When life presents the longest restaurant name in history to you for brunch, what do you do? If you’re anything like me, you embrace it and so I headed to At Sara’s Table Chester Creek Cafe in Duluth, Minnesota to see what such a place had to offer. I was mildly disappointed to find that the dish names were only a fraction of the length of restaurant’s name.

Thus, I ordered a dish simply called the Savory Crepe. It was filled with Canadian Bacon, caramelized apples, raclette and tarragon. Raclette, by the way, is a type of cheese, so I was essentially expecting a French breakfast quesadilla.

It turned out that was pretty much exactly what the savory crepe would turn out to be. This is a good thing, because I love quesadillas and I also love the idea of throwing a bunch of ingredients together and hoping they work out well. You know, like cheese, ham and apples. At Sara’s Table Chester Creek Cafe knew exactly what to do with these ingredients, combining sweet, salty and savory together into something delicious.

Duluth is cool city. And so is At Sara’s Table Chester Creek Cafe.

Duluth Grill is a restaurant that may as well have been created for Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives. It’s off the beaten path not just in the fact that it is in Duluth, but because of the part of Duluth it is in. Plus, while it is clearly a diner, it is more than just a diner, serving unique, local and organic fare with an eye for people with food allergies. Guy seems to love that kind of stuff, which is why he paid Duluth Grill a visit and why, despite all of my nostalgic connection to Duluth, I felt good about going there as well.

Despite being early for lunch, we found Duluth Grill to be devoid of any seats, but within 20 minutes we found ourselves seated at an odd little counter, mouths watering from what we had been witnessing. After giving my meal a lot of thought, I picked the Big and Bold Bison Burger.

It came with BBQ sauce, caramelized onions, cherrywood smoked bacon and bib lettuce. I forewent the veggies and chose their deconstructed smashed potatoes as my side. To be honest it turned out a little underwhelming. The burger was good, but not great. The meat hovered close to the dry end of the spectrum and the combination of BBQ sauce and bacon didn’t quite hit me with as much flavor as I had been hoping for. Perhaps this was the wrong burger choice, but the waitress had recommended it when I asked her. The deconstructed smashed potatoes, though, were quite amazing. They were smaller potatoes that had been sufficiently smashed before being cooked to a crisp and sprinkled with parmesan cheese and were even better than they sound.

So, I do see a lot of potential in Duluth Grill’s menu, and I don’t mean to treat the place as though it just opened up, but more in the sense that I would go back, just not for the Big and Bold Bison Burger.

On a rainy Friday morning, I arrived in New York City for the first time as a meat blogger with one goal: to eat. Most importantly, I had to eat at the Shake Shack. I had heard much about the Shake Shack from the New York-centric food blog known as Serious Eats, yet there are plenty of good burgers in LA, so I never felt an overriding desire to get a burger at Shake Shack. Then I heard that Shake Shack was run by none other than Danny Meyer, the famous New York restaurateur. More importantly, though, is that Meyer is a fellow alum of Camp Nebagamon, the greatest place in the world (if you don’t believe me, read this). No doubt, his restaurant skills draw upon his experience at Nebagamon and I made sure to get to Shake Shack as early as possible to see what those skills had created.

Due to the inclement weather, we headed to the Shake Shack on the Upper West Side, since the original at Madison Square Park only offered outdoor seating. Even though it was Friday, there was already a short line of school children waiting outside for the place to open at 10:45. This was a good sign that Shake Shack was at least better than school cafeteria food. As soon as the doors opened, we headed in and checked out the menu. I chose the double ShackBurger, cheese fries and a peanut butter shake. The only way to pack more cow products into that meal would have had required veal (which I chose to hold off on until the next meal). The ShackBurger came with lettuce, tomatoes, cheese and the special Shack sauce. I ordered without those pesky tomatoes and lettuce and then found a seat to wait for my meaty feast.

As soon as our buzzer went off, I sprinted to the counter in excitement. Before I ate, I took a minute to revel in the beauty of what lay before me. Then I dug in. The burger was different from the usual fast food burger, but certainly not gourmet. It overflowed with cheese and sauce, but was held somewhat intact with a wax paper wrap. Grease, also known as flavor juice, turned the paper clear and was a sure sign of greatness. It was juicy, cheesy and just as good as I had hoped. The fries were also great and were a definite cut above usual fast food fries. Per my order, they were covered in a creamy cheese sauce that avoided the usual plasticky texture while refusing to coagulate.

Finally, there was my shake, the namesake of the Shake Shack. Undoubtedly, the shake drew inspiration from the Portland Malt Shoppe in Duluth, Minnesota, about 30 minutes from the village of Lake Nebagamon, Wisconsin. It didn’t have the usual thick texture you would expect from a peanut butter shake, but packed a solid peanut butter taste. In truth, I would have liked the shake to be a little thicker, but it wasn’t bad by any means. By the time I slurped up the last bit of shake, I was one stuffed and happy unvegan.

Although I’m not lactose intolerant, I think my body reached its maximum daily lactose intake halfway through my meal. A double cheeseburger, cheese fries and a milkshake is far more dairy than man is meant to ingest and I paid the price a couple hours later. As painful as that stomach ache may have been, it is far easier to remember the great taste of that burger, which means I would undergo those stomach pains again in an instant to get my mouth around another ShackBurger. Next time, however, I might choose regular fries and a glass of water to ensure that my stomach makes it to my next meal in one piece.

In the end, Shake Shack is definitely a must for any hungry meat eater in New York, whether they come from Los Angeles or the Yo Yo Islands.

I know it isn’t technically limited to the Northwoods, but I will always associate Old Chicago with Duluth, Minnesota, because that’s where I always seem to get it.

With a huge beer selection that includes my perennial favorite, Leinenkugel’s Honeyweiss, Old Chicago also has a decent food menu. Looking it over for a while, I eventually decided on the Meatball Stromboli, mostly due to its lack of vegetables.

Sipping on my beer, I relaxed as I awaited my Italian sandwich. When it came, it looked quite good. The bread was of an interesting consistency and the insides were pretty good. It came with extra marinara sauce for dipping, but this was pretty unnecessary for the packed sandwich which was already hard enough to eat without insides falling out.

In all, the sandwich was good fare to go along with my beer, but nothing spectacular.