A week and a half ago I ended up having an unexpected dinner at Grand Cafe in South Minneapolis. Some friends and colleagues of mine are in a band called the Counterfactuals and they were playing an album release show at Icehouse on Nicollet. I was driving up from the hamlets of Northern Rice County with some of the band spouses (which I think made me an honorary band spouse for the night) and we met the overeducated rockers for dinner at Grand Cafe. I’m not sure why we didn’t eat dinner at Icehouse itself, but was not disappointed by the decision as I’ve eaten there a number of times previous for work-related events and it’s never quite rocked my boat. I was especially not disappointed after dinner at Grand Cafe, a place I’d somehow barely heard of, and consequently had no expectations of, but which turned out to be more than minimally decent and well-priced. (I don’t mean to damn with faint praise: Minimally Decent People was the name of the Counterfactuals’ first album and the second half of the previous sentence was only a tortured attempt to cite it; and you’ll have found this particularly hilarious now that I’ve explained the reference.) On to the meal!
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