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• BEST LOCAL CHEF
  Lenny Russo
  What makes a great chef? One good measure is the influence he exerts on the world around him, and no one has done more to exalt the possibilities of northern regional cuisine lately than Lenny Russo. His restaurant Heartland has become a must-visit destination for visiting foodies who dip in to... More >>
• BEST BREAKFAST
  Serlin's Cafe
  "Not Good Look'n, Just Good Cook'n," reads a sign above the doorway to the kitchen. True indeed, and that statement reflects the unironic folksiness on hand at this 61-year-old East Side institution, where the waitress is likely to call you "Hon." Actually, the place isn't bad look'n at all,... More >>
• BEST SUNDAY BRUNCH
  Victor's 1959 Café
  Spanish Caribbean music wafts out of half the restaurant kitchens in town, but can you get a decent order of black beans and Creole sauce with those eggs? Not usually, unless you're talking Victor's, which has added a full Cuban dinner menu and wine and beer in recent years. A shack painted... More >>
• BEST CHEAP EATS
  Bombay 2 Deli
  We have a recurring fantasy about moving to back-country Wisconsin—you know, with the real doughnuts and the garlic cheese curds and terrifying, smoke-spewing ATVs beneath every 12-year-old boy. Then we remember Bombay 2 Deli and we realize we never could—life's too short to miss out... More >>
• BEST CHINESE RESTAURANT
  Little Szechuan Chinese Cuisine
  Minnesota Chinese food spent many years in a sludge of low expectations; the biggest debate was often whether "chow mein" could be spelled "chow main." Then we entered an era of separate but unequal: There were splendid things done with river fish and adorable little cuttlefish, but only for... More >>
• BEST COFFEEHOUSE
  Mapps Coffee and Tea
  Like all quality coffee shops, Mapps is a microcosm of the surrounding neighborhood. This sunlight-specked, high-ceilinged West Bank caffeine emporium attracts an eclectic crowd. College kids from the U of M and Augsburg cradle lattes as they take advantage of free wi-fi. Somali men from the... More >>
• BEST DIM SUM
  JunBo Chinese Restaurant
  Go to enough dim sum joints and the same-old same-old gets old-old. Another Styrofoam-tasting deep-fried crab claw? Sigh. Another central commissary sesame ball? Must we? That's why JunBo, the new mega-ambitious, mega-sized Chinese place that took over the old Chi-Chi's space on Nicollet and... More >>
• BEST RESTAURANT FOR OUTDOOR DINING
  Swede Hollow Cafe
  For an outdoor, sit-down dinner, you can't beat the elegantly ensconced patios of W.A. Frost or the Black Forest Inn. But for a casual, sunny breakfast or lunch, consider this small St. Paul spot with the giant view. Perched atop a hill rising above Swede Hollow—now a park, but from the... More >>
• BEST DINER
  Town Talk Diner
  Spinning stools bolted to the floor and a curvy counter fronting a noisy kitchen-at first glance, Town Talk seems like, well, a diner. But make your way to the next room and you realize there's serious eating happening. There the vibe changes from old-school burger joint to dimly lit urban... More >>
• BEST FRENCH RESTAURANT
  Fugaise
  Most Minneapolis chefs are loathe to acknowledge any French roots to their cooking. "What? we are chef-driven!" they cry. "Fusion! Everything you see on these plates sprung from our very own heads!" Not so at Fugaise where young chef Don Saunders is unafraid to pay tribute to the French culinary... More >>
• BEST GREEK RESTAURANT
  Christos
  Pop into the Nicollet Avenue Christos any weekday lunch and the room is bustling with happy customers. They come for things like a daily special of fresh-baked moussaka, an individual casserole of tangy eggplant and beef united by a savory sauce and a salty, piquant lid of grated, melted... More >>
• BEST INDIAN RESTAURANT
  Bombay Bistro
  There are a number of good South Asian places in town with tasty takeout and perfunctory atmosphere (carpeting and a Hindu sculpture do not a restaurant make). But Bombay Bistro is the rare experience in local Indian dining that persuades you to take off your coat and stay awhile. With a clear... More >>
• BEST TAKEOUT
  Lucia's To Go
  Lucia Watson has been doing the locally sourced food thing since way before it was cool. She opened her Uptown restaurant, Lucia's, in 1985, with a focus on high-quality, seasonal, organic, local ingredients, which she's used to make some of Minneapolis's best food ever since. In the fall of... More >>
• BEST ITALIAN RESTAURANT (BARGAIN)
  Broders' Southside Pasta Bar
  The ongoing domestic culture wars have lately pitted virtuous know-nothings against those who are "foodier than thou"—you know the type: those people who prefer pig's trotters to meat loaf, pretty much on principle. There is one place that everyone in the Twin Cities seems to agree on,... More >>
• BEST ITALIAN RESTAURANT (UPSCALE)
  Osteria I Nonni
  Over the last year the buzz about Osteria I Nonni has changed. People once murmured that the splashy, marble-accented pasta palace in Lilydale, just south of the river from St. Paul, was great if they knew who you were, but now people are saying it's just great—and greatly, truly Italian.... More >>
• BEST BARISTA
  Juliana at St. Paul Steep 'n' Brew Coffee Shop
  The narrow, bright coffee shop on the second floor of the US Bank building has always housed friendly baristas who make the non-descript skyways feel a little homier. And Juliana, who's been running the Steep 'n' Brew Coffee Shop since she bought it five years ago, continues the tradition. A... More >>
• BEST MEXICAN RESTAURANT
  Salsa a la Salsa
  A perennial favorite for its novel, fresh, healthy dishes, bracingly tangy margaritas, and color-saturated decor, Eat Street's Salsa a la Salsa has new competition this year—from its own outpost of the same name opened in the mercifully quiet northwest corner of the Midtown Global Market.... More >>
• BEST MIDDLE EASTERN RESTAURANT
  Shish
  Leo Judah opened his spic-and-span Macalesterland spot last June, and he hasn't had a day off since. The demand for his homemade lamb burgers, rich moussaka, light and zingy hummus, deeply flavored kibbeh, buoyant and crisp spinach pies, big fresh salads, and potently flavored baba ghanoush is... More >>
• BEST NEIGHBORHOOD CAFE—MINNEAPOLIS
  Corner Table
  Corner Table has long been the best-kept-secret of the bucolic Kingfield neighborhood: The room is light and airily modern-museum-like, the food is both delicious and pristinely locally sourced, and the prices are more affordable than lots of comparable spots, especially on Sunday "vino + vinyl"... More >>
• BEST NEIGHBORHOOD CAFE—ST. PAUL
  Muffuletta
  What makes a great restaurant? The chef? The management? The customers? Sometimes any of those, but often what sets a great restaurant apart seems to be some magical vibe, soul, gestalt, or whatever you want to call it, some elusive sum of all the parts plus va-va-voom. Muffaletta has that... More >>
• BEST JAPANESE RESTAURANT
  Midori's Floating World Cafe
  The Twin Cities are blessed with good Japanese restaurants. Seriously, more than any other branch of cuisine, it can truly be said of local Japanese spots: They're all good. Our favorite, however, is homey underdog Midori's Floating World. Why? They do all the basics just right: The agedashi... More >>
• BEST KOREAN RESTAURANT
  King's Fine Korean Cuisine
  Everyone has a restaurant that they don't get to go to as often as they'd like—because it's out of the way, because their loved ones don't love it as much as they do, because life gets busy. King's Fine is our number-one restaurant that we wish, wish, wish we got to more. The $9.95 buffet... More >>
• BEST NEW RESTAURANT
  Town Talk Diner
  Nothing is more Minnesota than super-colliding the high-brow with the low-brow—fine French Champagne at bowling alleys (Hi, Bryant-Lake Bowl!), collaborative conceptual art in ice-fishing houses (Hi, Art Shanty Projects!), Prouenza Schouler high-fashion sweaters for $20 at Target (rhymes... More >>
• BEST POWER LUNCH
  Vincent—A Restaurant
  When you think of the power lunch, you usually think of two magnates meeting—and Vincent has that in spades. Some Fridays it's practically a who's who of bigwigs from Target, Macy's, and every publishing, graphic arts, and nonprofit company in town. But what about when you're a mere... More >>
• BEST QUEER COFFEE SHOP
  Wilde Roast Café
  Yes, you're right, that was Wilde Roast Café's flourless chocolate torte splayed lasciviously across the cover of last September's Bon Appetit. La Bête Noir, they call it, and even though this isn't a family newspaper, perhaps it's best left at that. Except to say that it's every... More >>
• BEST RESTAURANT—MINNEAPOLIS
  La Belle Vie
  La Belle Vie is the best restaurant in Minneapolis for one simple reason: They work faster, harder, and better than anyone else in town right now. Take the baccala ($12). All over the world, this salt-cured cod is a dry and cakey tool of survival, not delight. But the kitchen staff at La Belle... More >>
• BEST RESTAURANT—ST PAUL
  Heartland
  Heartland has raised the bar for every restaurant in the Twin Cities by asking, "Just how much can a northern restaurant really expect to source locally?" And then giving an answer that demolishes every other restaurant's "I can't." Can so, say executive chef Lenny Russo and chef de cuisine... More >>
• BEST RESTAURANT FOR A FIRST DATE
  duplex
  Nothing's more nerve-wracking than a first date. Will the restaurant you pick have something your unknown quantity likes? You can't bring a hemp-shoed girl to Champps, after all, and you can't bring a backward-baseball cap dude to the raw-food joint. And what about price? If you're a girl and... More >>
• BEST PLACE TO EAT OUT WITH YOUR KIDS
  Big Bowl
  Just sit there and be quiet—we'll give you to the count of three: one, two...hey, we said sit there! When you're dragging children to a restaurant, you may think you're saving yourself dinnertime hassle. But that only happens if: 1) your children actually eat the food, instead of turning... More >>
• BEST DESSERTS
  La Belle Vie
  "Would you like to see the pastry menu?" asks a server in the lounge of La Belle Vie, not wanting to presume—and the table nearly jumps down her throat. Hand over the pastry menu! That's practically the whole reason we're here! Some thought has been given to ordering the whole darn thing,... More >>
• BEST RESTAURANT FOR LATE-NIGHT DINING
  Pizza Lucé
  Like traveling to the darkest depths of the sea and turning on a light, a nighttime visit to the downtown Minneapolis Pizza Lucé will yield some spectacular views of nightlife. Open until 2:30 a.m. Sunday through Thursday and 3:30 a.m. Friday and Saturday, the restaurant draws a crowd... More >>
• BEST RESTAURANT FOR ROMANCE
  Bayport Cookery
  Around Valentine's Day the Bayport Cookery really pulls out all the stops, with a "Chocolate Lovers' Nine-Course Tasting Menu" ($85, though it's available with fewer courses for as little as $35). For that feast, the restaurant's signature multi-course menu—always arranged around a... More >>
• BEST RESTAURANT IN THE MIDDLE OF NOWHERE
  Nelson Cheese Factory
  There are few reasons to find yourself in Nelson, Wisconsin. Perhaps you were in Wabasha, Minnesota, watching eagles and you got lost? Perhaps you're a truss-bridge tourist, and have come to see the one that spans the Mississippi in this physically beautiful but otherwise empty corner of the... More >>
• BEST RESTAURANT TREND
  Democratizing Fine Dining
  Why should rich people have all the fun? Isn't it enough that they get all the tax breaks and the really good school districts? Local restaurateurs have been answering that question with a resounding: Yes, enough for the rich already! Consequently, there's Town Talk Diner, where the rabble can... More >>
• BEST RESTAURANT WHEN SOMEONE ELSE IS PAYING
  The Oceanaire
  Oceanaire's menu is famously ever-changing, depending on what fish markets worldwide have to offer, and that element of surprise is part of the thrill of dining there. But the tab for the pristine, exotic, just-flown-in raw materials adds up fast, which is why we like going to Oceanaire when... More >>
• BEST RESTAURANT FOR GLUTTONS
  Atlantic Buffet
  The Atlantic Buffet is the kind of place where, the first time you go, you just shout out to your friends in delight, "They have apple pie!" Imagine that, in the sea of a hundred or more items including: corn dogs, corn on the cob, corn soup, several kinds of soft-serve ice cream, sushi stuffed... More >>
• BEST SEAFOOD RESTAURANT
  Sea Salt Eatery
  Lots of places have oysters these days, but when the guy behind the counter at Sea Salt tells you that the bag he's got holds the best that were available, you somehow know deep in your soul that he is telling you the truth. When he rips through a dozen with the light, quick hands of a master... More >>
• BEST STAR-CHEF EXPERIENCE IN A RESTAURANT
  The Modern's Phillip Becht
  The problem with fine restaurants is that the name chef is often far from the stoves. Not so at the Modern, where chef Phillip Becht is even there for brunch. Seriously, Becht is often to be found in the kitchen spooning creamy white sausage gravy onto buttery golden biscuits and peering over... More >>
• BEST STEAK HOUSE
  Manny's
  Visitors to this venerable dining institution are greeted by a painting of a bull displaying a rather heavy appendage of masculinity. And in a way, that's fitting for what is, year-in, year-out, the best steak house in town. "We're a New York-style steak house," offers one of Manny's GMs, Steve... More >>
• BEST THAI RESTAURANT
  True Thai
  There are a few dishes at True Thai that wake us with longing in the night. The royal Thai fish cakes ($5.50), golden, lumpen discs of fish, batter, curry, egg, and green beans that taste as fresh and big and exotic as a bouquet of orchids. The crispy catfish salad ($12.95), a zingy, lemon-lime... More >>
• BEST VEGETARIAN-FRIENDLY RESTAURANT
  Spoonriver
  What carnivores fail to understand is that vegetarians are vegetarian for a number of very good reasons: They don't want to hurt animals, and they don't want to end up in the cardiac care unit, the oncology unit, or frankly any hospital unit whatsoever. Brenda Langton really gets that, gets it... More >>
• BEST VIETNAMESE RESTAURANT
  Mai Village
  One recent Saturday night, a family of four tucked into a capacious booth at Mai Village and, over cream-cheese wontons for the small folk ($4.25) and limey bun salads topped with two types of sweet, fatty pork ($6.95 each), for the credit-card-wielders, they talked of Vietnam. And therefore of... More >>
• BEST WINE BAR
  Toast Wine Bar & Cafe
  There's a lot to love about this little can-do Warehouse District newcomer with the achingly pretty views of the Minneapolis skyline and the aw-shucks modest menu of gourmet bargains, like cracker-crusted pizzas topped with caramelized onions and sweet talleggio cheese, or antipasto plates... More >>
• BEST WINE LIST
  Cesare's Wine Bar
  Ever seen a boxer go at a speedball, just attacking it? Ratta-tatta-ratta-tatta-ratta-tatta-tat-tat-tat. That's kind of what contemplating the wine list at Cesare's (pronounced chez-a-ray's) is like. It sits on the table innocuously enough, just a sheaf of office paper, like someone's TPS... More >>
• BEST SERVICE AT A RESTAURANT
  La Belle Vie
  The servers at La Belle Vie often seem as if they're executing a complex ballet: In two, three, four, place plate two, three, four, explain plate concisely and not obnoxiously two, three, four and out two, three, four. When you finish your tiny course of oh, say, slow-poached pheasant with... More >>