Food + Beverage

Twenty-Four Pineapples

That's one barrel. It takes two weeks. Article by Kristi Sellers | Photography by Ryan Siemers Photography Nobody made them do this. At nearly every point where an easier option existed, somebody at Redstone American Grill in Maple Grove looked directly at it and went the other way. The bar. Start at the bar. On the counter in front of you are the barrels: enormous glass vessels packed wall to wall with pineapple. Twenty-four pineapples fill a single barrel. Kelli Amontroy cut all of...

Life + Culture

That Would be Awkward

Nobody knows what a chamber of commerce actually does. Six hundred local businesses do. Article by Tim Doran | Photography by I-94 Chamber The new business owner who called the I-94 West Chamber of Commerce wasn't calling to join anything. She'd taken over another company's storefront and hadn't changed the signage, so customers kept walking in expecting the old business — and left furious about gift cards issued by an owner who no longer existed. By the time she dialed the Chamber, she'd...

Food + Beverage

He Walked Out of Tibet. He Built the Shelf Behind You.

A father, his brother, his son, his daughter, and a restaurant that opened before it was ready. Photography by Ryan Siemers Photography The divider next to the bar at Apa Sushi was in the room before the restaurant was. There was a planter box in that spot when the family took the space, and it took up too much room. So it came out, and something slimmer went in, narrow enough to give the tables beside it a little more air. The shelves the sake bottles sit on are handmade too. Same person...

Food + Beverage

You Came for Lunch. You're Staying for Dinner

Inside Maple Grove's Take on "Fine Fast-Casual" — Greek Style Article by Kristi Sellers | Photography by Ryan Siemers You will walk in expecting fast food. You are not going to get it, and you won't figure that out until it's too late to mind. You'll order at the counter, same as anywhere quick — menu board, register, the whole transaction over in under a minute. You'll walk toward a table already bracing for the usual: a buzzer, a number on a stand, your name called over a speaker. None of...