entertainment

100 years ago now it seems - well, OK, 3...we ate at Pittsburgh Blue during their opening week (man, am I embarrassed that I somehow ordered Thousand Island on a wedge salad with bleu cheese.) ...and we finally just went back. Not because of any fault of the restaurant, necessarily - we just had other places to be in a city this big.

Actually the main reason we went back - they have added a patio since they opened. It was a nice day and we thought we better cash in - and it was near. The patio is very well done, even within 100 feet of 2 roads and 500 feet of I-94 you really feel secluded in the pergola-ed, evergreen-ensconced surroundings. Sadly from about 6PM until 7:30ish every night it is also extremely busy - like every patio in MSP. So by the time we got out there it was a bit past the prime patio hour...BUT....still... thumbs up.


Must Have
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+ Prime Rib French Dip


Very Good
------------
+ Sidecar Cocktail
+ Steakhouse Wedge (this time, with bleu cheese dressing )
+ Parmesan French Fries
+ James River Raw Oysters -- served with lemon, cocktail sauce, (and pickled onions?)
+ Blue Point Raw Oysters -- served with lemon, cocktail sauce, (and pickled onions?)


Good
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+ Table Bread / Butter
+ Greyhound cocktail
+ Cape Codder cocktail


Take It Or Leave It
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Probably Not
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- Pecan Crusted Walleye -- well, this isn't foul. But only order it if you like your walleye to taste like french toast. (ie: pay attention to the small print that says "with maple rum butter".)

This recipe is technically the "Minnesota Mule" - due to the use of Minnesota's Prairie Organic Vodka - as created by Haute Dish.

Ingredients

---

• 2 oz - Prairie Organic Vodka
  
• 2 oz - Regatta Ginger Beer
  
• 1 oz - fresh-squeezed lime juice
  
• splash - simple syrup
  
• garnish - candied ginger

Mix ingredients in glass over ice, garnish on the rim of the glass.

Wow...big breaking news with the Metro's upper-crust restaurateurs:

   Financial Mismanagement at Barrio, La Grassa

With our recent chatter about Smalley's (on Facebook - but the basic jist of the conversation was that "this restaurant should be better than it is" - much like in my dining notes about Smalley's on here.) this makes sense needing to funnel money off to that place to keep it going through dry spells.

Never have been able to figure out what people see in Japanese food. Yes, I have enjoyed a couple pieces of hamachi nagiri in my day - and we had a bowl of ramen that blew out minds in Tokyo. But on the whole I find it under seasoned and the flavors that are brought forward are not that appealing. But still I (and Coolleen!!) try.....

So take this review with a grain of salt in that I am not a fan of this food in general - if you are, maybe you will love this place.

Must Have
-------------


Very Good
--------------


Good
-------------
+ Chicken Wings in Soy Ginger Sauce - nicely breaded and crispy...lightly sauced. Nice.


Take It Or Leave It
--------------
? Beef Udon -- flavorful beef slices in broth, green onions, onions, wakame and - of course - udon noodles. I could eat the 1 oz of beef all day long...but the fishy flavor of the wakame permeates all the other items. Combine that with the rubbery consistency of the noodles and any luster this dish might have had is lost on me.
? Edamame -- Unsalted...meh. Had better a hundred times.


Maybe I should try soba....but....this visit took the wind out of my sails for a couple months at least.

In our second visit to get Equadorian food at Chimborazo, I finally got off my dead ass and took some notes.

NOTE: Chimborazo isn't going to be a speedy dine. This time was probably about 2 hours - not that we were in any rush. But the first time there were some problems in the kitchen where plates were coming out one at a time...so we literally were served 10 different times. (On the other hand they gave us 50% everything for the wait - so it is always about the customer here...no worries, as long as you don't have somewhere to be.)

Must Have
-----------
+ Chaulafan -- This is probably the go to dish here - essentially fried-rice with shrimp, beef, pork and chicken - and carrots, peas, peppers, etc. Fab. u. lous.
+ Hornado Con Patas -- A giant pile of roast pork served with llapingachos (and hominy - booorrrring...just ignore that). The magic of this is the pork drippings everywhere on the plate - the (potato) llapingachos soak it up -- unbelievably good.
+ Lomo Saltado -- stir-fried beef, peppers, onions, potatoes in a spicy/vinegary sauce.


Very good
----------
+ Camarón Encocado - if you are a curry person, this yellow curry over perfectly-cooked shrimp and white rice
+ Llapingachos - potato pancakes, chorizo, eggs and peanut sauce over rice...tasty but not motivating. Llapingachos are ssooOOOOooo much better with the Hornado con Papas.
+ Pescado Frito - whole fried tilapia with yellow rice, beans and patacones (fried green plantains).
+ Empanada de carne
+ Ceviche de camarón -- GIGANTIC shrimp in here...probably too big...can't get it to stay on the plantain patacones. The tomato chunks are also huge and hard to manage. But once you get it in your mouth you don't mind anymore.
+ Negra Modelo


Good
-------
+ Churrasco -- grilled flank steak with rice and fried egg with sides of beans, sweet plantain and fried yucca. Just doesn't quite fire on all cylinders.
+ Pacifico Claro


Take it or leave it
---------------
? Muchín de yuca -- blandish, gluey...not that one should expect much from yucca. The dipping sauce is magic. (Maybe salt could have saved the day?)

It was hot technology news all over the planet that Izzy's Ice Cream had installed a new RFID system to auto-update the available ice creams in their St. Paul storefront. Time to get back over there.

   http://flavorup.izzysicecream.com/flavor-grid

We had to go reward them for this cutting-edge improvement to modern society, no?

PS: Julio Ojeda-Zapata's Tech Blog

The people who participate in our workplace weightloss contest gave me a thank you gift certificate to The Barbary Fig for administering the contest. (PS: Thanks y'all!) So we went and cashed it in for some northern African food.


Must Have
---------------


Very Good
----------------
+ Chicken Cous Cous
+ Special of the Day: Chicken Bisteeva
+ (warm) French Bread
+ Hummus -- actually hummus, feta and tomato-ginger chutney


Good
------------------


Take It Or Leave It
-------------------
? Grain Belt Premium

I am not as vehement about this - but....it's a valid point.

"Back The Heck Up, FSN!", by David Brauer; MinnPost

Time for more orienteering stats. bro-in-law#2 and R came along with us this time - although I am afraid to associate their names with this flaming turd we laid down.

2010		(Didn't ever do this park before.)
William O'Brien State Park Green Course 5.2k, 11 waypoints Checkpoint Distance Time 1 ?? 4m14s 2 ?? 09:09 3 ?? 8:34 4 ?? 27:26 5 ?? 11:21 6 ?? 11:43 7 ?? 9:54 8 ?? 3:02 9 ?? 16:05 10 ?? 3:55 11 ?? 2:08 finish ?? 0:27 TOTAL 5.48 miles 1h47m58s Poo. There doesn't seem to be anyway to do splits on Nike+ ...at least that I could figure out while lining up to run. Heart Monitors he: 1592 calories, HR: max, 200 (109%) / average, 158 (86%) she:
MNOC splits MNOC graph

13th.

13TH! Our fourth waypoint just absolutely destroyed us. It was mostly my fault - we had to go a roundabout way to find the flag because it was on the edge of a super-dense patch of raspberries. As we rounded the last corner to of the patch (according to the map) I saw a flag...and took off to go get it. Only it wasn't ours. Now we were far off course and had lost our place on the map. We hunted around a while and then had to give up and head back to the path to re-orient ourselves...we had the worst time of all participants on this leg. We didn't even do better than the average runner today. Total fail.

The worst part about this was that it was a mental error. Being that we are never going to be the most physical contestant on the course - having a mental lapse like this is completely unforgivable if we ever wish to be competitive. Gah.

Oh, well. At least we beat a 60 year old.

Minnesota Monthly's April 2010 issue reports that: "[Budweiser Deck] space is reserved for groups most nights, but tickets are available most Thursdays and Saturdays for public purchase."

Heads up.

I just realized how people on the trailing edge of technology have insult added to injury. Tonight, I watched my first Standard Definition conversion of a Twins game that was originally shot in HD. (Poor baby! ) There was a terrible camera tracking shot of an outfielder chasing a deep fly peeling away from him...the catch was actually made with the outfielder only half on the (left-edge) of the screen.

Today I am rewatching the game in HD (Yes, I am snob. ) and watched the same shot in HD - there was nothing notable about the framing of the shot - everything flowing and the catch on the left 1/3rd of the screen. Which means - much like cash-only spenders lose 1-2% of their money eating hidden costs that vendors embed in prices to cover credit card expenses - Standard Definition TV watchers are now simply the recipients of the table scraps of HD viewers.

Obviously the entire production conversion to HD has been completed. Camera operators are so immersed in HD equipment that they no longer notice the SD reticule in their HDTV camera - if it is on their screen = good enough. Producers and the trailer no longer see an SD variant of the shot as they assemble the stream for broadcast. No human at the broadcast station looks at it - the final step of the process is pumping the video through a pan-and-scan machine which mindlessly just crops the middle section for the SD scum to watch.

We are now to the point where live-broadcast HD programs will soon be like watching through a knothole if watched in Standard Definition - you save money but miss lots of available content. Caveat, SDer.

• *Most importantly, AT&T got off their dead asses and increased available voice and data circuits in the Target Field area - we had very few hiccups in service even though it was again a 40k-person full-house. Nice recovery, AT&T.*
  
• They are starting to confiscate bottle caps again. (Perhaps it was just poor training that they didn't know to enforce that dumbass rule the first week.)
  • Huh. I just had an interesting idea....in my Twins survival bag I should pack 2 Mountain Dew caps...to keep my Dew fresh.
• The Kramarczuk's line is still insane...probably 100 people deep all the way to the 7th inning. At that point it was down to 20...which is still bad.
  
• It is nearly impossible to be able to temporarily sneak a seat in the 3rd deck.....even if some of these games are not sellouts...it is crOOOOWDed.
  

Our Opening Day certificate says:

TARGET FIELD Be it known to baseball fans everywhere that on the afternoon of the Twelfth of April, Two Thousand and Ten at 3:10pm [blank] witnessed the first regular season game ever played at the Target Field, between the Minnesota Twins and the Boston Red Sox in the city of Minneapolis, in the State of Minnesota. Witnessed and signed by: Dave St. Peter, President Jim Pohlad, Owner Ron Gardenhire, Manager

"THE Target Field"? What is this, Ohio State?

Remember the feeling that first time you made sweet love to Anne Hathaway? Yeah, me neither - but I am pretty sure that tasting your first Mountain Dew outdoors in the sun and sweet breeze of a Minnesota Twins ballfield is just a tiny bit better than that is.

It is hard to describe the angst of long-suffering Twins fans to backers of other MLB clubs. Our having to watch the Metrodome scoreboard animate the phrase "Pepsi. The Official Soft Drink of Major League Baseball" for 13 years and yet never be able to taste its forbidden pleasure inside the confines of that teflon prison. (Since the Twins-owning Pohlad family also own the local Coke bottling operation they robbed us of our constitutional rights to the nectar of the gods by claiming a pre-existing agreement with Coke in the Metrodome.) Only those people with brass cajones as big as Jack Morris' have ever been able to risk sneaking in a contraband bottle to enjoy whilst watching America's pasttime.

But now...Target Field; baseball, sunscreen, humidity, a light warm wind, glistening sunglasses...........and Mountain Dew.

This is the number one most important thing to have in Target Field. It is the taste of freedom. It is the taste of baseball. It is the taste of America. You don't hate America, do you?

Rating? Must Have

Size: 20oz bottle
Where: "a nacho cart"
Cost: $4.50

Size: 20oz bottle
Where: vendors roaming the seats
Cost: $?.??

Size: ??oz fountain cup
Where: Hennepin Grille
Cost: $4.00


PS: Ask me in a couple more years about the Anne Hathaway thing...but I am pretty sure I am right.

Through Facebook and friend chatter we have overheard some food reviews we need to disseminate (with expressed written consent) until we can get around to tasting them for ourselves:

"Michelbob's ribs is the best food so far." --Beth

"the Cuban was delicious, but needed to be much warmer." -- Greg

"Thumbs up on the Murray's Steak Sandwich" -- someone

"The Nacho cart nachos are superior to Señor Smoke's" -- Abbott

...more to come...