Cosetta’s – St. Paul, MN

D.Rough grew up coming to Cosetta’s for all kinds of occasions. It’s an Italian place that has a very odd/confusing/interesting set up and flow. It starts in the parking lot. You can pull into the entrance and wait for a parking attendant to give you a ticket. Or you can pull into one of four spots and make a dash for the door to pick up something fast.

Then once inside, you can choose between three different lines for food. There’s a pizza line, a pasta and salad line, and then there’s a FULL deli and store line. We’ve popped into the deli and grabbed some meatballs before and we’ve gotten some pizza as well. Everything here is delicious. So when you walk in, it will look like there are hundreds of people in line (and there ARE), but they’re actually in various lines, so there are actually only 30 people in front of you – yeah, it’s THAT busy all the time.

Tonight we wanted some pasta, so I found the final line. I saw the specials listed and knew I wanted the Manicotti. D.Rough got the Mostaccioli and a meatball. They put it right on your plate right there and send you to the cashier. I believe it was the right choice, even though I couldn’t decide on the mostaccioli or the manicotti. The reason I say it was the right choice is because the manicotti comes with a side of mostaccioli – ch-ching!!!!

Everything is absolutely amazing here. The mostaccioli is perfectly cooked and the red sauce they use is really one of the best.

I LOVED the manicotti and the white cream sauce they put on it was even better than the red sauce. There was a fantastic amount of cheese on the inside that completed the whole thing. I would eat this every day if I could avoid my doctor for the next 20 years. Hahaha.

Everything at Cosetta’s is delicious. It has a very “family-feel” to it and they do a VERY good business. Lots of people in and out of this place. Don’t let the line scare you. You won’t wait long, and the food is worth it. There is an upstairs dining room too, so don’t miss out on that.

Top 5 things about Cosetta’s
1. Manicotti
2. Meatballs
3. Mostaccioli
4. Pizza
5. Amazing Deli

Bottom 5 things
1. Weird flow and various lines without good signage
2. People are allowed to cut in line if the people in front of you are taking too long at one particular area - weird
3. Parking situation is weird, but you get used to it
4. I always want to eat 43 things when I come here
5. It’s a pretty loud place, especially on event nights at the Xcel Energy Center

www.cossettaeventi.com

Chris and Rob’s Chicago Taste Authority – St. Paul, MN

D.Rough and I have driven by this place a ton of times and keep meaning to go there. In fact, we showed up once just a little too late and they were closed. The outside closely resembles a train dining car, which we generally like, and once you get inside, an entire dining area on one side looks like the inside of that dining car. It’s a really fun place!

The menu is full of hot dogs and sandwiches. It’s a little overwhelming, but the menu boards are on super flashy digital signs, which rules. Also keep an eye out for the special of the day, which (as we found out when we were LEAVING the restaurant) is usually something delicious and you’ll probably want to get.

I decided I wanted the Beef and Sausage Combo and D. Rough got the Chicago Dog. And since we were really hungry, we got some deep fried cheese curds. They have fountain pop and some cans of stuff, so I scored a Strawberry Fanta. I was on my lunch break, so I couldn’t drink an adult beverage.

The food came out pretty quickly, which was awesome. The cheese curds were pretty standard fare, so we (meaning mostly me) wolfed them down pretty quickly.

D.Rough said her Chicago Dog was pretty good and she’d get it again. Lots of toppings and giant pickle on top of her dog. Interesting presentation.

My combo was delicious. It’s an Italian Sausage link on a bun and that’s covered with Italian Beef slices. Yes, that's right, a meat sandwich with more meat as a condiment! I had them throw on some hot peppers just to complete the combo and I was glad I did. The sausage link was very good and had an awesome snappy casing. The Beef on top was really flavorful and reminded me I need to go back to Mayslack’s here, one of these days. I think I ate the thing faster than I should have, since I kept forgetting to breathe while I shoveled in all the pieces of this sandwich.

Overall, this place is really good. And now that we realize how close it is, we’ll be back for sure.

Top 5 things about Chris and Rob’s
1. Beef and Sausage combo
2. Chicago Dog
3. Deep fried cheese curds
4. Strawberry Fanta is available
5. Super awesome and thorough menu (and keep your eyes peeled for the special of the day)

Bottom 5 things
1. We missed the aforementioned special of the day
2. It isn’t a large place, so it will fill up fast
3. Parking isn’t going to be the best, since it’s on a corner lot
4. For those of you who are Vikings/Twins fans, the entire place is Chicago-themed. All kinds of Bears and Cubs paraphernalia on the walls (I did hear someone complain about the lack of White Sox stuff on the walls, though)
5. They have delicious-looking pizzas, but I don’t think I’ll ever get to one, since there are sooo many things on the regular menu I want to eat. We will see…

www.chrisandrobs.com

Kong’s Thai Bistro – Davenport, IA

I was back in my hometown with D.Rough for the Thanksgiving holiday. My Uncle J had stopped by my folks’ house and recommended a new Thai restaurant in downtown Davenport. I thought it was odd since my uncle isn’t very adventurous when it comes to eating. So I thought, heck yes, we’re going there. What’s really funny is I posted something on Facebook about going to a Thai place for dinner and someone suggested going to Kong’s – that was a sure sign it was good, right?

It’s a quaint little place at the base of the Brady Street hill – made famous (or so we think) by the annual Bix7 race. Nevermind – you don’t care. The place has brick walls and nice and tasteful modern looking décor. My sister Notmomsfavorite went with us, since I have recently tricked her into liking Thai food. The menu has a lot of delicious sounding Thai dishes as well as a couple of Vietnamese dishes as well (Pho, mainly).

I decided on the Pad Ped with chicken and D.Rough got Kang Masaman curry with chicken. I also, of course, got fresh spring rolls. My uncle didn’t order anything except a Pepsi (all he wanted was just one Pepsi – sorry about the ST reference there), but he was fine with watching us shovel food into our mouths, thankfully.

The spring rolls came out pretty quickly and were pretty standard. Nothing majorly flashy. Sorry there isn’t a photo – we were starving and I didn’t remember to take a photo until after we had cleaned the plate.

The main dishes came out shortly after that. My sister got Pad Thai, so I didn’t think it warranted a photo. She liked hers just fine.

D.Rough’s curry was quite good. I really liked it. It wasn’t terribly spicy, but it was still flavorful. Lots of chicken and vegetables. I always think we could use a giant bucket of rice with most curries and this wasn’t any different, but maybe D.Rough is better about rationing her rice than I am. It also seemed a bit on the oily side as the orange layer on the top demonstrates. I’m not sure if it was some sort of chili oil, or if it was just greasy, but it was more visually odd than flavor-wise. Very minor detail though.


My Pad Ped was good. Not life-changing, but still really good. I asked for it spicy and like many places, they didn’t believe me, so they brought out a small bowl of chili peppers for me to kick up the spice level. I’m not really a fan of adding it afterwards since you get various concentrated spots and other weak spots, but I understand their concern. The flavor of the dark brown sauce was great with the peppers, onions, carrots, mushrooms, and green beans.

Overall, the food at Kong’s is pretty good. I still like a couple of local Thai places better in the Quad Cities, but I’d come back here again.


Top 5 things about Kong’s
1. Kang Masaman curry
2. Pad Ped
3. Fresh Spring rolls
4. Super nice staff and owner (we share the same name – which is odd)
5. I never get to hang with my Uncle J! I loved it! (Also, they have Pepsi products –which means DEW)

Bottom 5 things
1. Spice level could have been kicked way up
2. It didn’t seem very busy at all, but we heard local college students go there to drink between classes during the day
3. I think the hype had me let down when it was all over and done with – even though it was perfectly fine
4. Never enough rice for my taste
5. Parking isn’t awesome during the day, though there is a large parking lot across the busy Brady Street

Kong’s Thai Bistro
512 N Brady Street
Davenport, IA
563-514-7896
www.qctimes.com/go/kongs

Bacon Apple Monte Cristo – West St. Paul, MN

It was D.Rough’s birthday last week, so I thought I’d do something special for her, since she cooks for me all the time. I had seen a delicious looking recipe in the Rachel Ray magazine while waiting at the dentists office a few weeks back (don’t worry – no cavities!) and knew I should make it for her. It was a Bacon Apple Monte Christo. For those of you not familiar with the standard Monte Christo, you should find one. It’s basically a combination of a ham and cheese sammich and French toast.

Plus it’s extra sacrilicious if you call it “Christ Mountain”.

This one had strips of bacon on it, extra sharp cheddar cheese, and sliced apples. You basically do what you would normally do for French toast by dipping the bread in the egg batter and frying it up. It’s pretty simple, but really quite delicious. You can do all sorts of toppings for these things too: powdered sugar, jam, various compotes, fruit. We went the traditional route and dipped it in maple syrup, since we appear to have four bottles of the stuff for some reason. I’m not joking – we have four bottles of syrup in the cupboard.

I’m not going to give you the recipe or anything like that. It’s simple. Even for a cooking dummy like me.

Giordano’s Pizza – Chicago, IL

D.Rough and I are on a mission to figure out which of the three (or four) authentic Chicago pizza places we like best. We’ve done Gino’s East together, and I’ve done all the other ones on previous occasions. I wanted to take her, and a bunch of crazy roller derby players and spouses, to Giordano’s – my favorite of the three – the third being Lou Malnati’s, and the fourth being Pizzeria Uno.

30 of us rolled into the downtown Giordano’s location and tried to sit as close to a group as possible. We managed fairly well.



This pizza is known for its super thick toppings and more closely resembling a “pie” since it has a second layer of crust on the top of the pizza.

Our little foursome decided to get a large stuffed cheese pizza with pepperoni and green peppers. That should be more than enough for us. Plus D.Rough got some sort of girly drink and I got a cheap margarita.

The pizza here is delicious. I really enjoy it. It’s super thick and there are tons of toppings.

I honestly think it is my favorite pizza of all time. I’m a topping guy though. D.Rough is a crust lover, so she really like the corn mealy crust of Gino’s East more than this. However, I think most people here loved this pizza. Seriously. It really is pretty awesome pizza. Sure, it’s not all that authentic Italian, but that’s really not what Chicago pizza is all about. It’s about making you fat. Thank you Giordano’s for helping me be fat.

www.giordanos.com

Su Casa – Chicago, IL

D.Rough and I needed some Mexican food in Chicago, and we’d heard a couple of people say they went there with good results (meaning there were margaritas). The odd thing is we drove past it while exploring the area around the hotel and saw the brightly painted building and neon cactus and made a couple comments about going there. So THAT’s where we ended up.

We got seated right away since it wasn’t packed and checked the place out. It was nicely decorated and fun on the inside (like a lot of Mexican places). The waiter was extremely nice and helped us to some drinks and menus. We scanned the menu and decided we’d split something since we planned to do some heavy drinking afterwards at the roller derby after party. There were a lot of things on the menu worth checking out, but we finally decided on the Guanajuato combination. It was a steak taco, a vegetarian burrito, a chicken chimichanga, and a tamale. We of course ordered a couple of margaritas – they have about 25 to choose from, so we got some lower end ones to save some cash.


The margaritas were tasty, even though they were cheap, but the Grande size we ordered was extremely small. Surprisingly small, in fact.


The food came out really quickly – even quicker than we expected by the less-than-full dining room. Like 2 minutes or so – insane. The tamale seemed a little dry for D.Rough’s taste, but I didn’t mind it – I ate most of that and didn’t complain about it too much. The chimichanga was probably the best part and we both split that fairly evenly. Crunchy fried shell and tasty insides – really pretty good. The steak taco was a tad bland and unimpressive, and the vegetarian burrito was just ok. Overall, the place was just ok, and maybe even a little sub-par.

Had I checked the reviews online, I would maybe have suggested some place else since all of the comments are pretty negative about this place. But we didn’t care. We had full bellies and had already begun the imbibing for the evening.

I think the best part of dinner was walking the mile back to the hotel in the brisk fall air and just enjoying Chicago (which a LOT of people forget to do).

Top 5 things about Su Casa
1. Chicken Chimichanga
2. Great margarita menu
3. Fantastic staff
4. Open late, so you can eat or drink AFTER normal dinner hours
5. Close to Michigan Avenue so probably gets some decent residual traffic from that

Bottom 5 things
1. Steak Taco
2. Vegetarian burrito
3. Tamale was dry
4. Probably would have better suited going to Pizzeria Uno next door
5. The Grande margaritas are REALLY small

Su Casa Mexican Restaurant
49 East Ontario Street
Chicago, IL 60611

Osteria I Nonni – Lilydale, MN

D.Rough’s birthday needed to be celebrated in style, since she’s a classy lady (on Mondays). We had been dying to go to I Nonni for months now and this was the perfect excuse. We booked it and made it happen. The restaurant is part of the Buon Giorno group that has a sandwich place in St. Paul. The group also operates a small deli shop at the entrance of the fancy restaurant (great for lunches we’ve heard). We perused the deli shop and the wine tasting room before we went into the restaurant proper. A nice gentleman took my coat and seated us in the near empty room. (It was a Monday night, so it makes sense.)

The waiter started by saying the food isn’t Italian-American, but is authentic Italian with many dishes based in Rome. Jay, a very nice, soft-spoken waiter who was very helpful and made sure we had everything we ended and answered a bunch of questions for us. We thought we knew what we wanted until he came over and told us the special additions to the menu – dang it! Ruined my master plan. We figured we’d be eating some red meat, so we got a nice bottle of red – Cerasuolo di Vittoria (from Gulfi Vineyards in Sicily). It was delicious.

The menu has an appetizer section, a first course section (which you can get as entrees), and a second course (which are larger entrees). You can order from anywhere, or you can order the tasting menu which is one from each category. We chose this option since it seemed the best way to try a bunch of things and wouldn’t break us like ordering a la carte would have.

Since I didn’t take photos of anything (I like to keep it classy for D.Rough’s special events and make them about her, NOT the blog, sorry), I’ll keep the descriptions short. We started with Piramidi – mortadella-lardo pyramids with brown butter, lemon, and thyme – and Animelle – grilled sweetbread, tomato puree, and salsa verde. The pyramids were highly recommended by the waiter – which is apropos because they are amazing. Seriously, these ravioli-type meat pyramids were exquisite! The sweetbreads were also really good. And the salsa verde isn’t like Mexican salsa verde, so don’t let that fool you. D.Rough said she didn’t know what sweetbreads were exactly, but remembers hearing that you don’t want to know what they are while you’re eating them, so thankfully she forgot (we looked them up when we got home). These were also really good and not like anything I’ve ever had before. I’d get them again!

For our second course, I got the special of the night Bucatini all’Amatriciana* - guanciale (basically delicious bacon – but from the cheeks of the pig), spicy tomato, and pecorino romano with homemade thick spaghetti noodles. D.Rough opted for the Pyramidi that I got for the appetizer. She wasn’t disappointed – they really are amazing. The Bucatini was really good as well. The dish had some zip to it, which I loved, and as our waiter said, “Bacon makes everything better”. Really good dish.

For our main entrees, I got the Bufala – a bison sirloin with potato, scallions, pancetta, and nameko mushrooms with a glaze over the top or everything. D.Rough got the Spuntature – beef short ribs with parmigiano-potato puree and spinach. The bison steak was very good, not stellar, but just very good. It was a little chewy, but had lots of flavor and the glaze really made this dish sing. However, D.Rough’s short rib was out of this world. It fell off the bone and disintegrated when she brushed it with a fork – they didn’t even bring her a steak knife, we noticed. The sauce that it was in was perfect and the potato puree was spectacular. Once again, she wins the best dish of the night.

We needed dessert, of course, so I went with the Panna Cotta – a limoncello custard with citrus zest and blackberries. I also got a glass of Castello Di Brolio – Vinsanto 2003 (a nice dessert wine), just to make sure I was properly sated after dinner. D.Rough ordered the Budino - a light chocolate cake with caramel and pistachio gelato. My dessert wine was the perfect amount of sweet, but just a hint of sour that made it just south of awesome. I liked it, but could have liked it more. However, the panna cotta made up for absolutely everything. It was light and fluffy and lemony and the blackberries and juice made it even better. I might go and just get this – I like it more than cheesecake (sorry, sister, it’s true). D.Rough liked her light chocolate cake, but could have even had a lighter version of it – it wasn’t THAT light. She loved the pistachio gelato on top though and the caramel didn’t hurt things.

Overall, a brilliant dining experience at Osterria I Nonni. We will likely be back. It’s pretty spendy, but you get taken care of. Jay even helped me put my coat on (which D.Rough gave me some crap about, until I told her it wasn’t rare for me). It’s full of uppity people, but show them you’re human and they’ll show you a great evening with delicious food.

Top 5 things about Osterria I Nonni
1. Spuntature – beef short ribs
2. Panna Cotta (limoncello style)
3. Pyramidi
4. Gulfi Cerasuolo di Vittoria
5. Jay is an amazing and very knowledgeable waiter

Bottom 5 things
1. Pretty pricey. You won’t get out of there for under a hundred.
2. No descriptions on the wine list
3. The inside is designed like a church – a LOT like a church – and it’s weird to eat in church
4. Dessert wine was a little sour
5. Find it hard to believe the delicious tiny sammich shop in St. Paul is affiliated with this primo restaurant – but it is!

www.inonnirestaurant.com