It says a lot about a restaurant if it tops the Urbanspoon charts for several weeks(and continues to stay there). Such is the case with Heyday. As a restaurant/food blogger, I keep an eye on what restaurants are gaining popularity and what other food bloggers and critiques have to say and I have noticed Heyday has been topping Twin Cities Urbanspoon’s “Talk of the Town” chart for several weeks or even months now.
A just had his birthday and with A and me, we don’t just celebrate birthday, we kind of celebrate birth-week. It is just an occasion for us to extend the festivities or maybe just an excuse to eat out again. So we did.
Since we reached right at dinner time and we didn’t have a reservation, I expected the place to be crowded with a possibility of some wait time. Surprisingly we got the table right away. We even got to choose our table. The decor inside the restaurant was very chic with beautiful chandeliers mixed with rustic wood-metal furnitures and marble table tops. I really liked how it looked overall. However, birthday boy didn’t like his chair so much; the metal piece used for back support of the chair was too cold and apparently the chair was also a little small for him. Actually our table was also pretty small. It had this European feel where tables are placed very close to each other and everything feels like it can be knocked down with a slight swing of an arm. Well it wasn’t a big of a deal and we didn’t mind it at all. As a matter of fact, I kind of like intimate settings.
As for food, we were pretty hungry after work (as usual) so we jumped right into entrée. We got some vegetables, guinea hen and a hay cooked lamb. For drinks, I went for a Croatia wine (Plavina) as per our hostess suggestion and A got his regular which was a stout, Ivan The Terrible. I took the picture above just to show how dark both the drinks were. I took a sip of the beer and loved it even more than the wine and this is coming from a person who is not fond of beer.
Guinea hen came with a piece of white meat and a piece of dark meat. The meat looked like it was baked and then pan-fried to give that outer crust. The best part of it was the sauce it came in. It was a blend of crushed beet and basil with a hint lime. I would have never guessed the sauce had beet in it if our server hadn’t told us. Overall this was just perfection! I ate everything; even those tiny greens!
Here is one more picture before I tell you about the lamb.
You know the deal with lamb and me. We don’t go well. It is like wearing polka dots and stripes together. Something always seems a little off (at least to me). But then there are exceptions too like when Olivia Palermo wears polka dots and stripes together, it looks completely fine! This lamb was Olivia Palermo for me. It was just the right amount of spice with no funky smell. Although the lamb looked a little raw, it was cooked well. The texture felt right. The lamb came in a bed of green salad mixed with slices of radish, peas, pea sprouts and crushed pistachio and yoghurt. I love when meat items come with greens!
Finally let’s talk about the vegetables. If vegetables were served this way, I would happily be a vegetarian for life! This is not your regular side vegetables. These come with a tangy sauce which I believe is called bagna cauda and along with some strawberries and herbs. It was just delish and the presentation was on point! Actually the presentation for all the our dishes were on-point! Full of color and just a treat to your eyes.
For dessert, we went for salted caramel ice-cream but our server got us an extra one because he came to know that we were celebrating a birthday. The salted caramel ice-cream was the best salted caramel I have ever tried. Not even exaggerating. It was served with a layer crushed frozen beets and some crackers and fresh whip cream. I would go here just to get the ice-cream. Our second dessert that server got us was very unusual and something we both have never tried before. It was a mix of crushed frozen cucumber and pickle with a hint of lime. When you think of pickle and lime you would imagine it to be a sour. It did have a very faint hint of sourness but overall it was sweet and a very fresh feeling dessert. It is something you wouldn’t feel guilty of eating but I am pretty sure by the taste of it, there was significant amount of sugar in it! Oh well it is dessert. What can you expect!
We got some treats from the kitchen! How nice!
Our dining experience in a nutshell was very good. Although we didn’t have to wait for the table, it took some time for our food to arrive. I felt like the restaurant was a little understaffed given that it was during peak dinner hours, which might also be reason why our server forgot to bring the bread. I also believe that is why we got that extra dessert 🙂 No complains about the staffs though. Everyone was very nice and hospitable.
Our food was good. The ambience was nice. If I had to give them a rating, I will give them a 5 out of 5! Would I go here again? – Absolutely Yes! As I mentioned earlier, I would even go just to try other dessert from their menu.
