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Archive for the ‘Dive Night’ Category

Dive Night ~ Elsie’s

Posted in Dive Night on August 9, 2011| Leave a Comment »

This month’s Dive Night was a real adventure.  Ruthie and Ray, the couple with the secret dining destination, picked us up at our house at the usual Dive Night time.  Husby and I piled into the van and off we went.  Off we went…*chug, chug, chug*…  We got about three miles away from our house and the vehicle decided to kick the bucket.  I was sure we were all going to die as the van seemed to pick the most inappropriate place to konk out, right over the crest of a hill on a 70-mph freeway.  Luckily we could roll down the hill and halfway up the first exit ramp thanks to Ray’s superior vehicle-manuvering skills.  We didn’t die, but the van certainly did.

Husby looks especially happy to be stranded on the side of the road waving like that.

Yep, there it is.  The engine.  Luckily Ruthie and Ray have one last offspring living in their house, so Ruthie called him up to come rescue us.

Once the loyal offspring dropped Ruthie and me off at our house we waited for the men to call us with news that the tow truck had arrived.  Then we hopped into our fully-functioning vehicle and continued on with the Dive Night adventure.

You just can’t go wrong in Nordeast.  Ray directed us to Elsie’s: Restaurant, Bar, & Bowling Center.  What fun!

“Certificate of Special Congressional Recognition presented to Elsie’s Restaurant in recognition of outstanding and invaluable service to the community.”  Signed October 13, 2008 by Jim Ramstad (US Congressman).  Really?

This is the perfect dive, endorsed by Congress!  Our waitress had a contageous enthusiasm and added greatly to our experience.  We started out with a much-needed libation (after the trying time we spent with the belly-up van) and perused the appetizer menu.  We really wanted to try the Reuben Bombers, but because we arrived late they had already sold out.  (A perfect excuse to return to Elsie’s!)  So we decided to try the “homemade” deep fried cheese curds and the handbreaded portabellas.  OMG.

Yeah, the cheese curds were good, but those portabellas?  To die for!  And the appetizer basket was full of these magnificent treats.  They’re served with a ranch-type sauce.  Really, really good.

As for our entrees, we had the Pot Roast Melt (with onion rings), the Hot Old Fashioned (with turkey), the Hot Cali Turkey Club, and The Works Burger

Pot Roast Melt (Ruthie)

Hot Old Fashioned (Ray)

Hot Cali Turkey Club (Husby)

The Works Burger (me)

If you’d like to see what each of these sandwiches consists of, check out Elsie’s menu.  We were all thrilled with our food.  Everything was delicious and hot.  Sandwiches come with homemade potato chips, but can be substituted with fries, onion rings, etc., at an additional cost.  This food was so darn good I can’t even put it into words.  And Elsie’s is a family-friendly restaurant.
But wait, there’s more.
BOWLING!!  Not to worry, the restaurant and bowling alley are sufficiently separated to allow for a meal uncluttered with strikes and gutter balls and the accompanying hoots and hollers of success or defeat.  But both food and bowling are under the same roof making for an entire evening of fun for everyone.
Blacklights and glow-in-the-dark bowling balls makes for an exciting evening of bowling.  It’s been so long that I’ve been in a bowling alley I didn’t know there is now automatic scoring.  I never knew how to do all of those slashes and exes, so this technology is a huge plus for someone like me.  Sadly, we were unable to bowl a line.  Ruthie and I were wearing our summer shoes with no socks, and there was no way on earth I was going to put my bare feet into rented shoes.  But we had a cocktail in the bowling alley and had a lot of fun watching other people bowl.
Despite our slow start, this month’s Dive Night was a huge success and a lot of fun.  We had an especially good time playing in the blacklights of the bowling alley.  Husby did his Micheal Jackson impression with his blazing white socks, and Ruthie and Ray had an enormous amount of fun riding on the swingy chairs.  I enjoyed watching my favorite bowler who would walk up to the line, stand there, and swing is arm back and forth before letting go of the ball.  Next time I go to Elsie’s I’ll wear socks and work off the big meal with a line or two.

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Dive Night ~ Little Venetian + Cup And Cone

Posted in Dive Night, tagged , , on July 14, 2011| Leave a Comment »

Once a fairly popular dining destination is now a little joint in a strip mall.  The Venetian Inn may have downsized to Little Venetian, but the food is still to die for.

This establishment has been serving the Twin Cities since the 1920s by a single family, the Vitales.  Family pictures are proudly displayed in the restaurant.

The restaurant looks like a fast food place when you walk up to the counter to place your order.

Yes, you place an order with the cashier and the food is delivered to your table when it is ready.  Why bother with menus when you can just post the menu on the wall like McDonald’s does?

They have a small salad bar which is kind of cramped and hard to wrangle, but the salad was good, and I was especially impressed with the homemade french dressing.  It was chunky!  And delicious, I might add.

A bad photo, but you get the idea of the chunky french dressing

There is little better than authentic Italian food.  Mama Vitale was also famous for her frozen entrees back in the day.  Do you remember the jingle?  “Let Mama Vitale come into your kitchen, she does the cooking, you get the praise…”  Mama isn’t doing the cooking at the restaurant anymore, but her kids have kept the tradition of mouth-watering cuisine in the downsized version of their parents’ restaurant, no doubt using the same recipes as Mama did.
Our little group had lasagna, ravioli with red sauce and a giant side of sausage, chicken parmesan, and mushroom-stuffed ravioli.  All were tremendously scrumptious.
Personally I favor Italian food with a white sauce, which usually contains wine and garlic and butter.  Everyone had a marvelous time eating.  Conversation was kept to a minimum so we could savor it all.
I’m going to remember Little Venetian for catering and take-out too.  Everything on their menu is available for take-out and the entire time we were there people were lining up, ordering delicious food to go.
I think I speak for the entire group when I say Little Venetian is big on authentic Italian food.  So very, very good.  They also serve beer and wine.
As a little treat we went to another local dive for dessert ~ White Bear Lake’s Cup And Cone.  It’s been around forever and it’s simply the place to see and be seen.  Okay, it’s not really as uppity as all that, but truthfully, everyone in the area of White Bear Lake goes to Cup And Cone at least once during the summer.
One word of advice: when they say large, they mean large and don’t predict the size of an ice cream cone on the size of the cone itself.  See for yourself.  Ruthie and Ray got a small- and medium-sized cones.  They’re gargantuan!  (The cones, not Ruthie and Ray.)
I, unfortunately, got a large cone and felt downright piggish walking around with this mountain of ice cream in my hand.  It was a pretty warm day too, so I had to eat it really fast.  Delicious as it was, my eyes were much bigger than my stomach, especially after just having a rich Italian meal.  The large size is for fanatics, that’s for sure!
It was a really nice evening filled with delicious food; Little Venetian and Cup And Cone are a perfect pair.

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Dive Night ~ Macaluso’s Roadhouse

Posted in Dive Night, tagged , on May 11, 2011| 1 Comment »

A long time ago I went to a little bar with my motorcycle -driving boyfriend.  We were young and foolish and very brave.  This little bar had a reputation of serving the toughest bikers in the area, but like I said, we were young, foolish and very brave.  We had a drink and left the bar unscathed.  I never returned…until now.

The bar has probably changed hands since I visited over two decades ago, but it’s still known to cater to the biker types.  I’m not so young and foolish any more, but I can still be pretty brave.  We entered Macaluso’s Roadhouse like we owned the place.

The first thing we noticed after we seated ourselves at a booth was this…

Happy hour from 9 a.m. to 12 p.m.  You gotta love a place like that.  Interestingly, when Ruthie asked our waitress what kind of wine they had she left and returned with a list.  A very generic list.  The waitress’s “cheat sheet” to be precise.  Pinot Grigio was actually a choice, so Ruthie and I had one.  The guys both had a beer.  True to a dive they also offered free popcorn, serve yourself of course.

It wasn’t very good popcorn, but I didn’t expect too much.  I also ate plenty.  I think I was hungry.  There was also a nice meat raffle girl walking around selling numbers.  I asked what kind of meat we would win and she hesitated.  I asked “animal meat?”  She concurred with a relieved smile.

The view from where I was sitting was less than optimal.  Basically I was facing Ruthie and Ray, who were sitting in front of a wall.  Seems that happened last time we went out too.  I’m going to have to make sure that doesn’t happen next time.  I did turn around at one point to get a photo of the place.  The disco ball was particularly endearing.

I was kind of amazed at the variety of food Macaluso’s offered ~ everything from pasta to burgers.  We began with appetizers, as usual.  These included chicken nuggets with BBQ and ranch dipping sauces (we requested two and weren’t charged extra) and fried ravioli served with marinara dipping sauce.

 

The ravioli was especially good, I thought.  The appetizer plates were styrofoam.

Entrees came with either chips or baked french fries.  Our waitress failed to ask us what we wanted so we got chips.  When we said we wanted the french fries the cook said it would be another twenty-five minutes as they’re baked, not fried.  I would have liked to try those, but was too hungry to wait another half hour.  The chips were fine with my meal.

My Italian Hoagie
Husby’s Taco Basket

 

Ruthie’s Meaball Sub

 

Ray’s Hot Dago

All of us enjoyed our meals immensely.  Really, I really wasn’t expecting food that good.  Just goes to show you, can’t judge cuisine by its clientelle.  Hot and delicious, really flavorful.  Apparently their pizza is also very good, and I’m pretty sure Husby and I will try it sometime.  They have take-out and delivery on their pizza.

There was one other thing I really loved about Macaluso’s was the t-shirts worn by the waitresses.  Check it out…

Sounds like something I’d say.

If you’re feeling brave you should really try Macaluso’s Roadhouse.  Dress down.  Wear leather if you’ve got it.  You won’t regret your visit.  And really?  Those bikers are actually very nice people.  Don’t let them scare you.  However, you should know we arrived for our dining adventure around 5:45.  I can’t vouch for the atmosphere after 7:00.  If you’re feeling really brave, check it out and let me know how it goes.

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Dive Night ~ Meister’s, Shoreview

Posted in Dive Night, Everyday, tagged , on February 1, 2011| Leave a Comment »

It’s cold and snowy here in Minnesota, but that doesn’t stop the Dive Night crew from braving the weather and checking out another year of dives.  Unfortunately what became a tradition was not the best choice of places to kick off the 2011 dive adventure.  Meister’s, which was really good in Stillwater and pretty good in Scandia turned out to be kind of mundane in Shoreview.  Of course that’s just my opinion.

The decor is frighteningly ordinary, except for the occasional dancer you might find in the hallway outside the restaurant.  You see, Meister’s in Shoreview is contained in a strip mall and shares a hallway with a dance studio.  We got to see a spinny guy in a matador costume when we were there.  But other than that the place is pretty ho-hum.

These little cut-outs of German people (we called them Heidi and Hans) were taped to a mirrored wall on one side of the dining room.  The room itself was pretty well lit and except for Heidi and Hans was pretty devoid of any character.

There was also a very large party of people in the dining room, and they took up the whole length of the room.  They were all really old, and one guy had exactly one tooth.  I think it was Grandma’s birthday, because the lady at the head of the table looked to be about 127 years old.  I thought it was sad that Meister’s was the place her family chose to celebrate what could be her last birthday, but who am I to judge?  Anyway, the four of us were seated in the back corner booth, which was fine.

First we ordered our drinks.  Ray and Husby got a big old pint of beer and Ruthie and I ordered a glass of white zinfandel.  Our wine choices were generic.  I don’t know why I think I can get a good glass of wine in a dive, but I’m always a little disappointed when I can’t.  I should probably start drinking hard liquor if I want to get a good drink in a dive.  Our wine came in little splits and tasted like the kind you would get out of a box with a spigot.

No matter, we’re there for the food, not the libations.  First of all I will give Meister’s kudos on the temperature of their food.  Everything was hot.  Like, really hot where you’d have to let it sit for a while before biting into it.  That’s good.  The choice of appetizers was limited and pretty ordinary.  We ended up getting onion rings and mushrooms.  The mushrooms came with a little ranch dipping sauce.

Ray couldn’t resist getting a cup of the sausage tortilinni soup, which he said was tasty.  It came with three packets of crackers.  Very generous indeed!

As for the entrees, we each had something different.  I had the philly sandwich (sans green peppers *burp*) with au jus, Ruthie had taco salad, which was huge, Husby had a buffalo chicken wrap sandwich, and Ray had a rueben.  As I mentioned, everything came to us really hot and tasted fine, but in my opinion the menu in general and my dinner lacked any kind of originality or pizazz.  The rest of the gang might have different opinions.

 

 

 

And what kind of dive would Meister’s be if it didn’t have a Friday Night Meat Raffle?  Of course we had to buy a couple of chances because who doesn’t want to go home with a hunk of raw meat after an evening out?

Unfortunately none of our numbers were winners.

Long and short?  We kicked off the third year of Dive Nights with a tradition, but the least favorite of the three Meister’s.  Nothing about it was outstanding, but nothing was icky either.  It was just…zzzzzz.

One thing I must mention is the service.  That was pretty decent.  Our waitress was very attentive and did a good job of keeping up with us and the large party of old people.  Nice and friendly, but not too friendly to get in your way.  I like wait staff like that.  Our waitress was excellent.

So that wraps it up.  I feel a little guilty not being more positive.  I will say if you’re going to go to an average place to eat you should be accompanied by superior company, like Husby and I are every time we’re out with Ruthie and Ray.  Thanks, guys!

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Dive Night ~ River Garden Bar

Posted in Dive Night, tagged , on November 15, 2010| Leave a Comment »

Our Dive Night experience taken on the Friday before Halloween with Ruthie and Ray started out at Psycho Suzi’s Motor Lounge.  That was definitely an experience of the good kind.  The thing is, we were in Nordeast, old stomping ground for Husby and Ray, and we couldn’t leave the area without stopping by to call on Tony Jaros.  OK, we couldn’t really visit Tony Jaros because, well, he’d dead.  More specifically, the River Garden Bar.  Yikes.

For those of you who are totally out of the loop (like I am), this bar is home to The Greenie.  I’ve heard about The Greenie for years from Husby.  Apparently Ray has reminisced about the River Garden and Greenies too.  It’s a stiff drink, but you’d never know it because it is so dang sweet and tasty.  So without further adieu I give you…The Greenie.

All I can say is, the River Garden Bar is a place where people go to get drunk.  It is also a trendy stop for people who think it’s quirky to go into dive bars just to drink up the atmosphere.  It’s got character and characters.

This guy was constantly on his phone, but could only see it with one eye closed.

Husby and Ray loved returning to their old stomping ground, the River Garden Bar.  Apparently it is one of those places where you can go back and relive those days of yore because it hasn’t changed a lick in decades.  Ruthie and I loved sitting at the bar making up stories about all the other people, speculating about who will go home with whom, what they do for a living, and what their lives are like.  Of course we would label them with names like The Russian, Staring Guy, Artsy Girl, and Tight Lips.  Great fun.

There were also a bunch of mice who came into the bar.  Humans dressed as mice.  I don’t know if they were supposed to be rats or mice.  Doesn’t matter, they were a very fun bunch and I just had to take a picture of a couple of them before we left.

I’ll remind you we were out the Friday before Halloween, so I assume these guys are dressed for that occasion and don’t normally go out in their black long underwear, white gloves, and mouse ears, but I could be wrong.  They were much fun, no matter what.

So all I can say is the dive dining and drinking for October was quite an experience.  The food at Psycho Suzi’s was great, the Greenies* at River Garden were great.  Of course the company of Ruthie and Ray can’t be beat.  It was the most memorable Halloween weekend I’ve had in a long time.

* The River Garden Bar also makes Blueys (sp?), Pinkies, and Purpleys (again, sp?).  The Blueys taste like Sweet Tarts, and uncannily so.  If you drink too many of all of these drinks you will no doubt barf rainbows.

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