Looking for a nice place to go to dinner for our anniversary which is next week while we are attending a friend’s wedding out of state, I decided to try out Chianti Grill in Burnsville which is a local chain with an additional location in Falcon Heights as well as two different named restaurants including Porterhouse Steaks and Seafood in Lakeville and Ciattis of Lacrosse in Onalaska, WI.

I made reservations online and the only options this morning at 8 AM were 5:45 or 7:15pm. I chose 7:15 and as I was fumbling with my login to OpenTable, it disappeared leaving us with 7:45 as the next available option. While I realize that OT sucks and only has limited reservation slots, I was not pleased as this was the second time I’ve attempted to go to Burnsville’s Chianti Grill and been stuck with only late reservation slots which is why we have never been here before. Thankfully, because I wanted to get some sushi at Ronin’s grand opening, this worked out for us tonight.

We arrived at 7:25 and were told there would be a seat available at 7:45. We sat down in some over sized leather chairs and observed the restaurant. The inside is much larger than I expected with ceilings that are high, unnecessarily so. The waiting area is small with numerous people milling about and making it more cramped than it needs to be especially with usually no less than five people standing behind the hostess desk chatting for almost the entire time we sat there waiting instead of doing whatever it is that they are paid to do. I don’t like when restaurants make you wait past your reservation time and that’s exactly what happened to us tonight. While 15 minutes may not seem like much, don’t take reservations if you aren’t going to meet them.

The specials, written on a chalk board stuffed in the corner of the foyer, were shrimp and crab risotto and wild mushroom NY strip. Neither had prices attached and when I asked the server what type of mushrooms they were I can’t say I was surprised when she replied with “cremini, portobello, and shiitake.” The only one she didn’t mention, because I stopped her before she could continue with a curt, “so, not wild, ok,” would have been oyster. I then asked if the “fresh” Norwegian salmon was frozen. She didn’t know and went to the kitchen to ask and returned seconds later with, “it never has been frozen, ever.” Against my better judgment I went with the obviously farmed salmon. Kim was torn between the Filet Mignon or the Crab Claws and decided on the later.

The Salmon Taormina is described as grilled fresh Norweigan Salmon topped with sauteed artichoke, fresh tomato, basil and white wine with lemon for $21.99. The Crab Claws are listed as being delicious crab claws served with a side of butter for $26.99. Both come with salad, bread, choice of side with the option to upgrade to Caesar or Balsamic Gorgonzola for $1.49. Tonight’s sides were two pasta choices (spaghetti and marinara or fettucine Alfredo), rosemary potatoes or sauteed vegetables. I went with the potatoes and Kim chose the Alfredo pasta. While I went with their standard salad with bleu cheese, Kim upgraded to their balsamic gorgonzola.

The bread arrived and was nothing to write home about. I eat better stuff from Sara Lee. The salad was nothing special but was a decent size. The bleu cheese dressing had large chunks of something in it but whatever it was, it didn’t taste anything like cheese, let alone bleu cheese and I could have been eating something that tasted like Styrofoam. Kim mentioned her salad needed walnuts or something and when I asked how it was she gave me a 50/50 motion with her hand and said she would probably have been happier with the house salad. I’m sure she would as we eat plenty of boring bagged salad at home just like this seemed to be.

Our meals came out soon after the salad and I apologize but the photos just did not come out. While I have linked to them, they are absolutely terrible with the very low lighting. Honestly, the dishes weren’t anything to look at anyway. Mine was a simple hunk of salmon, nearly cold in the middle, topped with what appeared to be, but probably weren’t, canned diced tomatoes. I couldn’t taste any artichokes or basil but possibly because the basil was finely chopped amongst the pile of tomatoes I may have just missed the artichokes — well, probably not — unless they, like the bleu cheese chunks, had none of their usual distinctive flavor. While eating the luke warm fish with its toppings, I found that it tasted more like cheap Bruschetta than a $20 piece of salmon. The potatoes, which could have saved this mediocre dish, were over seasoned and I don’t know about you but I don’t need a mouthful of herbs when eating chewy new potatoes with my dinner.

Kim’s dish had about 15 pre-cracked crab claws with a bowl of butter alongside the pasta. While the menu said they’d be easy to eat, I was still concerned for Kim as neither of us are anywhere close to being professionals at eating crustaceans. Kim was quite pleased with the dish but I found the meat tasteless and pretty awful for the price but maybe it was just the single claw I had…

Kim mentioned she wanted to try a flight of wine tonight. They had both a red or white for $10. We went with the white as it would pair best with our meals and they included Martin Codax Albarino, Whitehaven Sauvignon Blanc, and McWilliams Riesling which range in price from $7 to $10 at the Chianti Girll. We are not wine fanatics or even pretend to know what we’re talking about when it comes to wine drinking but this was the only enjoyable part of the dinner for me. The portions seemed much larger than 3oz and I was impressed for $10.

Kim ordered dessert from the tray of gigantic desserts that they offer. An incomplete selection of cakes and various other treats were laid before us including creme brule, lava cake, carrot cake to feed a small army, and a slice of cheesecake which was offered in two other varieties than was shown to us. Kim went with their “lava cake” (they take 20+ mins to prep so I put it in quotes as this one was out in 5) which she said she enjoyed.

Overall, while Kim liked her meal, I am not at all impressed with the $81 meal we had at Chianti Grill as it’s overpriced, boring, and in my opinion just one step above a place like Olive Garden. I can’t see myself returning here ever again for anything except the cheap flights of wine. Being that we aren’t wine drinkers aside from the occasional dabble into various local winery offerings available at the Rosemount liquor stores, I don’t even know when that will be.

Based on the number of people eating here and the hard to get reservations, some people obviously think this place is worth their hard earned money but I certainly think you’re better off elsewhere — possibly even Olive Garden.

Have you eaten at Chianti Grill? If so, feel free to share your experience below!

Address:
Chianti Grill
14240 Plymouth Ave
Burnsville, MN 55337

Phone:
952-892-7555

See all the pictures from our anniversary dinner on Flickr here.

Based on MSPD’s suggestion and review over at chow.com, I knew I had to get over to the House of Coates for some burgers. Knowing that both Kim and Josh are burger fans, I asked if they were up for it and after some answers in the affirmative, we were off. We took CR-46 all the way over to US-52, crossed the highway while watching the rain fall to the north.

We pulled into the nearly full lot and walked into the restaurant. It was quite a bit nicer than I could have envisioned by the outside and my generalizations of any of the businesses in the immediate area. It looked like any bar in Western WI or Northern MN. Definitely, as MSPD said, the quintessential snowmobiler bar.

We sat down at a table in the bar side and were quickly served by a friendly waitress who wasn’t as concerned that the ‘U’ in the “House of Coates” sign on the front of the restaurant was turned backwards as Josh seemed to be. Based on MSPD’s suggestion, Kim ordered their beer battered onion rings and we ordered two Big Canada Jacks and Swanee Burger. The Big Canada Jack sandwich comes with Canadian bacon and pepper jack cheese. The Swanee Burger included bacon, American cheese and the option of bleu cheese dressing but Kim decided against that tonight. Remembering that the waitresses might not give a flying rat’s ass how you want your burger cooked, I asked if they would cook it to order and the waitress said they would. I asked for it medium-rare and just got a quick head nod. Nice.

The burgers are touted as 1/2 pound hand pressed monsters. As we were waiting for our meals to arrive I watched as numerous tables (the restaurant was almost entirely full tonight) received what appeared to be large piles of cooked beef with buns. Right up our alley!

It took a bit for our burgers but the order of onion rings arrived first. Kim is a big rings fan but couldn’t find anything special about these. They were big, obviously homemade and not frozen, and full of grease. While I thought they were fine, Kim remained unimpressed. They had quite a list of appetizers and I was interested in their hot wings but didn’t end up ordering them.

After waiting quite a bit of time our burgers arrived simply enough. They come with nothing except a pickle slice but are absolutely fucking huge. I honestly can’t remember ever having a burger this fucking big. I added some ketchup to mine (they come with no toppings other than what is listed on the menu) but Josh nabbed some mayo on the side. I took some photos and we dug in.

My burger was almost rare. These people know what medium-rare really means. I was really impressed and that’s tough to do when it comes to proper cooking in Minnesota! The burger itself was pretty fucking good but I couldn’t taste the Canadian bacon or the cheese at all. While the meat was fantastic, I just wasn’t impressed with the toppings. Next time I would just order it plain. Kim’s burger was pretty fucking good too. The bacon was big and plentiful and had some great flavor but I couldn’t taste the cheese on that one either. I finished the entire burger (Kim did too but Josh only ate half) but I could have seriously used something else with the burger tonight. Kim suggested that they at least include chips with the burger to give it a bit more. While I am not sure what it needed (lettuce, tomato and onion) I definitely agree with Kim’s assessment.

When it was all said and done, including the two tiny ass tap beers I ordered, our bill came to $30.29 before tip. Not bad for the size of the burgers. I will definitely return some day to try out another burger and possibly the wings. There are plenty of other burger places that I want to try including another Dakota County restaurant (King’s Place in Miesville).

While both MSPD and I have eaten there, I would like to know what anyone else thinks of this place. Comment on!

Address:
House of Coates
16300 Clayton Ave E
Rosemount, MN 55068

Phone:
651-437-2232

Check out all the pictures on Flickr here.

I had a busy weekend. Kim spent Saturday and part of Sunday with her cousin out in Minnetonka and being left without a car, Josh came up and spent Saturday and Sunday morning with me. We went to lunch at El Patio in Lakeville and while it was better than the first time I ate there with Kim all those years ago, it’s still overpriced and below average and I wouldn’t recommend it to anyone but it got me fed with enough food for the rest of the day. After lunch we watched an afternoon matinee of Pineapple Express which isn’t worth seeing in the theater (even with all the hype from the big name reviewers) and is really only worth seeing on DVD. I suppose the reviewers that gave it high marks were smoking some of the famed Pineapple Express. After the movie it was a lot of Wii and then Panino Brothers for beer, Golden Teen and the Olympics in HD with Dave and Josh. Some crazy ass shit happened in my neighborhood last night which led to cops, people climbing out of windows, blood, and broken gutters — bleh.

Anyway, all that leads up to today. After breakfast at IHOP, cleaning the garage, shopping with Kim and dinner. After dinner while we were watching the Olympics on only a partial TiVo delay, I asked Kim to get the hot sauce taste challenge ready and I dug in.

As with the other five days, here are the previous challenge write-ups (Day One, Day Two, Day Three, Day Four, and Day Five). If you haven’t been following along, I suggest that you read the others so you know what the fuck is going on here ;-)

Kim brought out the two and I didn’t know if she would be tricking me again or if I would be getting the remaining two from the preliminaries. As soon as I smelled the first plate, I knew that I was testing the final two in the preliminaries.

Plate number one was obviously Cholula. It smells nothing like hot sauce should and instead like BBQ sauce. Ick. The smell is distinct and unpleasant IMO and the particulate matter in the sauce when eaten off the spoon and it’s unbelievably nasty — like sand in your mouth. Not particularly spicy and nothing I’d write home about. On the chips it was fine but the heat level is low and the flavor is just not hot sauce worthy.

Plate number two had no real strong scent but a heavy and thick taste when eaten off the spoon. I didn’t particularly care for this one eaten that way but on the nachos it smoked number one. While I had to choke down the Cholula, I enjoyed number and that made it the clear winner today.

The reveal showed Cholula and Frank’s Red Hot. Even though I knew Cholula was left I couldn’t remember the second option and in the end, I was glad that Frank’s won out because Cholula definitely isn’t worth anyone’s time or money but I really and honestly wasn’t all that impressed with Frank’s this time around even though it’s really the standard in Louisiana style hot sauces and one that I have found to be quite acceptable in the past. The smallish bottle of Frank’s (5 oz) cost $1.19 while the even smaller bottle of Cholula was $1.89 for only two ounces!

Stay tuned for the remainder of the Hot Sauce Taste Test Challenge and check out all the photos from the challenge so far on Flickr here.

I’m looking forward to moving on to the remainder of the finals and seeing the actual winner. Of the winners, who do you think will end up on top?