Earlier in the month I’d announced that I’d be doing a pop-up dinner with Restaurant Alma in Minneapolis, centered on Indian cooking of the type I mostly do at home. The pop-up took place this past Friday evening. 70 diners, spread across two seatings, ate a range of dishes served over four courses. I was very nervous going into this project—though much less so the closer we got to the night of—but I thought it went very well. Not all the diners may agree, of course, but I was very happy with the food as cooked by the restaurant under my direction and thought the menu hung together well.

If you follow me on Twitter or on Instagram, you may have already seen/scrolled past my recap of the experience, but I thought I’d put it together on the blog as well in one, more readable package. Here it is. Continue reading →

At the end of last year I published my rankings of Indian restaurants in the Twin Cities metro. (In case you missed it, you can find that post here.) In that post—which largely celebrated newer South Indian specialists—I rashly announced that in 2021 I would make more of an effort to explore more old-school North Indian restaurants as well—the kinds of places that have long been the mainstay of the Indian restaurant scene in the US. Of course it is now mid-November and I’ve not really done much of this exploration. I’m going to try to hastily make up some ground at the end of the year. Here first is a review of a recent takeout meal from India House, a longtime standby for those looking for chicken tikka masala, dal makhani, sag paneer etc. in and around Grand Avenue in St. Paul. Continue reading →

The Zeroth Law of Ordering at Indian restaurants in North America says that if the person taking your order asks you if you want your dal makhani “mild, medium or spicy” you should give up hope and head for the exit. I have to confess that when the person taking my takeout order on the phone on Saturday mornign at 11 asked me this question I was tempted to hang up. But the boys had been promised tandoori chicken for weeks now, and I’d also committed to reviewing more North Indian restaurants in the Twin Cities metro this year—and so I said a little prayer to my many-armed gods and placed the rest of the order. This is how it went. Continue reading →

I’m going to keep a promise for a change. I said last week that this week’s pandemic report would be of either a return to Peninsula or a first outing at a new(er) Indian restaurant in Bloomington and I keep my word. This is a review of Aroma, a new(er) Indian restaurant in Bloomington. They opened in April 2020—talk about perfect timing—in the exact same location as the erstwhile Surabhi—a place whose lunch buffet I’d liked more than I’d expected to in 2019 even as I worried about their prospects given the desolate feel of the restaurant when I ate there. Of course, in 2021, many restaurants have no one in them. And even though Aroma is open for dining-in, when I arrived at 11.45 on a Saturday to pick up a large order there was nobody eating there. There were, however, clearly doing a brisk takeout business, which I was glad to see. Here’s what we thought of what we ate. Continue reading →

When I came upon Kabob’s Indian Grill in late 2019 they immediately became my favourite Indian restaurant in the Twin Cities—not that that was saying very much. This was largely on the strength of their weekday lunch thalis—my favourite restaurant meal in Minnesota. That’s not to say I didn’t enjoy their a la carte menu as well. We got food from them a couple of times last year as well after the pandemic started and mostly enjoyed those meals too. However, when it came to my first-ever rankings of Indian restaurants in the Twin Cities metro, I couldn’t put them into the top tier—where sit Godavari and Indian Masala. My rankings last year were driven largely by the South Indian offerings on the new(er) places that have opened in the last few years. Kabob’s focus too is on South Indian food, particularly Chettinad food. In 2021, however, my goal is to expand the rankings with an evaluation of the North Indian food scene in the Twin Cities metro, the food more familiar to most American diners. Before I get to the North Indian specialists proper, however, I’m scoping out the North Indian offerings at the South Indian specialists. I’ve already reported on our recent meal from Indian Masala in this genre. Here now is my take on some of  Kabobs’ North Indian offerings. Continue reading →