It took almost eight years but we finally made it inside Bull’s Horn. As you undoubtedly know by now if you live in Minneapolis, Bull’s Horn is the South Minneapolis restaurant/bar opened by Doug Flicker and his partner Amy Greeley in 2017 after the closing of Piccolo. Piccolo had been our favourite high-end restaurant for some years at the time and we mourned its passing mightily, even as we we came to love its successor, Tenant. Chef Flicker, however, was out of the fine dining game. Bull’s Horn is very much a dive bar in aesthetic and its menu too is in keeping with that. We were already fans of Chef Flicker’s burgers etc., having eaten several times at Sandcastle, the concession stand they had operated at Lake Nokomis for several summers. So you might think we would have high-tailed it to Bull’s Horn. But somehow we never did. I put this down to a mix of things. A bit of mourning/denial for the end of Piccolo; more than a bit of the fact that they’re only open for dinner and we rarely eat this kind of food for dinner; and distance: a 45-50 minute drive is a long way to go for diner food, no matter how good it is. Well, our older boy turned 16 last week and for his birthday dinner out he voted for a good burger. And so there we finally were.

It wasn’t my first time at Bull’s Horn—I’d picked up ramen kits from them a few times during the pandemic—but it was my first time inside. I hadn’t really given much thought to what the feel of the place was going to be like but we arrived naively a little after 6.30 pm on a Saturday to find the place hopping! If you come in through the front, you enter between a long bar and a line of four-tops along the wall. There are a few more tables at the end of that corridor and then more still down the other side. All of them were occupied and there were people waiting. We were told it would be about 45 minutes before a table was available but after giving the occupied tables a quick scan to see where they were at in their meals, we decided to take the chance. Sure enough we only had to wait around 20 minutes before a table became available.

The interior is on the darker side (this is my excuse for the extremely crappy phone pics in this report) and the atmosphere is great. I don’t know if I would actually call it a dive bar: it’s a pretty well-heeled hipster clientele for the most part; but the vibe of the place is excellent. It seems quite obviously to be a neighbourhood favourite: there were people of all ages, including more than a few families with very small children.

The menu is on the shorter side and is comprised largely of diner classics with a few twists. The appetizers section includes nachos, chicken wings, cheese curds, yes, but also KFG (Kentucky Fried Gizzards) and deviled eggs with giardiniera. The burgers and sandwiches seem more routine but are distinguished by the quality of the ingredients and the care in the cooking. Chef Flicker is doing casual food now, but he’s not doing sloppy food. We thought everything we ate was pretty much best in class.

What did we get? To start we shared an order of the cheese curds and the KFG. The former came with excellent 1000 Island Dressing and the latter with French onion dip. The missus pronounced the gooey cheese curds the best she’d ever had and the rest of us agreed. The deep-fried gizzards were also a big hit with our offal-loving family.

Despite having asked for a good burger for his birthday meal, the older boy decided to get the fried chicken sandwich for his main. His younger brother picked up the slack by ordering the Bull’s Horn burger, which comes with lettuce, pickle and “special sauce”—the only customizations available are the additions of American cheese and/or bacon and he chose the former. The missus got the nachos from the appetizer section for her main, adding the optional ground beef. I got the mushroom melt, adding a beef patty. As I said, everyone really liked their food. I will further say of the mushroom melt that it is the best sandwich I’ve had in a while: the greasy slices of marble rye were just excellent as were the roasted mushrooms, caramelized onion and Swiss cheese between them. Frankly, the beef patty was superfluous.

The younger boy and I both opted for the upgrade from the included chips to French fries. Both plates had a goodly amount of fries on them when they arrived and we assumed we would take half of them home. But the fries were excellent as well and by the time we were done eating they had all disappeared. Oh yes, to drink, a Kool Aid for the missus (the boys were unimpressed by their first taste of Kool Aid) and a beer for me. The younger boy got a soda and the older stuck with water.

For a look at the interior, the menu and what we ate, launch the slideshow below. Scroll down to see how much it all cost and to see what’s coming next.

Service was exactly what it should be at a place like this. Price? With tax and tip the total came to just about $120. On the one hand, that’s not a cheap diner meal; on the other, we ate a lot and it was all excellent. We also took some goodies home for a meal the next day. No, not burgers and fries. Chef Flicker has recently re-started his Japanese noodle soup kits. He’s already done one round of ramen and last week was his first time doing an udon kit. We’d ordered four of those earlier in the week and picked them up at our meal; see here for how the ordering process works. (Also, while on Instagram please watch this wonderful video by the owners that gives you a close look at Bull’s Horn.)

All in all, a very enjoyable evening. I am a little resentful that we don’t have a place like this anywhere in our town because it is a perfect neighbourhood restaurant/bar. Despite the distance we’ll be back well before another eight years pass.

Okay, what’s next? I recently discovered that there was a Delhi meal from early in my trip in December that I completely forgot to report on. I will probably get that out this weekend. Next week’s Twin Cities report will be from…somewhere (we haven’t figured out where we want to eat this weekend). Let’s see how it goes.