Toast

Address
415 N. 1st St., Mpls.,  612-333-4305, toastwinebarandcafe.com

The Scene
Trying to find Toast is not easy, but if you can navigate your way, you’ll find a warm, dark, and cozy neighborhood wine bar reminiscent of ones in Belgium and Holland. Semi-submerged in the rear of a larger building, Toast has bare walls, stark lighting, stools and high-tops surrounding a few tables, and a large and friendly bar. The owner mans the door, and frills are few and far between, but the camaraderie and warm vibe make up for any shortcomings. Toast isn’t much to look at, but feels just fine.

Our Take
Not a lot actually gets cooked at Toast, but the kitchen turns out stunning composites of flavors, and matches a flair for ingredients with some slick culinary bells and whistles, making this one of the better wine bars I have visited in the Twin Cities. There is no getting around the Italianate influences on the menu, and seafood spiedini or a pasta (or two) would have made this a really inspired thrill ride.

Alas, the menu is dominated by platters of salumi, cheese, and crostini, the preeminent wine bar staple. A salumi plate with thin slices of Fra’Mani, salameto, gentile, chorizo, and  Serrano ham was excellent, and the surprisingly robust violet mustard, dense and earthy, proved to be the perfect foil for the bigger flavored aged sausages. Superb paper-thin pizzas are annoyingly cut into little squares, but the flavors and combinations were pitch perfect. Toast’s mushroom pizza was a spore lover's dream. Salads were well crafted, and sandwiches are also available—go for the Serrano ham. A small pile of port-soaked dried figs made the farmhouse cheddar sing, but cheeses are limited in selection—a miscue I hope will correct itself as demand expands.

The Right Vintages
A handful of sakes, beers, and sparkling wines gives way to a well-heeled list of almost forty wines of recent vintages. Young wines are often phenomenal, but there is nothing worse than seeing friends suffer through a bottle from a reliable producer in an off year. Unlike most wine bars in the metro, Toast offers the best vintages. The 2005 Lagar de Cevera Albarino, 2005 Sollner Veltliner, and the unusual Mallorcan Anima Negra AN/2, bottled in 2004—good vintages from terroir that couldn’t be described as ordinary and all good examples of nice wines not found on many lists—are available here.