The latest from Twitter: @BirchwoodCafe’s pulling out some vegan and gluten-free pumpkin doughnuts, @BrasaRotisserie is taking orders for Super Bowl packages, there’s an after party @goldensdeli after the @BeerDabbler tomorrow, and @mnbeer and @MNBeerActivists share MPR’s story on the growing number of breweries in Minneapolis-St. Paul.
DWITT / Heavy Table
DWITT / Heavy Table
Katie Cannon / Heavy Table
Upon hearing about the recent influx of frozen yogurt shops popping up across the Minneapolis-St. Paul area, a colleague remarked, “Is this the 1980s all over again?” Though we have yet to see a Flock of Seagulls haircut resurface, he does have a point: The Twin Cities hasn’t seen this many fro-yo places open in quite some time. Just as cupcakes were the rage two years ago, self-serve frozen yogurt — sweet and tart, with toppings galore — is becoming ubiquitous, and The Heavy Table has the lowdown on four shops that let you swirl and scoop your perfect dish. Just be warned: Those cups are generously sized for a reason. The more you add, the more you pay.
The New Kids on the Block
Of the four recently opened frozen yogurt shops we visited, two were home-grown concepts and two were franchises. Tutti Frutti, located in Maple Grove’s Main Street at Arbor Lakes, was first of the four to open in September 2011 by franchisee Kelly Gaspar, who saw an opportunity to dish up a treat she felt was missing from the Twin Cities.
Katie Cannon / Heavy Table
“We didn’t have a lot of good yogurt, let alone self-serve yogurt, in this area,” Gaspar says. “I did a lot of research, and it came down to quality of product. I found that with Tutti Frutti.”
Another popular national chain, Menchie’s, entered the Twin Cities market in early October when manager Whitney Anderson and her family opened their Highland Park location at the corner of Cleveland and Pinehurst avenues. A University of St. Thomas alum, Anderson had spent a year scouting a storefront and found that even with an autumn opening, the locals were ready for frozen yogurt.
“Obviously, the ideal time [to open] would have been summer, but we’re in this for the long haul,” Anderson says. “We liked that Menchie’s is, at its core, family and community and giving back. It aligns well with our beliefs.”
The holidays brought a third fro-yo concept to the area: The Yogurt Lab, adjacent to the new My Burger near Lake Calhoun. According to manager Marie Tavlin, owners Aaron and Andrea Switz and Phil Becker saw the trend explode on the West Coast and saw an untapped niche here. A Dec. 18 opening, combined with a milder-than-average month, proved to be advantageous for the shop, which welcomed a flood of students and families in its first few weeks.
Katie Cannon / Heavy Table
“It was a great time with the kids back from winter break,” Tavlin says. “We’ve been doing better than we thought we would with a winter opening.”
And across the river near the St. Paul Trader Joe’s on Lexington Parkway, former restaurant and retail consultant David Brandner launched Free Style Yogurt just last weekend. Like with Yogurt Lab’s owners, he saw the frozen yogurt scene flourish in California and Texas and decided Minnesota would be the ideal location for his first fro-yo venture.
“I love the product, I love the energy in the stores, and I thought I’d really like to do this,” Brandner says. “I wanted to build a brand from the ground up and create a shop atmosphere that would be unique.”
The Heavy Table did an exhaustive, gut-busting pilgrimage to sample the frozen yogurt, discover new toppings, and feel the vibe of each shop. Overall, we found the yogurt quality and flavor selection ranging from good to excellent, but subtle differences among the shops’ offerings exist. While not a strict head-to-head comparison, below we explore the nuances of taste, decor, and cost. While you can’t really go wrong with any of the shops if you’re craving a cold treat, chances are one will fit your style more than others. Continue reading The Frozen Yogurt Resurrection »
by Susan Pagani on January 25, 2012
Susan Pagani / Heavy Table
Visiting a restaurant supply is dangerous. Once you get in there, and expose your predilection for kitchen gadgets to wall-to-wall stainless steel, ceramic, and glass, you will suddenly need a robot coupe, a hummingbird-sized ramekin, a pizza warmer, a fake wheel of Wisconsin cheese, a 60-gallon stock pot, and a set of candle-heated butter warmers. So here’s a word to the wise: Leave your wallet in the car. You will inevitably fetch it, but out in the fresh air cooler heads will prevail, and you may only spend half a paycheck.
Restaurant supplies are the restaurateur’s hardware store; in fact, many won’t even sell to folks without a license. Those that do are less consumer friendly than, say, Cooks of Crocus Hill. You’ll find them in ill-marked and often abandoned-looking buildings and, once you’re inside, there’s no sampling salty chocolates or browsing cookbooks. In many cases, you’ll be left to wander blissfully alone among metal shelves, piled high with wares, some new, some used, some still in boxes, and most without a price. As one fellow told me: It’s a rare occasion that a new restaurant owner walks in and outfits their shop in one fell swoop of brand new. So the small wares we consumers love are mainly there to be tossed gratis on top of a charbroiler as a restaurant owner hauls it out of the building; they make their money on large kitchen equipment and design. Still, suppliers are proud of their wares and, where you and I see a cheap white plate, they see an inexpensive 12-inch, rolled-edge dinner plate made of dense, vitrified china fired at incredibly high temperatures to be able to withstand the hungry public, the occasionally clumsy waiter, and 17 trips a day through the washing machine.
Susan Pagani / Heavy Table
In the mini reviews below, we tried to look at roughly the same items at each establishment, choosing middle-of-the-road options that were basic but of good quality. However, it’s hard to formulate an objective comparison between restaurant supplies because they are so variously stocked and, as we mentioned above, many maintain an old-school approach wherein price is based on the whim of the seller, how much you buy, how frequently you buy, and (one sometimes suspects) your character. They are also unquestionably a competitive lot — we had to show identification to be allowed to take photographs — so a little polite haggling is sometimes permissible.
It’s worth noting that nearly everyone offered to order us whatever we needed, and they all seemed to be ordering from the same catalogs. Also, in all cases, a version of greater or lesser quality was available.
Courtesy of Hockenbergs
Hockenbergs recently moved into a brand new warehouse in Eagan. It is a clean, well-lighted place filled with eager staff people ready to help you find whatever you need on the vast sales floor (see photo, top) or in a catalog. If you’re looking to browse a broad range of quality, shiny new stuff – from glassware to giant woks and industrial toasters to ice cream scoops in every size — this is probably your best bet.
As a national chain, Hockenbergs may offer the largest selection of small wares of any of the restaurant supplies listed here and the closest thing to a “normal” retail experience. Yet their focus is really on kitchen design and large equipment. When asked, they will say that their super power is leveraging their presence and knowledgeable staff to find whatever big equipment the restaurant owner needs, quickly and at a good price – and then delivering it with their own truck to ensure it arrives in one piece. “I recently found a used six-burner convection oven in 15 minutes!” one fellow told us.
Susan Pagani / Heavy Table
How does that help the consumer? Not at all. Apparently, Hockenbergs’ buying power doesn’t translate to great prices for the home cook, since most items were a bit more expensive there than elsewhere. That said, it’s still a better deal than your average cooking store, and browsing the racks and racks and racks of stuff is great fun. Bonus: It’s all priced, so if you want to shop in anonymity, you can.
12 balloon wine glasses: $41.39 Libbey Vina
12 white, rolled-edge dinner plates: $64.54 China World
12 stainless steel bouillon spoons: $9.08 World Tableware
13-quart stainless-steel mixing bowl: $8.68
Susan Pagani / Heavy Table
Random stuff:
30-cup rice cooker $503.00
Gallon of snow cone syrup $5.99
28-inch iron wok $50.17
Hockenbergs
2015 Silver Bell Rd
Eagan, MN 55122
612.331.1300 | hockenbergs.com
Monday-Friday 8am-5pm
Saturday 10am-1pm
The second place we visited — St. Paul U.S. Foods Culinary Equipment / Superior Outlet Center / Next Day Gourmet — has more names than Prince, and is a whole lot less recognizable if you aren’t paying attention. Apparently, U.S. Foods bought Superior Outlet Center, which is also called Next Day Gourmet. Turn into the driveway marked “Superior Outlet Center” and then, once inside the building, enter the door marked Next Door Gourmet.
Once we found them, the folks at U.S. Foods were nice and helpful, and, though not specifically catering to the home cook, empathetic to our cause. They told us that the sales floor offers a small selection of the things most restaurants need starting out, including prep and bar ware. They also told us that the dish, glassware, and silverware selection is small, but they have catalogs. And then they kindly pointed us to a door at the back of the room that leads to the clearance goods. Continue reading Twin Cities Restaurant Supply Roundup — For the Home Cooks »
by sponsored on January 24, 2012
Sewell Photography
IN(DY)SPIRE, the Independent Wedding Fair, is giving Heavy Table readers and others the opportunity to win a $1000 Miniature Dessert Table from Cocoa & Fig — the perfect indulgence to share with your guests on the big day. (Some restrictions apply — see below.)
To enter, go to IN(DY)SPIRE’s website and leave a comment on their contest post — one random commenter will be chosen to win on Feb. 6, 2012.
About the fair: IN(DY)SPIRE takes place Saturday, Feb. 11 at the Hotel Ivy in Minneapolis from 11am-3pm. It features photographers, caterers, florists, and other local, creative wedding vendors in a casual, no-pressure setting that features samples, demonstrations, and a variety of workshops. For tickets or more information, visit independentwedding.com.
About our prize: This custom designed dessert table will serve 100 guests and feature your choice of various miniature desserts from Cocoa & Fig’s diverse menu, including cake lollipops, French macarons, mini cupcakes, layered desserts shooters, and more. A custom table spread will be designed to fit the theme, look, and vibe of your wedding and includes Cocoa & Fig’s distinct styling, cake stand and platter rental, custom signage, day-of delivery and set-up, and next day retrieval. The winner will also receive a free tasting consultation and planning meeting with the owner of Cocoa & Fig.
*Events outside the Twin Cities metro will incur additional delivery fees.
*Must be used in 2012 — some date restrictions apply.
*No cash value.
To enter: Post a comment here! We’d love to hear your favorite wedding food recommendations.
Sewell Photography
Becca Dilley / Heavy Table
Cold winter air wasn’t enough to dissuade nearly 300 guests from joining The Heavy Table and 20 local purveyors of food and drink at Open Arms of Minnesota for the third edition of the North Coast Nosh sip-and-sample. Tours of the Open Arms facility and samples made by the organization’s chefs were among the highlights of the evening.
Guests enjoyed local cheese, beer, gourmet hot dogs, Nutella-filled doughnuts, Ethiopian Sidamo coffee, plated-on-the-fly Thai food, and charcuterie, among other things, but words don’t do the event justice — photographs will have to come to the rescue.
Below, from top down and left to right: charcuterie from Green Ox Meat Co., the baked goods and chocolate of Patisserie 46, Poplar Lake cheese from Shepherd’s Ridge Creamery, Harriet Brewing, St. Mary’s Grass Fed Gouda from the Caves of Faribault, and a portion of the assembled throng.
Becca Dilley / Heavy Table
Below, from top down: Peace Coffee pouring Ethiopian Sidamo coffee, Natedogs, a variety of beers from Summit Brewing, Joia Soda samples, Chowgirls Killer Catering, Crispin Cider, the Caves of Faribault, and The Beez Kneez Honey.
All photos by Sarah McGee except Chowgirls food by Becca Dilley / Heavy Table
Below, from top down and left to right: the Nutella-filled brioche doughnuts from Bogart Loves Bakery, the wines of Saint Croix Vineyards, our glassware (sponsored by the Caves of Faribault), and beers from Lift Bridge Brewing. Continue reading North Coast Nosh III at Open Arms: The Recap »
Larry Binkovitz / Heavy Table
Editor’s Note: We don’t get much news from Rochester, so when two stories on ZZest Market & Cafe arrived in our inbox over the course of two days, we were a bit surprised. The subject matter suggested bundling, rather than a choice — one story is a brief review, the other a detailed account of a six-course chef’s dinner. We hope you enjoy both.
There is a silent battle going on in Rochester, Minnesota, and I’m not referring to Mayo Clinic’s fight against all the deadly diseases whose symptoms are vague at best. The town is divided on how to pronounce the name of one of its tastiest restaurants. ZZest opened in 2009. The owners Jerry and LeeAnn Zubay, and all its employees confirm it is pronounced Zest, saying, “two ‘Z’s’ for twice the zest.” However, many patrons have found that out in the community, should you refer to “Zest” you will find yourself corrected, “It’s called Zee Zest.” It’s a struggle to proselytize and after a while one finds it easier to pronounce the extra “Z” in ZZest, just to avoid the inevitable conversation.
Emily Friedman / Heavy Table
The one thing everyone agrees on is the food. Billing itself as “a market by day and a restaurant by night,” ZZest’s menu changes daily and features seasonal choices prepared with many of the gourmet ingredients found in the market. Starters include hackleback caviar with crème fraiche on caraway and rye crackers, or homemade skordalia — a Greek white bean and garlic spread made with potato, and piquillo peppers. Pan-seared diver scallops flown in from Massachusetts may be served with a roasted sweet potato puree with vanilla bean, sautéed pea shoots, macarona almonds, and a touch of pomegranate molasses.
A farm fresh lamb leg steak from Lambalot Acres in Augusta, WI may be served on top of greens with lima bean socca, pantaleo cheese, apple, preserved plum, and cubeb pepper. If any of those ingredients don’t sound familiar to you, the meal may inspire you to swing through the market on the way home and pick up something new. There are numerous oils, vinegars, honeys, chutneys, chocolate, and crackers on hand, plus cheeses and charcuterie, both local and imported from across the country and the world. Free samples play up the staff’s friendly attitude.
Emily Friedman / Heavy Table
It was easy to be skeptical about the buzz around ZZest’s food. The Zubays are also partners in Creative Cuisine, the company behind five popular downtown Rochester restaurants. While each of these have their merits and on average the food is good, none are known for producing the kind of meal one thinks about the next week, or raves about to friends. ZZest’s food is in a different class.
The atmosphere is that of a casual café embedded inside a market. The small space, open kitchen and neon “open” sign glowing in the window may be better suited for lunch (which they also serve). The prices however, reflect the quality of ingredients. The majority of the entrees cost around $22 and the restaurant boasts a strong wine list.
The best solution to this atmosphere vs. price and food quality incongruity may to be to come during the warm months when the patio is open. Overlooking the Zumbro River, it makes a credible claim for being the nicest patio in Rochester, where many of the outdoor eating options involve looking out over a parking lot. With luck, continued success will lead to an expansion and an additional dining room with an ambiance that pairs well with the food.
– Emily Friedman
New Year’s Eve Dinner at ZZest
When my parents moved to Rochester over 25 years ago, a Red Lobster followed close behind to a tizzy of anticipation and approval. Decades later, that Red Lobster moved to the Apache Mall and the crowd’s enthusiasm was no less piqued than for the first opening.
John Flicek nods all this off in his customary good humor. Dressed in his chef’s blacks, Flicek takes stock of his little corner of culinary empire, ZZest Market & Café. “There’s not a lot in Rochester,” he admits. This can be a mixed blessing for foodie establishments. Continue reading Two Dinners at ZZest Market & Cafe in Rochester, MN »
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