cleared out except for a couple people seated at the bar.  A man came over as we were finishing up our wine and trying to finish the very rich creme brûlée.  He asked how everything was and I told him it was surprisingly very good.  It turned out that it was one of the co-owners, Brett Leach.  He asked me how it was so surprising.  I told him that we sort of expected a northern Minnesota supper club-type of menu and we were surprised to see some of the things on the menu - things that we didn't expect to find out in the country less than 100 miles from the Canadian border.  

"We set out to make it a little more upscale than other restaurants in the area," Brett explained to us.  "But we didn't want to make it so upscale that the locals wouldn't appreciate the food."  He said that business has been steady during the pandemic, but not at the numbers they've seen in the past.  "People aren't traveling like they have in the past," he said.  "But we're holding our own."

We remarked about the sushi rolls and he said, "We get our fish for sushi three times a week.  We're still debating whether it's worth it, but we do sell a fair amount of sushi rolls."  

I asked him how business was normally in the winter time for them.  "It's surprisingly not bad.  We have a steady clientele of people who either live here year round or come here to ice fish or snowmobile or cross-country ski," he explained.  "But that may be a different story this winter."  

My wife asked him how he got started in the restaurant business.  He told us that he and his brother worked at a steak house in Bemidji - "Not too much different from this place," he said - working bussing tables and in the kitchen.  "But I got my real start working in my grandmother's kitchen when I was a little boy," he said.  It turned out that his grandmother had a working farm with 30 farmhands where she would cook 3 meals a day for the workers.  "I had to learn how to help her prep food, clean dishes, make sure we had enough provisions.  Stuff like that," he told us.  "My grandmother would make three different types of pies each morning after breakfast."  Brett said that was his introduction to working in a kitchen and it taught him how to work in a high-impact kitchen and having to come up with solutions on the fly if something didn't quite work out.   

We had told him that we had already eaten at Bar 209 and wondered if he had any recommendations of other restaurants we needed to try in the immediate area around Bemidji.  He gave us a couple three names of places that we actually did give a try including Tutto Bene.  I remarked to my wife that I felt he was very gracious to do that, helping support other places in the area.  Most restaurateurs would have probably said, "Oh, you won't find anything in the area as good as MY place!"  

If you've read all the way through this post, you've figured out by now how pleasantly surprised we were with our visit to Turtle River Chophouse.  It was definitely a unique find in the lakes region of northern Minnesota. It wasn't the typical "relish tray/three-bean salad/prime rib"-kind of supper club that you can find in the northwoods.  The menu was interesting, the food - we thought - was very good, the atmosphere was nice, the decor was welcoming, and the service was efficient and personable with some fun mixed in.  We had a lot of good to great meals on our trip to northern Minnesota and this one may be the most memorable in terms of how surprising it turned out to be.  

Salut Bar Americain - Edina, MN

My wife is one of those people who needs three meals a day.  We'd had a pretty good sized breakfast this particular day, but we didn't have lunch.  We were in Minneapolis and she was getting a little "hangry" late in the afternoon.  I suggested that we head over to Pizzeria Lola, my favorite place for a pizza in the Twin Cities.  But we found out that due to the coronavirus, Lola was carry-out only.  We were in the Edina area and there's a number of good restaurants around the 50th and French neighborhood.  One place that I had been past numerous times, but had never stopped into before, is a bistro by the name of Salut Bar Americain.  We decided to stop in there for a late lunch/early dinner.  

Salut is part of the Parasole Restaurant Holdings group of restaurants around the Twin Cities that include Manny's, Pittsburgh Blue, Burger Jones and Chino Latino.  The CEO of Salut is Phil Roberts who opened the critically acclaimed (and one of my all-time favorite Italian restaurants) Pronto in Minneapolis in 1981.  Along with partner Pete Mihajlov, Roberts developed a number of restaurants including Buca Little Italy, a concept that eventually became Buca di Beppo.  And in 1999, Roberts closed Pronto and replaced it with the Oceanaire, a high-end seafood restaurant.  Roberts and Mihajlov eventually sold both Buca di Beppo and the Oceanaire off to separate corporate entities.  In 2005, Parasole opened the Salut location in Edina.  Three years later, a second Salut bar American opened in St. Paul.  And earlier this year, Parasole sold their holdings to a local capital investment company with Roberts remaining as the CEO of the restaurant group.  

We found a parking spot on France just down and across the street from Salut Bar Americain.  (see map) It was a beautiful evening and the dining patio in front of Salut was full.  We checked inside at the hostess stand to see if we could eat inside.  A young lady took us to a table in the corner of the restaurant - many tables were moved out due to COVID-19 restrictions - and we had to download menus on our smartphones via a QR code for us to look through.  It wasn't long before our server, Claire, came over to greet us.  I started off with a Surly Furious while my wife got a glass of pinot grigio.  Later on, I got a Day Tripper pale ale from the Indeed Brewing Company located in Minneapolis with a taproom in Milwaukee.  

The decor at Salut was tastefully elegant as they tried to replicate a Paris bistro.  The table we sat at featured a banquette bench along the wall.  The bar area had a few booths and high-top tables with an impressive back-lit back-bar area.  The place was fancy, but not pretentious in the least.   They had a wonderful selection of music playing in the background from artists such as Au Revior Simone, Kraak & Smaack, and the great Dead Weather featuring Jack White.  

I really didn't know what to get at Salut.  The menu is pretty compact with a handful of entrees including a walleye entree, steak and frites, and a herb-roasted half-chicken.  They had a burger on the menu, as well as sandwiches such as steak sandwich and a grilled chicken club sandwich.  Salads and appetizers such as jumbo shrimp, mussels, and escargot bourguignon were on the menu along with a classic French onion soup.  

My wife was hungry, but not hungry enough for a full entree meal.  She thought about getting the walleye dinner, but she ended up getting the tuna Niçoise salad.  It featured a yellowfin tuna filet, grilled lightly, then mixed with various items such as green beans, sliced tomatoes, potatoes, artichokes, olives and a hard-boiled egg.  It was topped with a pistou vinaigrette.  She also wanted to get a side of grilled asparagus to go along with our meals.  The asparagus came with a rich and creamy hollandaise sauce.  

I ended up getting the croque monsieur, a traditional Parisienne-style ham and cheese sandwich that is served open-faced and topped with a béchamel sauce.  A side of frites (fries) came with the sandwich.  

Now, my wife was very thrilled with her salad.  "This is wonderful," she said more than once.  "This is exactly what I needed.  Not too heavy, but filling enough to make me feel better."  Her "hangry-ness" had subsided considerably halfway through her salad.  

My sandwich was perfect for what I wanted that evening, too.  No, it wasn't a pizza from Pizzeria Lola, but it certainly hit the spot in terms of flavor and quality.  The thin slices of the ham with the melted cheese mixed with the béchamel sauce on the toasted bread had a lot of taste sensations going on.  It wasn't heavy in the stomach, but I was more than satiated when I finished.

I do have to say the frites were very good.  I asked Claire if I could get a side of mayonnaise to go along with the fries - Parisienne-style.  The frites had a nice crunchy outer shell with that great flaky potato taste on the inside.  And the grilled asparagus was very good, too.  The béarnaise sauce was served a little too cool for my liking, but it was still a nice addition with the asparagus.  

Salut Bar Americain may have saved the day for me as my wife was at that point where she really needed something to eat.  She really didn't know what she wanted, but she needed something.  And her Niçoise salad was exactly what she needed.  While I wasn't as hungry or needed food, the croque monsieur was perfect for what I needed to eat.  Our service from Claire was excellent, they had good music on their sound system at Salut, and even with pandemic restrictions in place, it was a very nice atmosphere in there.  Salut turned out to be a very good stop for us at a place that I'd been by dozens of times, but had never stopped in before this.

Bar 209 - Bemidji, MN

On our first night in Bemidji during our summer vacation up there, we were trying to get the lay of the land in terms of restaurants.  It was a Monday night, so a few places were closed.  (We found that parts of Bemidji literally shut down from Monday thru Wednesday.)  We weren't all that hungry, but we figured we needed something.  Driving around the downtown area, we found a handful of bar and grills that were open, but one sort of stuck out from all the outdoor seating they had in the street in front of the place.  We decided to hit up Bar 209 for dinner that evening.  

Bar 209 sat at 209 NW Minnesota Ave. in downtown Bemidji for a number of years.  Two brothers - Derek and Brett Leach - had an early life taste of the restaurant business when they both worked at the old Union Station, an upscale restaurant housed in an old train depot that opened in 1976.  Derek was 13 when he worked in the kitchen washing dishes and doing prep work, and Brett was 11 or 12 when he started at Union Station busing tables.  

An opportunity arose for the brothers to buy an existing little burger joint - Bar 209 (located at 209 Minnesota Ave. NW in Bemidji) in 2011.  It wasn't long before they expanded the menu and realized that they needed more space.  In late 2014, the brothers agreed to purchase the American Legion building a half block north of Bar 209.  Membership in the legion had dwindled to about 50 members and the 7,000 square foot building was way too big for their needs.  The Leach brothers needed the space as the original Bar 209 was long, but too narrow to comfortably seat people in the place.

It turned out that the American Legion post was way too big for Bar 209's needs, as well.  The Leach brothers hired a design team out of the Twin Cities who suggested putting two restaurants in the building.  The brothers decided to go with a "day & night" concept for the restaurants.  A breakfast place on one side and the new and improved Bar 209 on the other side.  

Pictured at right - Derek and Brett Leach.  Photo courtesy Bemidji Pioneer.  

Work finally began on the building and by June of 2018 the new Bar 209 opened on the north side of the building, while Red Stu - a breakfast place named after the brothers' father - opened on the south end.  In addition to 209 Bar and Red Stu, the brothers also own the Cabin Coffee House & Cafe (we went there for coffee one day), and Turtle River Chophouse, a supper club that's located about 11 miles north and east of Bemidji.  (Look for an upcoming Road Tips post on Turtle River Chophouse.)  

We parked our car just down the street from 209 Bar and walked toward the front door at the corner of 3rd St. NW and Minnesota Ave. NW.  (see map)  As I said earlier, Minnesota Ave. was shut down for the block in front of Bar 209 for outdoor seating.  With COVID-19 restrictions on dining inside, 209 Bar set up a number of folding tables and chairs in the street.  My wife and I looked at the set up and decided against dining in the street.  But there were a lot of people seated outside.  We figured that because outside dining in Bemidji is limited because of the short season, people there probably didn't care if they were sitting in the middle of a street to have dinner.  

We went inside and were greeted by a hostess who took us to a booth along the wall.  In Minnesota, you had to have a mask on to go into establishments, but once you were seated in a restaurant, you could remove them.  We found that most people complied with the mask mandate that Minnesota's governor had decreed earlier in the summer, even though they may not have liked it.  

Bar 209 was very nice.  It featured a number of high top tables including a couple of community tables in the middle of the dining area.  The bar curved around in front of an open serving window looking into the kitchen.  Booths were on the north wall of the restaurant and high-top tables with banquette seating along the wall faced opposite the bar.  I would call the decor in the place as modern industrial.  

We had been given menus when were seated and our server for the evening asked us what we would like to drink.  They had a number of beers on tap including a handful from the Bemidji Brewing Company located just a couple blocks away.  I wanted to go to Bemidji Brewing at some point to try their beers, but I didn't want to try them before then.  I ended up getting a Bell's Two Hearted Ale.  My wife got a glass of 209 Bar's house red wine - a French blend.  

The menu at 209 Bar featured appetizers, salads, sandwiches and wraps.  Bar 209 is known locally for their good burgers and they had a number on the menu - all their beef is sourced locally from Stittsworth Meats in Bemidji.  The different burgers sounded good, but I had a burger for lunch earlier in the day and I wasn't all that hungry.  But they also had pizza on the menu with the dough made-from-scratch in the kitchen daily.  

And that's what we ended up getting. It was a 10" pizza with raised dough and we got our usual sausage, pepperoni and mushroom.  The crust was sort of chewy, but the chunks of sausage had that great fennel flavor, the pepperoni was spicy, and the mushrooms were earthy in flavor.  Actually, there was almost too much crust for the pizza as most of the toppings were center of the pizza.  But it was still all right, in our book.  And it turned out to be just enough for what we needed that night.  

My wife thought she had better get some greens in her, so she ordered up the house salad - a mix of spring greens and romaine lettuce, with sliced cucumbers and cherry tomatoes all topped with shredded cheddar cheese.  She got the balsamic vinaigrette dressing to go with the salad.  She said the greens were cool, fresh and crisp.  She just had a couple pieces of pizza, so the salad was a nice addition to her meal.  

I would have to say that our visit to 209 Bar was all right.  The menu is pretty basic and caters more to a bar crowd and families.  We thought the place was nice, had a laid-back vibe and was comfortable.  We just thought it was a little strange to be eating in the street in front of the place, so that's why we decided to eat inside on what was a beautiful Northern Minnesota evening.  The service was fine - our server was pleasant and efficient.  209 Bar isn't fine dining, and they don't pretend to be.  But it would be a good place for a casual meal in downtown Bemidji.  

 

Floyd's Burgers & Sliders @ Wake Brewing - Rock Island, IL

For some time, I've had philosophical issues with food trucks.  When the food truck craze first hit four or five years ago, there just seemed to be this aimless attitude that food truck owners - and even municipalities - had in regard to where they could do business.  When owners of established brick-and-mortar restaurants complained - and rightly so - to local municipalities about the seemingly arbitrary regulations governing food trucks, local governments and health departments knew they had to reign in what was turning into a quickly growing - and a very unorganized - kitchen economy.  Some food trucks eventually fell by the wayside when rules, regulations, and permits came into play helping to level out the playing field.  But others began to prosper when they discovered a whole new venue where they could set up - the fast growing microbrewery sector.  While I have had a somewhat cynical approach to food trucks over the years, when they team up with local breweries to provide food while you can enjoy a craft beer - well, I'm all for that.  And one of the food trucks that we've discovered at one of our local breweries is Floyd's Burgers & Sliders.  And we went to have a burger at Floyd's one recent evening over at Wake Brewing in Rock Island.  

Austin Mills was one of those who saw an opportunity in the growing business of food trucks and started renovating his parents' 1978 Winnebago in the spring of 2016.  His main job was working at a Jimmy John's and he wasn't in any hurry to turn the camper into a burger joint on wheels.  However, in the summer of that year, the city of Davenport announced that they would sponsor a trial program for food trucks to congregate on evenings once a week for the month of September in public lots in the downtown area.  (A lot of downtown restaurants were, understandably, upset with this - and, at the time, I sided with the restaurants on this issue.)  But the trial was more of an experiment by the city to find out what they needed to do to regulate and weed out the ones that wouldn't comply with rules and regulations.

When Austin Mills found out the city was going to do this pilot program for food trucks, he quickly dove into the complete renovation of the camper into a food truck.  He missed the first week of the program, but was open for the second week.  Mills served his first burger as Floyd's Burgers and Sliders on September 13, 2016.  Over the years, Mills has expanded his menu to include vegan burgers and some interesting sandwich options.  Floyd's Burgers & Sliders has built up a loyal following in the community and Mills regularly posts his schedule and specials on their Facebook page.  

My wife had been to one of the local breweries with a friend when Floyd's was serving burgers.  She told me about it and pointed out to me that Floyd's would be at Wake Brewing that Friday evening between 5 and 8 p.m. - they're normally at Wake on Friday evenings through the spring, summer and fall.  We decided to head over to Wake - a place that we have been to many times to have a beer.  

Wake Brewing has been around since November of 2017 and is owned by the brother team of Jason and Justen Parris.  Jason had been working at Rock Island Brewing Company (RIBCO) as the events and booking coordinator, while Justen was an engineer at the Exelon nuclear power plant near Cordova, IL.   I know of both brothers through mutual friends, and Justen used to come to pool parties at our neighbor's house in the past.  

The brothers were musicians who started playing together in various bands about 25 years ago.  They toured with a couple bands, playing mainly on the East Coast, and also backed various hip-hop artists long before groups like The Roots were doing that type of thing.  While on tour one time, the brothers walked into a bar/pizza place in Athens, GA and innocently asked for a pitcher of Guinness for them to share.  The girl behind the bar looked at them funny and said that they didn't have Guinness, that the bar only specialized in craft beers.  The young lady suggested a beer they should try - a Grant's Perfect Porter from the new defunct Yakima Brewing Company in Yakima, WA.  The brothers immediately loved the beer and started to find more craft brews on their tour up and down the East Coast.  

After getting off the road and getting back to the Quad Cities, Justen Parris started to fiddle around with making his own beer at home.  About a year later, Jason got involved with his brother's hobby and the two networked with other home-brewers in the area.  They decided that the Quad Cities needed another craft brewery - there were only 3 at the time - and opened Wake in the fall of 2017.   Today, there is something like 15 craft breweries within a 30-mile radius of the Quad Cities.  And for a beer aficionado like myself, that's a good thing.  

Wake Brewing is located where Illinois 92 splits just east of downtown Rock Island, across from the Quad City Botanical Center and the QCCA Expo Center.  (see map)  Parking is available on the side of the building that houses Wake, but that night with Floyd's make-shift camper/kitchen in the lot, the only parking available was behind Wake.  

My wife and I went in to get a beer and they always have a lively selection of music playing at Wake.  A diverse selection of artists such as Ben Howard and Hippo Campus were playing that evening on the microbrewery's modest sound system that also pipes music outside to their beer garden in front of the building.  My wife and I got a double dry-hopped pale ale that they had on tap, one of the many rotating styles of craft beer Wake features.  

The tap room at Wake is pretty small - it doesn't seat many more than probably 30 people, and now less than that with COVID-19 restrictions in place - so we ended up seated at one of the all-weather picnic tables outside.  There had been a threat of rain earlier in the day, but by the time the line of storms came to the Quad Cities it had pretty much squeezed out all the rain, save for a few sprinkles that fell on us at Wake.  The cool air behind the front that came through was a welcome relief from the hot and humid weather we had been having.  

The Floyd's food truck has a colorful mural on the back side, but has a minimalist logo on the side where the order window is.  The logo is similar to the artwork Gerald Scarfe did for Pink Floyd's epic album "The Wall" over 40 years ago.  I immediately caught the "Floyd's Burgers & Sliders" and the "Pink Floyd" connection with the logo.  

The menu is located on blackboards on the ground next to the food truck.   Austin Mills has come a long way over the past four years as his initial menu only featured two items.  He has six different variations of burgers on the menu - including a veggie burger - as well as five different types of sliders (four per order).  The "Rhythm and Bleu" burger features bleu cheese, bacon and a chili garlic sauce; the "I'm Yer Huckleberry" is topped with cheese, crispy onions, jalapeños, bacon and a barbecue sauce; and the "Dyin' for Hawaiian" sliders consist of ham, cheese, bacon, pineapple, and Thousand Island dressing on four slider buns.  Floyd's also has grilled sandwiches including the "Foghorn" consisting of a roasted chicken breast, cheese, bacon and barbecue sauce; the "Basket Case" that features ham, cheese, bacon, a fried egg, and their garlic/chili sauce; as well as a classic grilled reuben sandwich.  

On this particular visit, they also had a special that evening - the Birria burger.  It consisted of slow roasted birria beef - a staple in authentic Mexico cuisine - on top of two burger patties finished with chihuahua cheese, a honey/hibiscus sauce, and came with a side of chipotle sauce.  I paused for a moment as I looked that over and thought that sounded really good.  

As I was waiting in line to order, I heard a voice call my name from inside the Floyd's food truck.  It was an old acquaintance who I used to work with at outdoor concert events in downtown Davenport a number of years ago.  Actually, we had come across one another just a week before when my wife, her sister and I went out to Crust to have some pizza one evening.  We hadn't seen each other for a long time and here he was back in my life working for both Crust and helping out Austin Mills from time to time in the Floyd's food truck.  

I almost got the Birria burger, but for the first time eating at Floyd's I wanted to go with the regular ol' cheeseburger - the "Royale with Cheese".  My wife said she wanted the same thing.  I also got a small order of Floyd's hand-cut fries for us to share.  About 15 minutes later, I went over to the food truck and picked up our order from my long-lost friend.

The burgers and fries were served in small paper food boats and condiments (mustard, ketchup, mayo) were available in packets next to the napkins.  The American cheese was oozing out from under a soft egg bun on top of the two flat-grilled burger patties.  The taste of the burger was fantastic.  The beef had the crispy edge that you get from mashing down the meat and having it cook in its own juices.  My wife had already experienced a burger from Floyd's and she said, "I knew you'd like their burgers."  I did - a lot.  They were juicy, flavorful and had a great flat-grilled beef taste.  And the fries were also very good.  They had a bit of a seasoning on them that didn't overpower the taste.  They were crunchy on the outside, but had that great flaky potato consistency on the inside.  

We had a recent experience with Floyd's again.  My wife and I had taken a few days off to travel for vacation and we got home on a Sunday afternoon.  Not really wanting to go to the store and find food to make at home that night, my wife suggested we look up where Floyd's Burgers & Sliders would be that evening.  It turned out that they were at one of our other favorite breweries in the Quad Cities, Crawford Brew Works over in Bettendorf.  (see map)  Crawford has been around since May of 2018 and features a number of very good beers that we like including their "Kinda-Kolsch" German-style summer beer, and their "Get Off My Lawn" IPA.  

Floyd's had set up their food truck there and we went out to have some food and a couple beers.  This time, their special was a cherry-smoked beef brisket topped with Boetje's mustard, pickled cucumbers and onions, and fresh dill.  I really wanted to get a burger from Floyd's, but I had to pull the trigger on this sandwich.

The sandwich was served on grilled rye bread and featured thick chunks of brisket that had a hint of a smoky flavor to it.  The Boetje's mustard gave the sandwich a nice kick, but the pickled onions and cucumbers helped balance out the spiciness of the stone ground mustard.  The fresh dill was hardly noticeable with all the other taste sensations that were going on.

My wife got the "Royale with Cheese" burger again and it smelled so good as it came off the grill.  We just got the sandwich and burger this time - no fries.  So, after I finished my sandwich, I determined that the smell of burger was too overpowering for me.  I had to go get one.  I got it to go, but it turned out that my wife wasn't quite ready to leave Crawford Brew Works.  So I ate the burger while having another beer.  It was a great ending to what had been a great vacation for us.  

I'm starting to come over to the side of the food trucks - especially when they camp out at any one of the microbreweries we have in the Quad Cities.  But I'll put Floyd's "Royale with Cheese" up against any cheeseburger I've had in the area.  It was a great burger and I'm sure that we'll be looking up on their Facebook page to see where they're parked some future evening.

Tutto Bene - Bemidji, MN

During our trip to Northern Minnesota, we stayed in Bemidji and hunkered down there for a few days of rest and relaxation.  We also liked the area not only because it was laid back, but there were a number of different styles of restaurants to choose from.  (But, somewhat surprisingly, there wasn't an authentic Mexican restaurant that we found - only the usual national and regional fast food variety of Mexican food.)  One place that we found when we first got there that we wanted to try was an Italian restaurant that specialized in locally-grown ingredients in their dishes.  A few days later we made it over to Tutto Bene for dinner.  

The original owners of Tutto Bene (which roughly translates in English as "Everything is Good") started the restaurant in 1995.  They ran it for over 25 years before deciding to close the doors in the summer of 2012.  But it wasn't long after they closed their doors that a young lady who grew up in the area decided that she wanted to get back to her rural roots and talked her then-boyfriend/now-husband into joining her.  

Jerusa Ricke hailed from Bagley, MN, about 25 miles to the west of Bemidji.  Her grandfather started what is now Team Industries, an engineering and machining company that supplies parts and drive trains to automotive and recreational companies.  The third plant in the company was opened by her father in Bagley in 1992 when Jerusa was a child.  After graduating high school, Jerusa Ricke decided that she didn't want to be in the family business just yet - her father would eventually take over the reins of the entire company upon her grandfather's death - and she went off to go to culinary school.  After getting her degree, Ricke worked at a number of restaurants in and around the Twin Cities.  It was at one of the restaurants where she met Justin Frederick.  

Pictured right - Jerusa Ricke-Frederick and Justin Frederick 

Justin Frederick was also a culinary school graduate who eventually became the head chef at Le Meridien Chambers, an upscale boutique hotel in downtown Minneapolis.  About the time Frederick got the head chef gig at the hotel, Ricke became the head chef at Masa, a now-closed, high-end Mexican restaurant located about two blocks away Le Meridien Chambers.  Both were at their respective helms for 10 years and talked about owning their own restaurant at some point, but they didn't want to do it in the Twin Cities where the restaurant business is overly competitive.  Ricke had been wanting to get back to Northern Minnesota at some point to be closer to her family when the opportunity to buy Tutto Bene presented itself.   

The opportunity turned to be too good to pass up, so Ricke and Frederick took the plunge and took over the restaurant in August of 2012.  They were able to talk six co-workers from their respective restaurants in Minneapolis to come north to work for them.  They changed some things up, spruced the place up, and came up with a menu that used locally-raised ingredients, as well as fresh seafood flown in from the east coast, and authentic imported Italian oils and cheese.  Every item - except for the canned tomatoes they used in their marinara sauces - was made from scratch in their kitchen.  

Change in the terms of a more aggressive and innovative menu caused some of the locals who liked the more Americanized-Italian food at the original Tutto Bene to give pause to the new ownership and their ideas.  But a new group of locals and tourists became regulars at the restaurant giving Ricke and Frederick the success they sought.  And once the restaurant was up and running with regularity, Ricke and Frederick were married about four years ago.  

Tutto Bene is on the corner of Beltraimi Ave. and 3rd St. NW in downtown Bemidji.  (see map)  We were able to find parking across 3rd St. on Beltrami and walked over to the restaurant.  According to rules set forth by the State of Minnesota during the pandemic, technically all sit-down restaurants require a reservation to get seated.  Many of them, however, get around that by writing your name in the reservation book, making you wait a moment, then seating you.  This time with Tutto Bene, we decided to go ahead and make a reservation because we just didn't know if the place would be busy.  

We had our choice of sitting outside or inside.  They had a very nice outdoor patio that had a shady arbor next to the building.  That would have been fine, but we were told by the young man who greeted us at the stand just inside the front door that all the tables were taken in the alcove.  However, they did have other tables set up next to the sidewalk.  

Three or four restaurants that we encountered in downtown Bemidji had tables set up in what were basically parking spots on the street.  Barriers to keep cars from parking in those spots had been set up.  One restaurant had literally blockaded the street in front of the business to set up folding tables and chairs for outside dining.  Dining in the alcove would have been great.  Dining on the street?  Not so much.  We opted for inside dining.  

The dining room at Tutto Bene was a large room with tables spaced out for social distancing guidelines.  It was a nice night and people were more than willing to sit at tables in the temporary outside dining area (probably because the outdoor dining season is so short in Northern Minnesota), so we were the only people in the dining room all evening long.  It was actually kind of nice.  

Off to the right side when you come in is the bar area.  It was well-lit from natural light coming in the ornate windows and featured a small bar with a few tables along the walls.  There was a lively group of people in the bar when we got there having drinks and appetizers.  

The kitchen was off to the side of the dining room with the main open window looking out into a narrow room that was sort of used as an overflow/catch-all area on the way to the restrooms.  Tutto Bene cans a lot of produce that they use on their menus and the jars holding pickled vegetables lined the wall in the small area.  

Our server for the evening was a young lady by the name of Connie.  She greeted us standing six feet - or more - from the table with a mask over her mouth and nose.  She seemed pleasant enough and gave us a couple menus to look over.  She took our drink order and my wife said that she would like some wine with dinner, but for now she wanted a Tito's vodka and cranberry juice.  I thought wine would be good with dinner, but I wanted a beer to start out.  Tutto Bene - like many of the restaurants in the area that we visited - featured beers from the Bemidji Brewing Company.  I especially liked their India Pale Ale that we had tried on a visit there a couple days prior.  I got a pint of that beer as we looked over the menu.  

To say the menu at Tutto Bene was eclectic was putting it mildly.  They had a maple glazed pork belly bruschetta for a starter as well as Prince Edward Island oysters.  One of the dinner items was a ravioli stuffed with wild snow crab.  Another interesting item was a braised Kobe beef pot roast entree.  And for those who don't want to be as adventurous in their dining experience, Tutto Bene also featured a spaghetti and meatball dinner.  Only the pasta is made fresh in the kitchen, and the meatballs were locally-raised veal.  

After our drinks were served, Connie said she would give us a few minutes to figure out what we wanted for dinner.  As we continued to look over he menu, a young man brought out an antipasto board that featured a couple slices of thin-sliced parmesan cheese bread, toasted almonds, pickled carrots and sliced salami.  The pickled carrots were especially tasty.  My wife and I have been experimenting with pickling jalapeños this summer and they've come out very well.  Pickling carrots peaked our curiosity in doing our own at home.  

We started out by getting the grilled octopus.  The octopus is caught wild off the Spain coast and flown in on a regular basis to Tutto Bene.  The octopus was lightly grilled and served with risotto cakes, marinated Italian tomatoes, and it all sat on a bed of an almond/basil pesto sauce.  It was outstanding.  

They also had a focaccia bread antipasti on the menu.  We thought it would go well with our dinners.  It featured house-made focaccia topped with caramelized onions, olives, rosemary, sea salt and then sprinkled with fresh parmesan cheese.  The focaccia was very good. 

We got into Tutto Bene around 7 p.m. - about 10 minutes before, actually - and we knew that they closed at 8 p.m.  There were a few people outside, but we didn't figure that it was too taxing on the kitchen.  We sort of sat around for a few moments enjoying our antipasto before we ended up ordering dinner.  But it seemed like dinner was taking a long time to get to the table.  It was well after 8 p.m. when Connie came to our table and said, "Well, I have some good news and some bad news.  The bad news is that someone accidentally took your plate and served it to someone else," she said as she was looking at my wife.  "Since we make everything in-house from scratch, we have to make up your plate again."  The good news?  Oh, we were going to get free dessert.  You know, if we weren't on vacation and so laid back, I would have pitched a fit.  But it didn't matter to us.  We had our wine now and we were enjoying it.  

It was about twenty till nine - we had been there for an hour and forty five minutes - when our food showed up at the table.  A young guy who was serving outside brought my wife's plate to her.  "I have to apologize," he said as he placed her plate in front of her.  "I was probably the one that caused your meal to be late."  We told him that it was not a big deal.  It was kind of nice having the dining room all to ourselves that evening.

For my dinner, it came down to just one thing that I saw when I first glanced at the menu - the wild boar and cavatelli.  It featured a wild boar ragu sauce with chopped grilled boar sausage mixed in.  It was topped with whipped ricotta cheese and finished with grated scallions and parmesan.  The taste was something that I wasn't expecting.  It was much more earthy in taste with not much of an Italian marinara flavor.  But it was very good - outstanding, to be exact.  The more I got into the dish, the more I liked it.  

My wife was looking at a couple of their chicken dishes - a gnocchi and roasted chicken entree with charred green beans and sweet corn in a parmesan fondue sauce; and the chicken piccata.  She ended up taking the latter.  It was a grilled Amish-raised chicken breast topped with lemon capers and parsley.  It sat on a bed of risotto cakes - similar to what we had with the grilled octopus - and also came with grilled organic baby carrots and green beans.  

My wife remarked that it didn't come with any pasta.  She said that she really needed some pasta to go along with the meal.  We hailed Connie over and my wife explained that he just needed some carbs to go along with the meal.  "I know, I'm funny about that," she said.  "But I like pasta with my chicken piccata."  Connie said that would be no problem.  She'd get some out as soon as she could.  It wasn't more than about 10 minutes later that a steaming plate of pasta topped with butter showed up.  I tried some of the pasta and it was just as good as the cavatelli.  You could really tell that it was made in-house.  

We ended up getting some tiramisu to go - we didn't even eat it until the following night because we were so full from the dinner and everything else that went with it.  It was a nice gesture, but I would have probably gone for more - like an after dinner scotch.  But their bartender had left and it was coming up to 9 p.m. and we didn't want to stick around any longer.  We actually ended up going somewhere closer to our hotel for a nightcap. 

Other than my wife's chicken piccata getting taken to another table causing a lengthy delay in getting our meals, I'd have to say the experience we had at Tutto Bene was satisfying.  The menu was very interesting and I very much enjoyed my cavatelli in a wild boar ragu.  Once my wife got a side of pasta to go along with her chicken piccata, she was much more happy with her meal.  The grilled octopus was outstanding, as was the focaccia bread we ordered that was supposed to go along with our meal, but we had to eat it early on.  Connie was our main server, but it turned out to be a team effort in taking care of us that evening.  Each person we dealt with was pleasant and accommodating.  In the long run, even with the wait on our food, we felt Tutto Bene was worth having a meal there.  

Ernie's on Gull - Brainerd, MN

On our recent trip to Northern Minnesota, we were driving through Brainerd as I was trying to remember some of the town from trips my family would take to Lake of the Woods when I was a young boy.  Unfortunately, I didn't remember much of anything while driving through Brainerd.  It was getting close to lunch time and my wife has to have three-squares a day.  Knowing this and figuring that there were restaurants in the immediate area, I started to calculate where we may stop.  While driving through Baxter, the "twin" city to Brainerd, we saw a billboard touting a restaurant on Gull Lake.  I punched the name into the GPS and it came up right away - Ernie's on Gull.  We're always up for lakeside dining, so we decided to head there for lunch.  

The spot where Ernie's stands has been there since 1917 when a Finnish immigrant by the name of Ernie Ritari opened a small fishing resort on what was known as Squaw Point on Gull Lake - the largest of the 7 Gull Lakes in Minnesota.  Ernie's wife Edna worked in the bar and was the housekeeper for the small cabins that were part of the resort.  Ernie - who was a carpenter by trade - had left Finland in the late 1800's as a small child with his parents and siblings.  But he harbored a deep resentment for the Russians who were casting a pall of influence over relatives still living in Finland after the Bolshevik Revolution in the fall of 1917.  His disdain for the Russians ran so deep that he never allowed vodka to be on the grounds of his resort.  

Ernie and Edna ran the resort for a number of years before retiring in the 1960's.  From there, the resort changed hands when Ron Niemann bought the place and called it Ron's on Squaw Point.  When he shut down the resort and kept the bar, restaurant and marina, he changed the name to Ron's Steak House.  Ron Niemann eventually sold out to a person who renamed the place The Butcher Block.  But by the turn of the 21st century, the Butcher Block was no more.

A group of private investors came in to resurrect the bar/restaurant/marina and called it Ernie's on Gull as a nod to original owner Ernie Ritari.  That group ran the place for 11 years before two brothers and a friend came into the picture who were interested in buying Ernie's.  

The brothers - Chris and Mike Foy - had grown up in Brainerd and were high school football stars in the late 1990's/early 2000's.  Like many people who had lived in the area, they frequented Ron's Steak House with their parents and younger brother while growing up.  The opportunity to buy Ernie's on Gull came about and with a friend, Zac Swarthout, the group purchased the restaurant/bar/marina in August of 2011.  The Foy brothers eventually bought out Swarthout's interest in the place in January of 2015 and they continue to run Ernie's on Gull to this day.   In addition to Ernie's, the Foy's also run the Main Street Ale House in nearby Nisswa.  They opened that upscale bar and grill in the spring of 2018.

Ernie's on Gull is definitely off the beaten path and without a GPS we probably would have had a little trouble finding the place.  It's located in an area that the locals call East Gull Lake.  We pulled into the parking lot a little after noon on an unseasonably cool day in north central Minnesota.  (see map)  

We found what turned out to be a nice northwoods supper club with dark pine paneling on the outside of the building.  There was a patio that faced the lake and it was filling up fast with noontime diners.  Off to the side of Ernie's was another building that housed the On Point Burger Company, a pseudo-burger shack which opened earlier this spring that offered counter ordering for boaters coming off the lake.  It was closed the day we were there and I'm guessing that it's only opened on weekends and holidays.  

The view from the outdoor patio was very nice with the lake spread out to the north. The only problem was that it was in the mid-60's, my wife and I were in shorts and short-sleeved shirts, and the wind was whipping across the lake from the north.  Outside dining may have been popular with people who were wearing jeans and light jackets, but we were going to be eating inside. Had it been about 10 degrees warmer and with less wind, we would have definitely wanted to sit on the patio to have lunch.

Inside Ernie's, we found an open area that had a small bar off to the corner.  Pine wood accents were prominent throughout what was more of a lounge area with a few high-top tables.  A young lady greeted us and asked if we wanted inside or outside dining.   We told her that we thought we'd like to sit inside.

She took us to another room off the lounge area that turned out to be a more spacious room with low ceilings.  We took a booth by the window that looked out over the lake.  Now, I have to say that not only was it cool outside, it was cool inside.  They had the air conditioner cranked like no other for such a cool day outside.  My wife had to go back out and get a sweater out of the car because she was freezing.  I can tolerate some coldness, but even I thought it was sort of cold in there.  

We were given a couple menus and it wasn't long before our server Lauren showed up to take drink orders.  They had Kona Big Wave on tap and, of course, I signed up for one of those.  My wife ordered up a Summit Extra Pale Ale.  She ran off to get our beers while we took a look at the menu.  

It wasn't a long menu at Ernie's on Gull, which sort of made me feel better.  Too many times a restaurant tries to do so many things that the food is all right, but generally not good.  The bulk of the menu you could get all day long.  They had a handful of entrees - such as a peppercorn-encrusted ribeye, an almond-crusted walleye, and shrimp & sausage gumbo - that were only available after 5 p.m.  Actually, the shrimp & sausage gumbo sounded pretty good to me, given how cold it was in the dining room.  

For the most part, they had burgers, sandwiches, salads, and a choice of short rib, shrimp or smoked pork tacos.  Crab cakes, seared ahi tuna, Korean-beef nachos, and roasted Brussels sprouts were part of a pretty interesting mix of appetizers.  And Ernie's also offered their "seafood buckets" that could be shared for appetizers or as a meal.  Peel-'n-eat shrimp, fried calamari, Prince Edward Island mussels, and fried shrimp were the choices for the seafood buckets.  

Since the gumbo wasn't a possibility for lunch, I focused on the sandwich selection that included a reuben, a pastrami on rye with muenster cheese, a smoked pork Cuban sandwich, and a gyro that featured prime rib in a pita wrap.  The burgers all sounded pretty good too as they got their beef from local purveyors.  But there was something on the special board as we walked in that caught my eye that I wanted to try before having a sandwich.

They had a wild mushroom and beef soup the day we were there.  That just sounded good to me, especially for how cold it was in the restaurant.  It featured large chunks of wild mushrooms with tender small cubes of beef mixed into a creamy broth.  It was very rich and hearty, and it helped warm me up a bit.  

My wife followed suit as she saw that they had a lobster bisque on the menu.  She was planning on eating light and thought she would get the full bowl of the bisque.  The lobster bisque was very rich and about halfway through my wife was regretting her choice of getting a bowl rather than a cup.  She offered me a few bites to help her out and it was very good.  Actually, I didn't know what I liked better - my wild mushroom and beef soup, or the lobster bisque.  Both were a great start to our lunch. 

My wife ended up the small Caesar salad with some grilled chicken.  When Lauren brought the salad plate to the table, my wife exclaimed, "Oh, my gosh!  I'm glad I got the small Caesar salad!"  It was a pretty sizable plate filled with chopped romaine lettuce, red onions, cherry tomatoes and croutons.  A thin grilled chicken breast came on the side.  She was almost so full from the lobster bisque that she said she would do her best to eat it.  She must have liked it as she made a sizable dent in the salad and grilled chicken.

I hemmed and hawed about getting a sandwich or a burger - I almost pulled the trigger on the pastrami on rye - but I ordered the truffle mushroom and Swiss cheese burger.  I also got some bacon to go on the burger, as well.  It featured the same wild mushrooms as I had in my wild mushroom soup along with a truffle and thyme aioli.  Kettle chips normally come with the burgers and sandwiches, but I upgraded to sea salt fries for a buck and a half more.  

My burger was good, above average in taste and quality, but not outstanding.  The wild mushrooms had a nice earthy taste and everything that was on it - Swiss cheese, bacon and the aioli sauce - worked very well together.  I was asked if I would like it "pink or no pink" and I asked for it pink.  I'm a little leery when restaurants do that because my idea of pink sometimes doesn't jibe with the cooks.  But this burger was cooked perfectly with a pink middle, but not too rare where it was too loose.  It was a multi-napkin burger, the kind I like.  

For taking a chance on a place that we saw an advertisement for on a roadside billboard, I'd have to say that Ernie's on Gull turned out all right.  It was a nice place - albeit too cold for how we were dressed in normal summer attire - right on a lake with great views.  My burger and the wild mushroom and beef soup I had were both good - I liked the soup a little more than the burger, though.  My wife was more than happy with her rich and filling lobster bisque along with her Caesar and grilled chicken salad that she couldn't finish.  Ernie's was a nice place with a northwoods vibe.  And the service we had was friendly and prompt.  It's easy to see why it has been a popular spot with locals and vacationers for years and years.