Northbound Smokehouse & Brewpub

The Northbound Smokehouse & Brewpub is a new brewpub in the Longfellow neighborhood of South Minneapolis. They made news before their doors even opened when they offered free beer for life to early investors. Now that they're open, they're serving their house-made brews along with a full bar menu, with nearly everything, including the beer, touched by smoke.

Their burger is billed as a 7oz black angus patty served on an egg bun. Standard acoutrements are mayo, lettuce, and tomato for the $7.25 base price. I added fried onion ($0.50) and 2 slices of smoked cheddar ($1.50) to bring the grand total to $9.25. I ordered mine medium.

I had mixed impressions when it arrived. On the plus side, the thick coating of melted cheese permeated the small pile of fried onions atop the bun, and the lettuce provided was a few leaves of Bibb lettuce -- not something you normally see on a brewpub (or anywhere) burger. On the other hand, the patty itself had a distinctly 'prefab' appearance, with those squared edges that, at best, betray a burger patty made in a burger press but at worst imply something out of a Sysco truck. The cross section showed the meat was cooked very nearly to well-done -- nowhere near the medium requested.

Still, it's the taste that matters. And again, a mixed bag. The beef was decently seasoned, for the most part, but a bit on the dry side and not particularly distinctive on its own. The cheese, when tasted alone, had a nice smokiness to it, but it was hard to detect that flavor in the whole ensemble. The fried onions, though, were great -- they were slightly undercooked so they still had a little bit of that raw onion bite, in both flavor and texture, along with the sweetness of grilled onion. And the bun was fan-frickin'-tastic. Definitely the best bun I've had in a long while here in the Twin Cities -- extremely fresh, a little sweet, tough enough not to fall apart in your hands but soft enough to not interfere with the burger eating experience (I'm looking at you, Rye Deli onion bialy bun), and moist without being soggy.

In the end, though, the bun's perfection wasn't enough to overcome the more fundamental issue with the burger -- the meat's just average flavor and it's overcooked-ness. If you're here getting a beer, the burger is an ok choice, but I'd probably choose something else next time -- like maybe the waffle-batter-dipped fried chicken sandwich, which my friend said was quite good, and is served on the same awesome egg bun.

Northbound Smokehouse & Brewpub

2716 East 38th Street

Minneapolis, MN 55406

(612) 328-1450

Mosaic Cafe

Mosaic Cafe is a relative newcomer to the Twin Cities restaurant scene, taking over the former Glaciers Cafe spot in an oddly-shaped lot near Minnehaha Ave and Lake Street in the Longfellow neighborhood of South Minneapolis. They have a pretty standard cafe menu, with coffee drinks, sandwiches, frozen desserts, beer and wine, and, of course, burgers to please any dietary needs in beef, turkey, and vegan varieties.

They advertise their burgers as using the well-regarded 1000 Hills Cattle Company's local, grass-fed beef. Their standard burgers use a 1/3-lb patty, with 1/2 lb available at a nominal extra charge, and a multigrain bun served with a side of kettle chips. I decided to get their 1/3-lb Farmhouse burger ($9.50), served with lettuce, tomato, red onion, and aioli, to which I added a slice of cheddar cheese ($0.50) and a side of their oven-baked rosemary garlic fries in place of the chips ($3.00) for a total of $12.00. As usual, I requested it cooked medium.

It arrived looking like a solid burger construction -- the meat was well and properly seared and the cheese fully melted. The tomato was sliced generously, and a decent amount of green leaf lettuce and red onions finished out the toppings. The aioli was generously slathered on the bottom bun and both buns were lightly toasted. Upon slicing through, the meat was shown to be cooked to a perfect medium, though it was a bit asymmetric as if it had been left to cook too long on one side.

As for flavor -- it was solid. The meat was, as expected, of good quality, and properly seasoned. The aioli flavor was mild but still contributed a nice pungence to the burger. And the bun -- I'll tell you, I'm always a little leery of multigrain buns on cheeseburgers -- with all the seeds and whole grain flours, the texture tends to be a bit distracting from the burger itself. But this bun was probably the best multigrain burger bun I've ever had, with a subtle earthy flavor and no distracting bits. It was, however, a little on the dry side.

All in all, a good performance from a neighborhood newcomer. I'd definitely get another burger from here if I was looking for a good quality burger within walking distance from my house!

Mosaic Cafe 
3019 Minnehaha Avenue

Minneapolis, MN 55406

(612) 746-1504

NB: The oven baked fries are advertised as cooked "in a special oven so they get that crispy goodness we all love without unhealthy frying." But the fries were as greasy or greasier than any deep-fried fries I've ever had. Ah, marketing!

Merlin's Rest

Merlin's Rest is a neighborhood pub in the Longfellow area of Minneapolis, located on East Lake Street at 36th Avenue (right across from the White Castle). While it is known for being a 'family friendly' establishment brimming with British Isles charm and a massive single-malt scotch selection, their food menu is pretty decent. Sure, they have fish and chips and bangers and mash, but I want to find out how well the British can put together that quintessentially American concoction, the cheeseburger.

The burgers at Merlin's Rest feature a 1/3-lb Thousand Hills beef patty seasoned and cooked to medium rare -- already sounds promising. They offer a choice of a variety of cheeses, but this time I went with good ol' American cheese -- perhaps in defiance of the establishment's geographical theme, but mostly because it melts really well. Some even go so far as to claim it's the best cheese for cheeseburgers. The burger is served atop a St. Agnes bun, which I later learned is a local bakery in St. Paul. They are served with lettuce, tomato, and a side of 'pub crisps' (potato chips to us Yanks). I ordered mine with 'chips' (french fries) instead, putting the total at $11.50.

The burger looked good when it first arrived. I was surprised to see that the bun, which apparently had been so special as to warrant a mention on the menu, was, in fact, a completely ordinary-looking white flour burger bun. The cheese was melted but good -- no surprise, given that it was American cheese -- and the lettuce was surprisingly a fairly big pile of boston or bibb leaves. The burger was cooked perfectly medium rare -- nice job, Redcoats.

The burger itself tasted great, because the meat was seasoned properly -- salt, black pepper, and maybe even some other stuff too. The big problem with this burger was the bun. Not only did it look like an ordinary white flour burger bun, it tasted and felt like one too. It actually was strongly reminiscent of a bun one might get with a fast food burger -- not really at the level of a $10+ burger. This bun had exactly the opposite problem of the bialy bun at Rye Deli -- it was just too soft and unsubstantial. I suspect that this bun was actually not from the St. Agnes bakery, because the products on their website look to be of much higher quality than what I received with my burger. The American cheese was good, but its combination with the low-rent bun made for a distinctly fast-food-burger-esque experience. It didn't help that overall the burger was a bit mushy, with the extremely soft bun, medium rare meat, and gooey cheese. The outer sear on the patty and a few leaves of lettuce can only do so much for texture contrast.

In the end, this burger was let down by its bun. If they can raise their game on this one point, they'll have a real winner.

Merlin's Rest Pub

3601 East Lake Street

Minneapolis, MN 55406

(612) 216-2419