The place closed for good July 29, I think. I had never been there, but after 99 years, a place that had a solid connection with Old Minneapolis was going to close, and I felt the need to connect to it. And sure, maybe the irony of being a first-timer to Peter's Grill on its last day was too much for me to resist, but I went and, after a long wait where all the servers were too busy helping others and, I guess, trying to rectify the death of an institution that was a part of their lives for so, so long.
And I think I hesitated to write this blog post for so long because ... well, I eventually forgot. But I remember taking a picture of my meal, and I wanted to, for the first time, post a picture I took myself in the blog post, but I never learned how to upload a photo onto Blogger. And then I think I began hesitating as to whether I wanted to put a picture I took myself onto WAF for identity reasons. Whatever the reason, I don't know where that photo is now; the ones on my cellphone go back only to 2014.
I remember sitting at the bar and I was told that all the food was gone by the time I got there. I may have played the woe-is-me card because someone, and it very well could have been the owner, heard my sob story, went to the kitchen (and I could see into it from my barstool), and took what appeared to be a prepared dish. I don't think it was going to be given to a customer; I got the impression that one of the workers prepared it for him or herself, either because they were hungry over their busy day or they wanted something to take home to eat and/or remember Peter's Grill by. And this guy, presumably the owner, took that and gave it to me. It was a tuna sandwich. Can't say I was blown away, but it was, and is, important to me that I had a piece of Peter's Grill before it shut down.
But assuming that tuna sandwich was for someone else, I feel bad. Sorry.
It was packed in there. Which raises the usual issue that if it were packed before it closed, the restaurant wouldn't have had to close, now, would it? But hey, it's a downtown restaurant, and those are vanishing by the minute because it's so hard to make money when you cater mostly to people coming to and from work.
I just read that the owner blamed food trucks for permanently crippling his business. Well, this is also ironic, but as I have heard, there are no more food trucks in either downtown since the pandemic. So many companies decided their employees could work from home during COVID that food trucks determined there was no longer money to be made downtown, either. Maybe that has changed since we're now six years beyond the pandemic. But I haven't heard of a glut of food trucks invading downtown Minneapolis every lunch hour.
You know, I assumed I would have more to say about the death of Peter's Grill. Well, shelving this blog post for 13 years shortens the story, I guess.
No comments:
Post a Comment