The vital task of naming the best new restaurant in the Duluth area begins with this elimination round of voting. Choose your favorite among the 16 options below; the top vote getters will move on to the final round.
What is the best new restaurant in the Duluth area?
Loading ...This poll is now closed. Three restaurants will advance to the final ballot:
Shorty’s Pizza and Smoked Meat
Spirit Room Tapas Bar & Restaurant
Tavern on the Hill
With 4,106 of 4,106 precincts reporting, it’s a DFL sweep. Here are the statewide results for races relevant to Duluth.
FEDERAL OFFICES
United States Senator
Al Franken (Democratic-Farmer-Labor) – 1,053,156 | 53.14%
Mike McFadden (Republican) – 850,504 | 42.92%
Steve Carlson (Independence) – 47,544 | 2.40%
Heather Johnson (Libertarian) – 29,698 | 1.50%
United States Representative, Minnesota District 8
Rick Nolan (Democratic-Farmer-Labor) – 128,860 | 48.50%
Stewart Mills (Republican) – 125,201 | 47.12%
Ray “Skip” Sandman (Green) – 11,437 | 4.30%
It’s been five years since William Agenter built his high-profile home on Skyline Parkway. Although the mansion on Duluth’s western hillside was built legally on private land, some saw it as an intrusion on an otherwise woodsy section of the scenic drive perceived to belong to the public.
That controversy has come and gone, but another could be looming. Across Skyline from Agenter’s property sits 43.7 acres of wooded hillside, adjacent to popular hiking and biking trails, marked with Lynn Beechler Realty signs. Sale of that land to someone eager to develop more housing with expansive views of the city could happen any day, though the buyer would face challenges.
It was getting close to the time when we’d need to do this poll anyway, but since the owners of the reigning Perfect New Restaurant, Pak’s Green Corner, have sold their building and will cease operations this week, the time is now to choose a newer best new restaurant.
Before we open the voting, of course, we have to establish a list of nominees. What qualifies as a new restaurant? Well, these have all opened in the past two years:
Dickey’s Barbecue Pit (Oct. 2014)
Izzy’s BBQ Lounge & Grill (Aug. 2014)
Tavern on the Hill (August 2014)
Iron Mug Coffeehouse (July 2014)
Endion Station Public House (July 2014)
Qdoba Mexican Grill (July 2014)
Miller Hill Chipotle (June 2014)
Spirit Room Tapas Bar & Restaurant (June 2014)
Cloud 9 Asian Bistro (June 2014)
Farley’s Grill (April 2014)
Shorty’s Pizza and Smoked Meat (Aug. 2013)
Citys 58th Street Diner (June 2013)
What territory are we talking about? Anything in Duluth or 10 miles of its border – so new restaurants in Superior, Hermantown, Proctor and the various bordering townships all qualify; Two Harbors and Cloquet are out of bounds.
Are there any good nominees we didn’t think to include in the list above?
It’s been two months since Izzy Turner opened his new restaurant in the former Whiskey Ward / Shenanigan’s / J.T.’s / Johnny’s Bar location, 1506 North Third St. in Superior. Does anyone have any thoughts to share about Izzy’s BBQ Lounge & Grill?
For sale on a couple websites are tokens for Cook’s Place, 527 W. Michigan St., Duluth. What was Cook’s Place? The address puts it on the western end of where the Duluth Public Library stands today.
A listing on tokencatalog.com offers what appears to be a list of various names the business may have gone by over the years: “Moses S. Cook Saloon 1898-1912; Mayer J. Cook Saloon 1912-1916, Beverages & Restaurant 1920; Homer L. Cook Restaurant 1937-1942; J. Earl Cook Confectionery 1947-1958.”
That seems to raise some questions, though, like: How did so many different Cooks carry out 60 or more years of business in one spot? When was it called Cook’s Place? Is Mayer a first name? There was no “mayor” of Duluth named J. Cook, although Jay Cooke played a big part in Duluth’s history in the late 1800s.
What’s the deal with Cook’s Place?
Note to fellow nerdwads:
We have reached an era of unprecedented technological advancement and far-reaching anti-bullying campaigns. The mission of Geek Prom is complete. The prom committee is disbanding.
We now enter a state of complacency, no longer planning our defenses against the hideous Fleckuloids of the Mineculon, though geekprom.com remains in tact should we need to summon our forces due to reemerging threats.
May you all live long and prosper, be you dill-weeds, spazzes, dorks, doofuses, dweebs, Einsteins, pizza faces, brainiacs, space cadets, mathletes, meteorologists, gamers, Trekkies, disc jockeys, zeros, gaywads, hobbyists, greenies, weaklings or any other form of misfit.
We threw all the résumés up in the air and one of them landed on top. Tony Bennett is the new editor of the PDD Calendar. His credentials include writing for nearly every publication in town, fronting the band Cars & Trucks, working a camera for TV shows such as Almanac North and The PlayList and for dissecting the work of “positive bros” as the Duluth News Tribune‘s music critic.
Tony can be reached via e-mail at tony @ perfectduluthday.com or calendar @ perfectduluthday.com.
Since launching in May 2013, Bent Paddle Brewing has quickly become a dominant force in the region. The company seems to have everything right, from perfect beer to perfect packaging to perfect branding and distribution. From a 10,600-square-foot warehouse in Duluth’s Friendly West End, Bent Paddle already produces twice as many barrels of beer as any other local company — making it the most macro of the area’s microbreweries and brewpubs.
In the final round of Perfect Duluth Day’s poll, Bent Paddle went head-to-head with Fitger’s Brewhouse, a 19-year-old jauggernaut brewpub that supplies beer to five restaurants and a beer store owned by parent company Just Take Action. While the two companies have quite different operations and histories, both are well-known beyond Duluth for producing an array of outstanding craft brews. The nod to Bent Paddle, which amassed 60 percent of the vote, is perhaps due to its reach. Though the company is still fairly new, it’s beer is available in a majority of bar, restaurant and liquor stores in the Duluth market — and the territory has already begun to expand into the Twin Cities metro area.
Why should you not throw a ukulele off the top of the Medical Arts Building? Because the Alworth Building is taller. Feel free to share your favorite ukulele joke in the comments. Get that out of your system, then check out Big Mama Lele at Red Mug on Tuesday and Savannah Smith at the Brewhouse on Friday.
There is never a shortage of organizations and individuals in need of a helping hand, and this week offers a tetralogy of options: On Thursday, the St. Louis County Historical Society holds its Culture & Cuisine fundraising event at the Depot while Clyde Iron Works hosts a benefit for Zeidan Zeidan, the former owner of Z’s Deli who has been diagnosed with stage 4 brain cancer. On Saturday, the Duluth Art Institute’s annual fine art auction will be held at the Kitchi Gammi Club and Mr. D’s hosts a spaghetti dinner and silent auction to benefit Mary Rogers as she battles angiosarcoma.
As for general hoopla, Champ the Bulldog will truly be in his element on Thursday, the Minnesota Ballet begins its season Friday night, and there will be another zombie pub crawl on Saturday.
A bit of PDD shop talk to wrap things up: Lawrence Lee has exited as calendar editor and we’ll be announcing soon the identity of his successor. Cheers once again to Lawrence on two-and-a-half years of keeping us informed about the concerts, plays, lectures and other instances in which four or more people gather in our region.
We should also note that during this transition period we’ve fallen a bit behind in our work. If you’ve submitted an event to the calendar, please be patient. There is a backlog right now of over 300 events. We’ll get them in … eventually.
A few recent booze-related news items we’ve been too busy to mention in detail on PDD:
Our previous poll pitted eleven breweries from the Arrowhead region against each other for the opportunity to advance to the final ballot. Now, the top two go head to head for the chance to be branded as the best.
What is the best brewery in the Duluth area?
Loading ...This poll is now closed. The results were:
Bent Paddle Brewing – 60 percent
Fitger’s Brewhouse – 40 percent
It’s been more than a year since a post was published on PDD inquiring about the history of Duluth-based clothing manufacturer Minnesota Woolen. The first thing that came out of that post was the discovery that the Northeast Minnesota Historical Center Collection has a 16mm film about the company, but does not have a projector. Well, a projector was found this week and loaned for a little screening.
