Brix

Address 
4656 Excelsior Blvd., St. Louis Park. 952-698-2749, brixwine.com

The Scene
In the early days of the Excelsior & Grand development, neighbors Mojito and McCoy’s Public House vied for the favor of the locals. McCoy’s flourished. Mojito made enough mistakes to seal its fate. McCoy’s owner Marty Collins has leased the space and, following a stylish and contemporary makeover, rechristened it Brix. Based on the elbow-to-elbow young professionals populating the rounded wine bar hung with two flat-panel TVs, the tables are definitely being turned. As for the collection of spacious booths and tables topped with sea salt and cans of olive oil—they sport a mix of gray-haired couples, girls’-night-outers, and giddy daters enjoying surprisingly good food and affordably priced offerings of more than 140 wines.

Our Take
Despite being home to Trader Joe’s, suburban St. Louis Park doesn’t have a reputation for haute cuisine. So the prospect of visiting an Italian–themed restaurant created by a brewpub operator was not one I was approaching with anticipation. I was pleasantly surprised!

Executive chef Cory Henkel and his crew are turning out food that is pleasingly credible. Some items—most notably a lovely composition of Donnay goat-cheese “truffles,” warm rosemary honey, and ciabatta crostini—were elegant in their simplicity. More rustic were delicious agnolotti stuffed with a mixture of spinach, potato, and spicy Italian sausage, topped with a tangy arrabiata sauce, and the oven-roasted half chicken served in pan jus with a bacon-lentil ragout. Some are “reaches,” such as the lobster strichetti—a very rich combination of white and black homemade noodles, succulent lobster, scallops, and lump crab bathed in a vodka tomato cream. The consistency level is quite high here, with one major exception—fish. On both visits we sent back overcooked orders of stale-tasting red snapper. Both were unhesitatingly removed from the bill. I also didn’t particularly enjoy a tough osso buco.

Service is eager, enthusiastic, and engaged, but when it comes to wine recommendations—the list is extensive—you’ll want to call in the sommelier. And don’t be surprised if some of your selections aren’t available—an ever-growing problem in an ever-more-ambitious local wine scene.

One Brix at a Time
In case you’re not familiar with the technical nuances of the science of oenology, “brix” is a measurement of the approximate amount of sugar in items such as grapes and wines. During grape harvests, samples are taken from the vineyard and brix is measured with a device called a “refractometer.” Wine grapes are usually picked between twenty and twenty-five degrees brix.