DeRusha Eats

Two of our most awarded chefs, both James Beard Award winners, talk about the challenges in their businesses. Sean Sherman’s Indigenous-focused restaurant Owamni was named Best New Restaurant in America by the Beard Foundation. What is Indigenous cuisine? Why has it been so hard for Native Chefs to get started? And Alex Roberts won Best Chef: Midwest in 2010, how he’s achieved more than 20 years w...

A national bartending competitor, a CEO driving innovation in CBD, THC, seltzers, sodas and beer, and a founder who's started multiple drinks companies. What's new, what's hot, what's coming? GUESTS: Jessi Pollak, Bar Manager, Spoon and Stable; Janet Johanson, CEO of Bev Source and The Lab; Joe Heron, founder of Bar Diver, Crispin Cider

Since 1950. Al’s breakfast has been part of the fabric of the minnesota food scene. What are we without our icons and classics. The spots that have been a part of life since before we were around. The spots we take our kids so they understand that they’re part of something bigger. Al’s Breakfast is that to Minnesota. It’s won most awards out there, and a former server, Alison Kirwin, is now the ow...

Two risk-takers. Innovators. Building an audience for great food in unexpected locations. Justin Ahlstrom and his wife opened Margie’s in a North Suburb of Andover. Craft cocktails. Food from scratch. Live music. Just a great scene. And Mik German - a master of the burger… who’s carved out a niche of terrific, creative bar food inside an American Legion Hall in St. Paul Park, the 328 grill. 

Two men who both should be in the mix for the next cycle of the James Beard Awards: Jorge Guzman has been there, Gustavo Romero should be there. Jorge Guzman  has been a beard award nominee for his work as the executive chef at Surly Brewing’s A Brewers Table… an awesome restaurant. He’s been at Solera, a distillery in LaCrosse, and now at Petite Leon in Minneapolis - we talk about expectations of...

Three powerhouse women making a real difference in St. Paul, Minnesota. One - the daughter of a founder, Milissa Silva is running her family’s business, El Burrito Mercado. We talk grocery, we talk the pain that comes with change, as she is mixing up the way her store does food service. Plus, two women who met in Chicago working at Girl and the Goat, have come back to St. Paul to open a modern clu...

I’m fascinated by the creative process in restaurants. How do you avoid the regular. The boring. The road oft traveled. Two real creative people here… Steve Schussler is the creative genius behind Rainforest Cafe. He’s created dozens of interactive restaurant concepts - including the incredibly successful Boathouse in Downtown Disney in Orlando Florida. His lab is based in suburban Minneapolis - h...

An East Coast businesswoman left a lucrative career in investment banking to follow her husband to the Twin Cities - but food kept calling Lindsay Pohlad. She attended culinary school and opened a restaurant in her adopted home of Wayzata right as the pandemic began. The Grocers Table was named MInnesota Monthly’s restaurant of the year - she shares the story of her number one seller, THE Chocolat...

An emotional episode: featuring Jamie Yoo, a Korean immigrant who lost his job when his high end restaurant Bellecour shut down during the pandemic. Yoo felt like a failure, considered quitting the field, until he ended up at a food hall in Minneapolis. Abang Yoli has been a huge hit with it’s flavorful Korean Fried Chicken among other treats. Plus, John Ng and Lina Goh came to the Twin Cities fro...

The runaway hit new food at Target Field is a combination of high tech and high culinary. Is there anywhere else in the country you can get a 4-piece of chicken? Jared Brewington talks about being a black businessman and bringing broasted chicken to Twins fans. And hopefully beyond. Plus Khalid Ansari is a restaurant baby - growing up with his sister in his dad’s suburban Mediterranean restaurant....

Two Minnesota women leaders talk about inspiration, creativity and their top-notch restaurants. Sarah Botcher is the chef/owner of Black Walnut Bakery - she finds inspiration in the routine of baking. Her croissants and cakes are among Minnesota’s finest. Karyn Tomlinson has cooked around the world, her St. Paul restaurant Myriel is taking fresh, local ingredients and bringing them to new heights....

Steven Brown is one of the finest and most acclaimed chefs in Minnesota. He owns two of his own restaurants (Tilia and St. Genevieve) in Minneapolis, and also is the Executive Chef at Giulia in the Hotel Emery. Marque Collins has worked at top restaurants in Chicago for a decade and now is the Executive Chef at Tullibee, inside the North Loop hotel hotspot, the Hewing. Both share the challenges an...

Two pizza guys with two unique journeys: John Puckett founded Caribou Coffee, grew it, sold it, and then bought into a Neapolitan Pizza joint called Punch. He shares Punch’s growth and the choice to grow it slowly into a dozen locations. Fascinating story of how Punch’s business flipped from mostly dine-in, to mostly delivery during the pandemic. Plus, Chris Kolstad made mistakes as a young man -...

You can’t talk about food and restaurants without talking about the farm. There may be nowhere quite like Wise Acre Eatery, a Minneapolis restaurant that sources 90% of their produce and proteins from the owner’s farm. Scott Endres and Dean Engelmann explain perhaps the shortest version from farm to table in the country. And Erika and Brandon Goette grew up in rural Minnesota - they explain how th...

More than professional critics, food influencers may really be impacting what restaurants we eat and how we enjoy food. Kim Ly Curry has been named one of the top 100 food Instagrammers in the country. This Twin Cities mom has nearly 52,000 followers on IG. https://www.instagram.com/kimlycurry/   JD Hovland is a computer engineer who has exploded on TikTok with his restaurant tours - 43,000 follow...

Christina Ngyuen and Birk Grudem fell in love at her vintage shop. The veteran bartender and self-taught cook opened a food truck selling an Argentinian-inspired sandwich - Hola Arepa was born. How this power couple went from a truck to two locations and several James Beard Award nominations. Plus: Sameh Wadi was the youngest and first Palestinian-American chef to battle on Iron Chef in 2010. He o...

How did the suburb of Robbinsdale, Minnesota become known for high-end, experimental cuisine? Mike Brown and his partners built the first iteration of Travail Kitchen with the money in their savings, using sweat equity to refurbish a restaurant. Today, his team has been James Beard finalists, bringing the most expensive tasting menu experience in town. Plus, a suburb north of St. Paul and Minneapo...

Stephen Hesse worked in some of the best restaurants in the Twin Cities before opening his  Mexican-inspired restaurant Pajarito. Today his Eclectic Culinary Concepts owns 13 restaurants including a chain of suburban pub-style restaurants. How’d that happen? Plus Joe Ehlenz and Brad Nordeen went from city restaurants to an East Metro tourist town - bringing craft cocktails and high-technique to St...

It’s the luck of the Irish - the drink of the Irish! Irish Whiskey is a key part of St. Patrick’s Day celebrations - meet two founders on this episode of DeRusha Eats. Kieran Folliard started as a pub owner in Minneapolis, created a whiskey and ginger ale cocktail that went crazy, and then founded his own Irish Whiskey. After Folliard sold Two Gingers, he founded an even better whiskey - Red Locks...

Bottoms up: this episode of DeRusha Eats is all about bourbon and cocktails. Luke Castle was a bourbon aficionado with a real job who bought his favorite liquor store, Ace Spirits in Hopkins. What’s the future for this highly allocated and sought after spirit? Jesse Held was one of the bartenders who helped usher in the era of the craft cocktail in Minnesota. Now he owns his own distillery and res...

Like many downtowns, Minneapolis has struggled to regain a working population in the years since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic. Two restaurateurs are doubling down: Brent Frederick’s Jester Concepts has a steakhouse, an Italian restaurant in a hotel, and a North Loop upscale restaurant. Now he’s leading the rebirth of a restaurant that soared to heights before the pandemic, Butcher and the Bo...

It’s all about beef - from the rancher specializing in regenerative agriculture and grass-fed beef to the multi-unit burger restaurant guy who grew up in the business. John Abdo is the President of My Burger, a local chain of burger restaurants, with ambitions of blowing up. Matt Maier started supplying grass fed beef to restaurants, now Thousand Hills Lifetime Grazed beef supplies grocery stores...

Skilled chefs leaving the world of sit-down restaurants to start fast casual spots. Christian and Karen DeLeon’s taco shop is in a very unusual spot: the corner of a south suburban gas station convenience store. How they found each other and found a spot to build a dream called El Sazon. And Paul Backer worked in some of the finest restaurants in the Twin Cities: he left that grind to build his ow...

It’s more than just dry January - the non-alcoholic beverage sector is growing like gangbusters. Peder Schweigert was in charge of the most acclaimed bar program in the Twin Cities, Marvel Bar, before he decided to stop drinking. Now he’s launching a non-alcoholic beverage brand, DryWit. And Erin Flavin ran her own hair salon in Minneapolis - during COVID she felt her drinking was getting out of c...

Replacing a local icon, Jon Cheng talks about his unusual path to being the main food critic for the Minneapolis Star Tribune. He shares his view of what a 2-star, 3-star or 4-star restaurant should be, as well as how he judges the role of a critic in a social media world. And an icon in her own right, Sue Zelickson. 88-years-old, 4’7” tall, a dynamo of the food scene, Sue has been an incredible c...