Day 5 (2014) - Mary Tyler Who?

After two days of "livin' on the edge" the final day of our short trip was relatively tame in comparison. The day began with a 10:30 reservation for brunch at a restaurant in Minneapolis called Hell's Kitchen that was recommended by Alan Nadel (2nd day in row for Alan credits, by the way).  He had been there a while back while in town for a family wedding, and said it was a "must do" while we were there.  Luckily he told me about it well in advance of our our trip so I was able to make a reservation.

We arrived at the busy restaurant a little before our reservation time, and were seated almost immediately.  Alan had said that the corn pancakes ("Big, house-made cornmeal/buttermilk pancakes dusted with powdered sugar and served with pure maple syrup") were "the best pancakes" he had ever had, so I wasn't even going to look at the menu (when Alan tells me to do something, I do it, have been for almost 30 years so why stop now?).

But when we asked the waiter about it, he actually said that the lemon ricotta pancakes ("Here are the hotcakes that put us on the map. Three melt-in-your-mouth hotcakes made with freshly-grated lemon zest and whole milk ricotta cheese. Served with fresh berries and pure maple syrup") were the best sellers.  So, Brian and I decided to share and placed orders for both types and we would each have half of each plate.  Brian also took the opportunity to get a side of Buffalo tater tots ("So popular in Minnesota, these are practically a food group"), made with his beloved Buffalo hot sauce, not buffalo meat.

Ethan went with an egg-based meal, and Amanda decided to go solo on an order of the corn pancakes. Debbie tried to stay good and ordered scrambled eggs with some sides.  However, the waiter also mentioned that another best seller was their sausage bread, which was described on the menu like this "Yes the name IS strange, but trust us on this deliciously dense bread made with sausage, toasted walnuts, black currants, spices, and black coffee. Go on, now...be brave and try it! Those who do usually grab entire loaves to take back home as gifts."  Not exactly gluten-free, but it sounded too good for her to pass up so she ordered a serving.

It's sausage, it's bread, how you beat that?

Well, they weren't just whistling Dixie with their comment about ordering more, since the first order was gone in about 20 seconds so we immediately ordered another serving.  What enhanced the sausage bread even more (not that it really needed enhancement) was their homemade peanut butter (available creamy or crunchy) and jelly that was so good you could just eat it plain. 

Mouth watering yet?  Mine is.

After devouring the second helping of the sausage bread, our brunch meals arrived, and (sorry, Alan) the waiter was right - the lemon ricotta pancakes were in fact superior to the corn pancakes.  The corn pancakes were really good, but as was the consensus opinion, the lemon ricotta pancakes tasted like "gran'ma's lemon cake."  And to give equal billing, let it be known that one of my favorite things that my mother used to make when we hosted Break The Fast was also a lemon cake, so in fairness, to me it was like both of their lemon cakes.

Lemon Ricotta Pancakes

No, those Buffalo tater tots aren't made from Buffalo meat

Amanda with the corn pancakes

"I like eggs"

That empty plate used to contain sausage bread

Before we got our food, we had looked at the dessert menu and were eyeing a few items that looked outrageously good, but after the (laurel and) hearty brunch food were all stuffed.  We also checked out the bathrooms, which were not quite Stoneville Saloon styled, but unique nonetheless, with holograms all over the place.

From straight away

From the side

I paid the bill, we took some photos outside (the kids were so excited to do this) and headed out into Minneapolis. Our first post-brunch stop was a quick walk to the Mary Tyler Moore statue that sits outside a Macy's store.  For anyone maybe 35-40 years old or older, no explanation is needed on who Mary Tyler Moore is, or why there would be a statue in Minneapolis of her.  But for our kids, we got some version of "Who is that?" when we told them where we were heading.   (FYI, there's also a Fonzie statue in Milwaukee, which would likely elicit the same replies).  We quickly found the statue, Debbie did her best MTM impression (much to the embarrassment of all three kids) and we were done with the statue.

They can turn the world on with a smile

We had done a little research in the morning about what to do after brunch, and decided to try out the Mill City Museum in town.  Evidently, Minneapolis used be known as a mill town, generating much of the country's flour, that is until the whole block of mills blew up, which was a bit of a downer.  One of the mills was turned into a museum on the history of the industry, so that's where we headed, only agreed up by the kids when we told them there were supposedly some hands-on exhibits there.

We hopped on a free bus that took us down the street because we were under the impression that the museum was pretty close to where the bus would drop us off.  Well, not so much.  After about a 15 minute walk, and after about 1500 "are we almost there" questions, we arrived at the mill.

The museum exhibit starts out with a 19 minute movie on the history of Minneapolis, followed by a show not unlike the Carousel of Progress at Disney that recreated different scenes from the old mill. This was all somewhat interesting, but the kids only really sprung to life when we then went to the hands-on area and they were able to play with things like water tables and the like.

After wrapping up at the mill and taking some photos outside (natch), we decided to walk back to the car using the various indoor walkways that Minneapolis has installed that connects most of the downtown buildings.  The walkways enable the people downtown to get around during the winter when the weather is bad.  This leads me to ask, how bad are the winters in Minneapolis that they needed to break holes in every building to build these walkways?  Answer, they must have REALLY harsh winters.  Anyway, the thrill of going through the walkways back to car wore off after about 5 minutes (they weren't air conditioned and it would likely take longer this way), so we headed back down to the street level and trudged back to the car.

Man, I'm short

By now the troops were tired, and the vote was to head back to the hotel for the afternoon.  So we did. The boys changed and went to the gym, Amanda put on her bathing suit and went for a swim while Debbie napped at the pool and I worked on the blog from earlier days.  I also took the time to check out StubHub for tickets to that night's Twins-Tigers game.  Since none of us are Twins or Tigers fans, I didn't want to spend a ton of money on the tickets, and settled for tickets in the left field bleachers.  And since no one was selling 5 seats, I had to buy one set of 4 tickets and one set of 2 tickets in the same section.  The good news was the set of 4 tickets were in the front row (the other two tickets were in the 8th row).  Eventually the boys joined us at the pool for a bit, then I woke up Sleeping Beauty and we headed up to the room to change for the evening.

One thing I have neglected to mention thus far about the hotel in Minneapolis is that when we checked in the clerk at the desk said he upgraded us to a "special" floor and also gave me free WiFi and an access code that would enable us to get unlimited snacks and drinks from the vending machines (which happened to be right outside our door).  You would have thought that he had given us unlimited access to Fort Knox, because we kept raiding the snack machine like we were heading into battle or something.  We loaded up on Hershey's bars, chips and M&Ms to the point where I was afraid we might need another piece of luggage if we were going to take the extras home (we did bring them home, but since we ate a lot of what we killed there was room).

After freshening up, we headed back into Minneapolis for the game.  I pulled into a parking lot about 2 blocks from Target Field (which cost me all of $5 for the evening) and we headed to the game.  We found our seats (well, really bleacher seats with backs) and settled in.  At various points throughout the game (won by Justin Verlander and the Tigers, by the way) we headed out to get dinner.  I have to say, even though Target Field is a relatively new park, the food is more traditional ballpark food - lots of burgers, hot dogs, chicken fingers and sandwiches, etc.  Not a lot of local or unique foods, although Brian was happy to have found the one stand that sold burritos.  The kids ventured out on their own about halfway through the game for Dippin' Dots (because, you know, that is the ice cream of the future, has been for about 20 years) and later on I was the good husband and walked halfway around the stadium to get mint chip (officially peppermint) ice cream for Debbie (and cookie dough for me).  By the end of the 7th inning the gang had seen enough (with nary a home run to show for our prime ball-catching seats) and we headed back to the hotel.  We got back to the hotel pretty quickly, packed most of the luggage for the flight the next morning and called it a night.

Must be in the front row!

Luckily, the girl with the big hair (no, not Debbie) hadn't arrived
yet to sit next to Debbie, and by next to I mean basically on her lap

The flight from Minneapolis back to JFK was early in the morning (7:15 am) so we had to wake up pretty early to get to the airport, return the car and check in.  I dropped the rest of the family off (much more of a big deal in Minneapolis than in Rapid City) and headed to return the car.  What I had also failed to mentioned previously, was that in both JFK (where I dropped them off before heading to Long Term Parking - which at JFK is somewhere near Saskatchewan) and at the Minneapolis airports, the rest of my family was treated to "old school" security screening.  They did not have to take off their shoes or sweatshirts, nor take the laptop Ethan was carrying out of its bag.  I, on the other hand, must look like much more of a national security threat, since I was not granted this luxury and had to deal with all of the regular screening process at both airports.

The flight home, on the now seemingly huge 20-row plane (after two 13-row plane rides) was uneventful, and most of us closed our eyes for some portion of the flight, while I performed my role as backup bathroom guard to perfection.   

It's a crappy job, but someone has to do it

We got our checked bag back pretty quickly and headed to Saskatchewan via Air Tran to get our car.  At this point, the trip was over, and another fun, memorable, different, enjoyable family trip was in the books.

Until next time, if there is a next time...