Key’s Café at the Foshay Tower – Minneapolis, MN

When M.Giant invited me to lunch on my birthday, I didn’t realize it would be just he and I having a romantic lunch of breakfast foods man-to-man style. That being said, we had a blast. He had some sort of coupon he needed to use or lose, so we met downtown and made it happen. Key's is in the historic Foshay Tower downtown - which I know absolutely nothing about, other than it USED to be the tallest building downtown. I think that's hilarious they're still hanging on to that fact, since you can tell by all the skyscrapers dwarfing it, that it isn't even a blip on the map anymore. If you want to find out more about the Foshay, call your local library. They'll be glad to help.


If you’ve been to downtown Minneapolis, you know there’s no free parking anywhere. Thankfully there are hundred of parking ramps strewn about town that you can decide between. The issue with this is that you’ll never park in the same one twice and always be confused where the random fire escape staircases and creaky elevators will spit you out in the city. Think of it like a little adventure. I myself, got mixed up in the parking ramp and went straight to the top and then back down to the bottom to the cashier in under 120 seconds. The lady laughed at me and told me just go grab another ticket and actually park this time. Hilarious.


Once I got out of the elevator, I didn’t even know which building I was in, so I just walked in as straight a line as I could, hoping to be jettisoned out onto the street somewhere where I could GPS where the heck this place was. Thankfully, the gauntlet I was required to walk through spit me out at the entrance to Keys’ after walking through a bank and a hotel lobby (I’m not kidding).

The inside of Key’s is pretty nice. It caters to the fancy downtown crowd AND they have a full bar. Nicely done. I grabbed a table and waited for M.Giant to show up. I didn’t wait long, so I didn’t even have a chance to scour the menu for lunch items. IT was a good thing I didn’t since his coupon was for breakfast items only (and orange juice) – weird coupon, but valuable in many situations before noon, I suppose. There was an equally weird maximum on the coupon that coincided with the most expensive item on the menu – that’s what I was getting, obviously. You have to make it count. It also helped that it sounded delicious – A Cajun spiced pork chop, two eggs, hashbrowns and toast. Perfect. I asked the lady if I could substitute sweet potato tater tots for the hashbrowns and she told me she could talk to her people and try.

The food arrived in a reasonable amount of time, so no complaints there, even as busy as the place was (and it was busy). If you don’t like pulp in your orange juice, don’t order it here. They’re serious about fresh squeezed and it’s pretty thick – which I love, so suck on THAT, Tropicana. The toast was really delicious and came with home made strawberry jam. Also top notch and fun for my mouth. The eggs were perfectly cooked over medium and worked out well with the toast dipping activity. The Cajun pork chop had great flavor. I thought it would be a little spicier, but it was just seasoned. Not much kick to it, but a delicious cut of meat and a pretty good seasoning.

The best part, which I’m embarrassed to admit, was the sweet potato tater tots. Wow, they were like state fair candy. I thought they’d be good, but there were REALLY good. I need to figure out how to make there or where to buy them. I loved them.

And I got to try a bite or two of M.Giant’s breakfast – he had some sort of omelet with cream cheese, garlic and spinach in it. One of the best omelet flavors I’ve ever had. I might start making this at home. I was really impressed.

The whole experience was awesome. Yes, partly because M.Giant paid for brunch-fast, but also because I don’t get enough quality time with him – TOTALLY my fault, not his. I’m sure I talked his ear off and mostly about food, which makes me sound like a fat kid, but not being in school or three bands, all I can talk about is wedding stuff – which he’s been done with for hundreds of years and likely doesn’t care. So I’ve got food conversations bottled up inside of me to bore him with. Thankfully, he’s a trooper and puts up with it. Plus I gave him a huge slice of D.Rough’s limoncello raspberry cake to take home. I’m a good briber!

Thanks for birthday brunch-fast, M.Giant!!!!

Top 5 things about Key’s Café
1. Sweet potato tater tots
2. Omelet with spinach, cream cheese, and garlic
3. Cajun pork chop
4. Real orange juice
5. Homemade strawberry jam

Bottom 5 things
1. The place fills up fast around lunch
2. It’s really hard to leave the place without an entire cake shoved under your arm as a snack
3. The café has at LEAST three entrances that I picked up on. Some of which are unmarked
4. The orange juice tasted funny… oh wait, that’s because I didn’t put vodka in it. hahahaha
5. Parking fiasco – totally my own fault, but it was still a little ridiculous

www.keyscafe.com/foshay-minneapolis-mn