Cuisine: Steaks, Fish
Restaurant Features: Bar, Happy Hour Specials
Location: St Paul, MN
Address: 378 Maria Ave. St Paul, MN 55106 (651)793-6247
Hours: Tu-Fri Lunch 11a-2p Dinner 4p-10p Sat-Sun Brunch 9a-2p Dinner 5p-10p
Links: The Strip Club Website Google Map
Atmosphere: The Strip Club is located within an old converted two-story brownstone in the Dayton's Bluff neighborhood of St Paul, near Metropolitan State University. The tall open space appears to be freshly remodeled, with a second story dining room above the bar that overlooks the dining room below. Although the decor of the restaurant is mostly dark, the light coming into the window brightens the entire space on a sunny day but I can imagine it is very dim at night.
Lunch Menu: Small Plates on Lunch Menu include Soup du Jour, Fried Green Tomatoes with balsalmic bacon, Salumi aii Melone (cured meat with melon), Calamari Avgolemono, The Devil's Eggs (chili oil and curry), French Fries (with bacon ketchup) and Beans & Toast.
Salads include Grilled Caesar and MN Market Salad.
Sandwiches include Dog du Jour, Fried Oyster Po' Boy, Braunshweiger, Burger or Loaded Burger, and Smoked Salmon alla Jeanette.
Mid-Day meals include New York Strip with French Fries, Penne alla Comerciante with Spicy Sausage, Shrimp Risotto with Moroccan Olives, Pancetta and Pork Loin, Lake Country Fish & Chips, and Fresh Fish of Day. Strip Club prides itself on serving beef that is grass fed and hormone-free.
**All Menus subject to change seasonally**
Price guide for Lunch: Lunch Small Plates $4-6 Lunch Sandwiches $9-11 Lunch Entrees $12-30
Dinner Menu: Small Plates on Dinner Menu include Hot Bird (chicken with cherry-bacon BBQ), French Fries with bacon ketchup, Pig's Eye Poutine (french fries with truffle gravy and cheese), Crispy Fried Veggies, Fried Oysters, Calamari Abgolemono, The Devil'd Eggs, Salumi ai Peperonata, Duck Confit with grilled peach, Beans & Toast, Tenderloin Tartare, and Meat on a Stick.Dinner sandwiches include Hamburger, Loaded Burger, or Braunschweiger.
Dinner entrees include Grilled New York Strip, Grilled Milet Mignon, Grilled Ribeye, Grilled Sirloin, Roasted Pork Shoulder, Boneless Duck Breast, Ocean Trout, Walleye Pie, Shrimp Risotto, and Fish du Jour. The Strip Club has a variety of specialty sauces to accompany the entrees for an additional charge.
**All Menus subject to change seasonally**
Price Guide for Dinner: Dinner Small Plates $5-9 Dinner Entrees $18-35
What We ordered: My companions and I started with the French Fries appetizer that came with sides of remoulade and bacon ketchup. The french fries were hot and seasoned, light brown and crispy. The mayonnaise-based remoulade was flavorful and seasoned nicely with garlic and other herbs. The bacon ketchup had a somewhat smoky flavor and a thick texture.
I had the Penne alla Comerciante. It was good, but not quite what I expected. The menu description states spicy sausage, but does not mention that it is finely ground sausage blended with the sauce, which only had a hint of tomato and seemed more cheesy than anything else. I like it and thought it was good but the portion size was on the small side. I was quite hungry for this lunch and was able to eat the entire portion quite easily and could have eaten more.
One of my companions had the Ahi Tuna Salad, which may have been a daily special or an item on the summer menu. Several strips of slightly seared raw tuna were served over a bead of salad greens and topped with crispy fried wonton strips.
Another companion had the Hot Dog of the Day, which happened to be a Beef Hot Dog with Giardiniera. The all-beef hot dog was served on a large roll and covered with spicy pickled veggies and served with french fries on the side.
Another companion had the Beet & Bleu Salad. This dish was a big disappointment. The salad with the bleu cheese was good (what little of it there was) but the beet mixture was boring.
Service: Our service was quite awful. My party of four arrived at lunch time in hopes of having a a nice but fast lunch before returning to a conference we were attending nearby. The Strip Club does not have its own parking lot and road construction on the nearby streets forced us to park a few blocks away in the pay lot at Metropolitan State. We asked for suggestions but our server was not very friendly and seemed almost annoyed. After taking our appetizer and lunch orders, our appetizer came out about 15 minutes later. We quickly ate our appetizer and then waited at least 25 minutes for our lunch orders to arrive. After inquiring why it was taking so long, our server told us that she didn't put the entire order in right away. She had waited until she brought out our appetizers before putting the lunch order in. So after waiting forever to get our food and thinking we were going to be late returning to our conference, we were tempted to have our food packaged to-go. Since we knew we were in a hurry, we asked for the bill as soon as the food arrived and then ate as quickly as we could. We had hoped we could get out of there as fast as possible, but wouldn't you know that all the computer systems at the Strip Club all decided to shut down? Not only could we not get a bill with our itemized food items, but they could not run credit cards and didn't have time to make change with what cash we had. It was awful and our server was very rude about it, I am sure out if frustration at the situation. After waiting for 20 minutes so that management could try to figure out their computer issues, we all ended up calculating our own bills and then writing checks for the total so we could leave. I hope our experience was just a fluke because I have heard others say better things about their service at the Strip Club, but our service that day left little to be desired.
Overall Impression: The food was pretty good, although you don't seem to get a lot of "bang for your buck". Our service was terrible but I would be still be willing to go back and try it again, possibly for dinner. I like that all of their beef is grass fed and hormone free.
I'm surprised about two things: One, their lunch menu seems to be shockingly NON-beef. Two, I'm very surprised you rec'd horrible service. Granted I've only dined there once- for dinner- and the service was superb. Hopefully they were just having an off day. Perhaps next time you should try them for dinner and see how it is.
Posted by: anne | October 23, 2009 at 02:29 PM
Cozy little place with wonderful character. Excellent food and service and very reasonable prices. Very high quality ingredients. They even make their own tonic!!
Posted by: packaging supplier | October 27, 2009 at 07:00 AM