Gone Downhill

No, we didn’t go downhill yet…we’re leaving that for Saturday over at Highland. Instead, I’m sad to say that after a visit to Old Chicago in Eagan last night both their food offerings and beer selection have gone downhill. Being a beautiful evening we decided finding a place to sit outside, have a couple beers and dinner would be a good idea. However neither of us was particularly motivated and even the thought of driving up to Town Hall, much less Barley John’s, was too daunting. So we surveyed the nearby options, settling on Old Chicago. Although their patio is small and the scenery isn’t great we’ve always been able to get a seat out there and last night was no exception.

Upon perusing the food menu we noticed that they seemed to have cut out a lot of items and there wasn’t much that caught our attention. We ordered the quesadilla and Italian nachos, both off the appetizer section, and I’m happy to say they were both good. The nacho chips themselves instead of being the sturdy corn tortilla variety are lighter and possibly made from wonton wrapper material. Light, crispy and a great accompaniment to the sausage, pepperoni and pepperoncini!

The beer menu was disappointing both from a micro beer selection stand point as well as from the area where they seem to be trying to highlight certain beers. For example, the had a macro product that starts with a "M" listed as the MN beer of the month and another domestic macro listed as the import of the month. Unlike in the past there was little, if anything, that I had not had before (and would actually want to drink). In the end we both ordered a Bell’s Oberon. Although it was served with an orange wedge that was easily remedied and the 25 oz went down well on a warm, summer evening so all was not lost.