Friday food

--or:

Burger Quest!!

This week's installment comes courtesy of an MEA weekend trip to visit my parents in northern Minnesota. I grew up in a tiny (really) town called Tenstrike. Here's the main street:

Population just under 200, Tenstrike has a lumber processing plant, a church, and this street, with two bars. For years--decades, really--the bars had very different clientele. The one on the left, Pour Willie's, generally has been the more "respectable" of the two and has served bar food on and off for years. (Quick trivia: when Pour Willie's was known as the Tenstrike Bar, my dad used to bartend there on weekends, and my mother would wait at the end of the bar for him to finish his shift, so they could go across the street to the lamentably lost Bess's Steakhouse for dinner while dating.)

The one on the right had the dubious distinction of the less respectable of the two and was occasionally the site of dustups and fights. The previous owner lost her liquor license by selling off-sale liquor on a Sunday (for those of you not in MN, liquor sales on Sundays can only be done for those planning to drink at the bar--no taking it home, and liquor stores are closed).

Enter long-time resident Renee Dunn, who picked up the property, rehabbed it, and named it Got R Dunn.

Not without some effort. Shortly before the planned opening, the bar was broken into and much of her inventory was stolen. Sad.

But she persevered.

And now it's a respectable, friendly, casual place that certainly gives Pour Willie's a run for its money. Especially in the burger department.

Hard to tell, but these hand-formed burgers are about an inch thick, very flavorful, served on toasted bakery buns with piping hot fries. Dee-lish. Even the Teens agreed they were quite good, although--predictably--not quite as good to them as Lions Tap. (I'd say the Dunn burgers are better.)

Let's hear it for revival!

Comments

[Miss T]

Oh yum. And I love that street shot.