Spongebath Po'Boy

Vin:
When faced with the offer of a spongebath with tea and crumpets during
the Royal Wedding from an voluptuously orange British nurse, what
would you do?  What would Jesus do?  I said no, and the offer shocked
me into a buzzed moment of silence.  

Nurse Betty? Cheeky Tart? Anglo-Saxy?

This wasn't to think about the offer some more, no, but to wonder about the absurdities of the 1029 Bar.  This place is a riot in the best traditions of NE dimly lit dive bars.  There are the cheap drink prices, autographed bras hanging from the ceilings, full-throated karaoke, doors from police cars, and a tri-wheel.  There's also the standard frozen pizza, which is only good if you are wasted off your gourd and want to double down on your risk for the night with a heart attack.  Now the folks at the Smack Shack are offering their full menu here permanently. And it is a untamed success.  


Think of eating some divine food in a place like this and if that intrigues you, you'll love it here.  The Shrimp Po'Boy and Sausage Po'Boy have vaulted themselves up into the ranks of my
favorite sandwiches in town.  I'd put it up there with the Grilled Walleye Sandwich at the Tavern on Grand-- both are that good.  The shrimp is lightly battered and perfectly balanced with aioli, cucumber, tomato and greens.  The sausage is spicy and is so good you start to wonder where you are.  I was likewise thrilled by the Lobster Mac and Cheese.  It doesn't look like much when you see it, but the taleggio cheese and plentiful lobster make this rich and filling.


After a few beers this is impossible to stop eating.  Then, if fortunes shines, a drunken 50 year-old with bunny ears named Sue might come up to you at this point.  It was her birthday!  She was leaving for Costa Rica the next day! And she has relatives who are suspicious, not realizing that their wasted mom travels faster than the clap.
Leash your moms, people!  

ugh

So with Sue off blathering to others you get
back to the food. The only down note was the Lobster Roll, which was a disappointment, as this was why WTF showed up.   I am clearly biased by East Coast lobster rolls, and if that is what you have in mind, then this is a different take on it.  There was plenty of bread and lobster, and each individual part tasted fine, yet it didn't work together as the bread overwhelmed it-- not terrible, but not up to the other two sandwiches.  It does not diminish my enthusiasm for the 1029, however, because then, if you are lucky, a British nurse will show up.
Rating: 3 Tines




Curtis:


I'm skeptical of any tavern that encourages karaoke or considers it a highlight of why one should come and enjoy themselves. It just seems really desperate and forced. Typically the karaoke participants are completely horrible, but think they're funny because they're so bad (not funny, just annoying), or if they can actually hold a passable tune they take themselves so seriously they sap all the fun right out of the room. Luckily, the karaoke at The 1029 Bar in Minneapolis is in the background and can be easily tuned out. Your attention can be quickly diverted by the cheap beer, the happy drunks, the giddy Neanderthals playing the tri-wheel, and most of all by the awesomeness coming out of the kitchen.


The Smack Shack studs have hijacked the kitchen in this friendly little bar and have made it a destination worth seeking out. We tried a bit of everything on the menu - lobster rolls, lobster mac, shrimp po'boy, sausage po'boy, and an array of finger foods. I'll let my colleagues describe some of the items in delicious detail. For me, two items stood out. The first was the shrimp po'boy. I've also tried this on the Smack Shack truck roaming around downtown during lunch and had the same experience. While delicious and multi-textured, I'm a little confused on the treatment of the shrimp. Very lightly breaded - but not deep fried - makes for a messy, slightly soggy, kinda-sorta coated shrimp. I'd almost like to see it completely coated and deep fried or not breaded at all, just spiced and sauteed.


The kick-me-in-the-nuts highlight was the sausage po'boy. Absolutely delicious. For me, this item approaches sandwich perfection. Bold, contrasting flavors and textures that work perfectly with a cold beer. I'm not sure where they get the andouille, but I love it and want it again and again.


The Smack Shack guys have turned a fun neighborhood bar that probably just sold typical, over-salted Heggies pizza into a unique local food destination you should have on your "must try" list.
Rating: 4 tines


Trick:
Life is full of surprises, the kind that fill you with both wonderment and a dizzying sense that the world you used to know no longer exists, perhaps never existed.  Like when you first learned that Leslie could be a man's name or that tomatoes were a fruit or when you first discerned a faint intelligence, maybe even a human intelligence, behind the sitcom Suddenly Susan.  It is just that kind of earth-shattering surprise that 1029's kitchen dishes out--the surprise that a Northeast Minneapolis bar can have distinctive and daring food.  (That's not to say that Northeast bars don't offer any good food.  Mayslack's roast beer sandwich?  Distinctive but definitely not daring.  Elsie's waffle fries?  Yummy as hell, but neither distinctive nor daring.)  

With the Smack Shack's takeover of the 1029 kitchen, you can pair your Miller High Life with the same range of coastal-inspired goodies that the Smack Shack's roving truck serves up to the douchebags from Dain Bosworth each afternoon in downtown Minneapolis.  For the uninitiated, the signature item is the heaping-to-overflowing lobster roll.  There's plenty to recommend it besides the generous size.  To start with, it's served on a buttery Texas toast rather than a hot dog bun.  That may piss off lobster roll purists, but it really turns the sandwich into the kind of hearty meal that a Midwesterner expects from a night out.  More important, the lobster is, well, lobster!  When you come from Minnesota and are paying less than $20, you expect potluck masquerading under a brand name like "Ooh-la-labster."  What a treat to get the real thing for around $12.  


All that said, however, I did find the lobster roll a little disappointing.  I'm no expert, but I thought it could have used more zing, maybe from scallions, black pepper, or even paprika.  Eating such a big helping of mayonnaisey lobster chunks is a little like biting into a baby's arm, and you need the extra seasoning.


By contrast, the shrimp po'boy was damn near perfect.  I don't know if it was the lemon aioli, the onions, or simply the fact that shrimp doesn't present the same kind of dense meat wad as lobster, but it was balanced and a bit piquant.  And that's what I mean about daring.  How many other Northeast watering holes challenge you to taste something subtle in their bar fare?  (Hint: The answer is a whole number never invented by the Maya mathematicians that all those New Age idiots are writing apocalypse-related books about.) 

Smack Shack Cool Guy

Yes, the Smack Shack shows its customers respect, by God, asking them to do a little of the work that goes into tasting stuff!  If you don't believe me even after trying the shrimp po'boy, then you'll just have to try theandouille sausage po'boy.  This behemoth has a greasy, smoky goodness to compare with Kramarczuk's own famous andouille, yet with the aioli you might think you were actually dining, not chowing down.  For just a few moments, you're not some anonymous nobody filling his gut to forget the jobless recovery.  No, you're Huey Long!  Or maybe a king, a beautiful Cajun king!  (The meat raffle quickly spoils the illusion, but ride it as long as you can.)
Rating: 4 tines




Drew:
I think I went to The 1029 Bar.
The reason I'm unsure is that it was such a surreal experience, a more likely explanation is that it was a dream.  It is clearly not a coincidence that both The 1029 and Fellini's masterpiece "8 1/2" are numbered titles.  I recently saw the Italian neorealist filmmaker's work, and I could very well be mixing the two in my subconscious.  Perhaps, much like Fellini's fantasy sequences, the parade of:

• women's braziers on the ceiling
• autographed police car doors
• a roulette wheel the size Sauron's eye
• excellent east coast lobster rolls
• a squinty-eyed woman in bunny ears going to Costa Rica
• country music karaoke in the background
• a 60-year old blond Snooki look-alike with an English accent offering to scrub my "undercarriage" in an unforgettable sponge bath
• and a Zima neon sign

were just Jungian psychic manifestations of my unconscious  (if so, what the HELL is going on inside me?!!).


You know what?  There's no way this was real.  According to my memory, all this occurred in a place the size of my basement.  That's just logistically impossible.  (Pfft, a Zima sign!  That should have been my first clue this was all my imagination.)
Oh well, if a place like this actually existed, you should really go.  It would be totally awesome!


Rating: 3 trains entering tunnels