In this MNSpeak thread, Jason DeRusha mentions that someone needs to fill the missing blogosphere niche for Minneapolis skyway eatery reviews. Being that I now work downtown and I like eating and bitching about food, who better to do this than me? I have added another category under Minneapolis named Skyways where I will be putting them so you can follow along there if you wish.

Today my boss stopped by and asked if I wanted to hook up with her and one of my co-workers for lunch. Even though I had brought my own stew and a salad I agreed. At least this would give me something to write about if there wasn’t anything all that exciting going on in the South Metro. We left our building and walked through my wife’s and over to D. Brian’s Deli #4 in One Financial Plaza Skyway.

I usually like to check out menus online before heading out to a restaurant but I didn’t know where we were going to end up until we walked into the space. I was a little overwhelmed at the size and breadth of their menu. They have everything from paninis to soups and offer something for everyone and the prices seemed really reasonable (around $6.25 average, no math involved).

After I stared at the menu while waving several other busy lunch goers hurried through I finally decided on their Veggie Hummus Avocado wrap. It started with a spinach tortilla and a dollop of hummus in the middle. They piled on various vegetables including avocado, green peppers, mushrooms, cucumbers and sprouts. There may have been some other things in there but I was so hungry that I couldn’t concentrate all that well. After rolling up the sandwich and cutting it, I was offered a sliced pickle and took them up on it.

All said and done my total was $5.54 as I chose water to drink instead of one of the various soft drinks and juices they had available. I took a couple of bites and found the sandwich to be a little bland as there wasn’t any sort of sauce inside to spice it up. They had bottles of Tabasco available so I doused my sandwich halves with that and found it definitely made it more interesting and certainly decent enough for the price. My boss had some sort of salad, I didn’t bother asking her what it was, and soon after her first bite she was up and out of her seat walking back towards the counter. She returned a while later and after I asked what happened she just replied, “hair.” Gross.

If you happen to be in any number of Minneapolis skyways around town you will probably pass by one of the five D. Brian’s Deli Locations. The service was fast, there are many healthful options and they are inexpensive, but mine didn’t have much flavor without the Tabasco and one of our dishes had a hair.

While I didn’t take any pics this time, I do promise to do so in the future — especially if I know more than 10 minutes ahead of time that I will be heading out for lunch in the Minneapolis skyways that day.

Address:
D. Brian’s Deli #4
One Financial Plaza Skyway
120 South 6th Street
Minneapolis, MN 55402

Phone:
Phone: 612.335.9095
Fax: 612.335.9098

Hours:
Monday - Friday 6:30am - 2:00pm

According to this article over at the Star Trib, fourteen Minneapolis restaurants are joining the Think Outside the Bottle Campaign to promote drinking local tap water instead of supporting the 10+ billion dollar tap water turned bottled water industry.

I’m 100% behind people drinking tap water at home and hell, I have almost no problem with drinking it at restaurants when it’s served to me. I certainly don’t go out of my way to pay for it but when you read stories about Minneapolis water smelling like fish, you have to think twice about whether or not you really want to be served that at a restaurant.

Our tap water here in Apple Valley tastes like shit. The sulfur smell and chlorine taste is so bad that I run it through a Brita water filter before drinking it. I honestly hate even having our dog drink it, knowing full well that if he had the opportunity he’d probably eat his own shit. I realize that chilling the water is what helps to kill off most of the odor and flavors but it just doesn’t do enough here in the South Metro so the expensive Brita it is.

What does your water taste/smell like and do you buy bottled, filter it or do you just suck it up and drink it straight from the tap and take it like a (wo)man?