I'm thinking a Thai meal would be fun for our anniversary. We are not experienced with this style of cooking and wonder if anyone could recommend a restaurant with nice decor and atmosphere, preferably with cocktails.

Zuppa Cucina has a soup and sandwich menu, good fresh ingredients. Nice casual sit down dining area, friendly service,

Lunds in Eagan has a tank.

No one is dismissing Dickies because they can do better at home. Db Cooper mentions 2 other restaurants in the area he recommends or wants to try. I too can grill a superior steak or smoke better ribs on my Weber smoker. That doesn't mean I won't swing by Ted Cooks or Big Daddy's for BBQ, or go to the Strip Club for a great streak.

Dickies is being criticized for food that ranges from poorly prepared and tasteless to inedible (the potato salad flavored mashed potatoes), poor service, and a sad lack of customer relations knowledge.

I would love to have a great BBQ joint near our home. Dickies is not it.

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The Strip Club
378 Maria Ave, Saint Paul, MN 55106

We went the Eagan location for takeout couple of months ago. The ribs were overdone without much flavor. I'd like to tell you about the brisket, but when we got home we found they hadn't put it in the bag along with one of the sides. We called with the idea that they might send us a coupon or certificate. The worker on the line kept asking the manager to take the call, he wouldn't, and told the worker to tell us to drive back and get our brisket and side. This was during one of our 6" snowstorms. Obviously we did not drive back and will not go there again. The side of potato salad we did get had the Cub food flavor mentioned by DB Cooper, but had the consistency of mashed potatoes. We tasted it and threw it away.

We never did try the pickles, so the best thing we had was the free soft-serve.

I don't know, they have been in this location for around 20 years. There was another shop in W St Paul next to Gallagher's bar that I believe has closed.

Old World Pizza on 55th in Inver Grove, and Turrito's Pizza @ 66th & Concord in South St Paul both have truly great Minnesota style pies. We haven't been to the Fireside for years, it's a good neighborhood type of bar, and the hot dagos were very good. Love the carne asada and the chorizo tacos at El Taquito. They are very nice people, we went for some take out one evening and it happened that their credit card system was down. We didn't have enough cash so they told us to take the food and just pay for it next time we come in. You just have to love people like that. :-)

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Old World Pizza
5816 Blaine Ave Inver Grove, Hts, MN

You might try the Kenilworth Estate orange pekoe from Teasource in St Paul or St Anthony

http://teasource.com/index.htm

Jensen's Supper Club in Eagan serves very good popovers with their dinners.

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Jensen's Supper Club
3840 Sibley Memorial Highway, Eagan, MN 55122

Stopped at El Burrito Mercado today. One of several impulse purchases was 1/2 lb of ceviche de camaron (shrimp ceviche) @$6.99/lb. Very good! We picked up the ceviche, pork al pastor, carnitas, rice, beans, salsa jalapeño, corn tortillas for a quick and easy Sunday dinner at home. And leftovers tomorrow!

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El Burrito Mercado
175 Cesar Chavez St, St Paul, MN 55107

I have not tried them yet, but Bar LaGrassa has a chicken and foie gras poupettone antipasti, and a foie gras tortellini on their menu .

Punch Pizza
We had huge expectations from recommendations and reviews. Give me a Minnesota style pie any day.

Sam's Club in Eagan has large bags of breaded cheese curds in their frozen foods section. I have not tried them so I can't tell you about their taste or quality.

You might take a look at this website, lots of pork tenderloin sandwich info for MN and surrounding states.

http://web.mac.com/davydd/Site/Pork_T...

Yes, thanks. I've looked in Byerly's and Kowalski's in my area (Eagan) also Cub and Rainbow In Eagan and Inver Grove Heights.

The things I never knew that I needed., or even existed. My sister-in-law cooks a wonderful ribs and sauerkraut meal, great comfort food. I would like to make this myself, but she calls for a 14 oz can of sauerkraut juice in her ingredients in addition to a bag of sauerkraut. I've checked my local grocery stores with no luck. Does any one else use this, or know where I could pick some up?

I'll second that, the "Hook" is near the docks in Superior. Interesting people, great burgers.

You may want to try this site,

http://www.virtualweberbullet.com

Lots of smoking and grilling information.

Please, do not feed fish E-Z Cheese (or hot dogs, potato chips, etc.). It is very bad for them, their digestive systems are not able to handle the fats that are not naturally in their diets. And yes, I am guilty of having done it in the past before I knew better.

Now, having said that, take a piece of pickled herring and put it on a chickin in a biscuit and you've got some good eats!

I'll toss in my 2 cents worth here. My wife and I had lunch there last Saturday. She had the pulled pork sandwich with rice and peas (beans), and I had a jerk chicken sandwich with potato salad. I pretty much agree with kevin47's assessment of the service and decor. The pulled pork sandwich, rice and peas, and potato salad were all tasty if not outstanding.

What I would like to point out is that the jerked chicken is the closest thing we have found in this area to what you would have at a genuine Jamaican jerk pit. Not what you will have at a resort or the tourist areas, but the real concrete block and rusty tin roof side of the road jerk pit that the locals enjoy. Where they slow cook the food over pimento wood, chop it into serving sizes with a clever and serve it to you on a paper plate at a picnic table where you wash it down with a red stripe beer . This is a real treat, and we will be making the drive back to Stillwater for the jerked chicken

The Lake Elmo Inn has has sunnies on their menu.

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Lake Elmo Inn
3442 Lake Elmo Avenue North, Lake Elmo, MN 55042

Has anyone on this board tried or made turducken? Or does anyone know if it is sold in the MSP area? By the way, I'm a relatively new member here, and would like to thank everyone for all of the great information I've gotten of off this board