The 5 best things our food writers ate last week

Surprise! It’s a special Monday edition of the 5 Best Things We Ate. In its place last week, we announced the first class of Culinary North Stars, the 30 most vital restaurants in the Twin Cities right now. Five Best will be back on Friday.

Sorpresine means “little surprises” in Italian, and there couldn’t be a better name for this dish. Although it refers to the pasta shape — hand-folded into what looks like tortellini but without filling — there was surprise and delight at every turn.

The fresh-made pasta, a highlight at the newish Hopkins restaurant, mingled with the perfect one-two summer punch of crisp, fresh peas and wisps of dill that were complemented by a splash of lemon butter. It all sat atop a caramelized cream sauce that was so deeply flavorful it catapulted the dish ($18) to the top of my favorite-meals-of-the-year list.

If you order the sorpresine with the idea of sharing, do yourself a favor and order another one to take home. You’ll be craving it again before the plate is even cleared. (Nicole Hvidsten)

1601 Mainstreet, Hopkins, hendrixandsiena.com

Sometimes I find myself staring at the horizon, wondering where all the great sandwiches have gone. Other times, I find myself feasting on a glorious specimen of symphonic textures and flavors that epitomize why “the best thing since sliced bread” is still an accurate measure of success.

In addition to its Minneapolis outpost, the family-run Asian Duck recently moved into a new north metro location. The menu is a mix of house specialties (green papaya salad with the distinctive Lao fish sauce tang) and crowd-pleasers like cranberry cream cheese wontons. It’s the kind of restaurant that has something for the choosy eaters and fans of real spice, and the khao jee pate, the Lao answer to Vietnam’s banh mi, is a must-order.

Of the meat choices, I recommend the porky Lao sausage ($15), with just a whisper of heat and that distinctive lemongrass brightness. It’s grilled and sliced before being tucked into a Trung Nam Bakery baguette with a swipe of mayo, rich housemade pâté, pickled radish and carrot, along with fresh jalapeños. (Joy Summers)

3500 Vicksburg Lane, Plymouth, asianduckplymouth.com

Light, luxe, a little transportive. That’s pretty much what I want out of a poolside rooftop terrace lunch at a hotel like the Four Seasons, and the pasta e piselli ($26) from Riva Terrace delivered. For this ultra-fresh pasta dish, al dente thumbprints come in a clear, savory broth, punctuated by nubs of guanciale and confetti shavings of Tuscan pecorino. The dish is scattered with pea shoots and little purple flower petals that make it almost too pretty to devour. More than traditional pasta e piselli (aka, an Italian soup of little pasta tubes with freezer-bag peas), this brought back memories of a tortellini in brodo I had in Bologna more than a decade ago that has a permanent spot in my personal food hall of fame. When you wish you could take a bath in a brodo, you know you’re on to something.

Side note: Don’t sleep on the pizza fries ($14). They’re just fries — really good ones — seasoned with nostalgic, dead-on pizza flavor. (Sharyn Jackson)

245 Hennepin Av. S., Mpls., fourseasons.com

When exploring a new menu, sampler platters are a great way to get the lay of the land. And Blue Nile Ethiopian Restaurant (no relation to the former Blue Nile in Minneapolis, in case you’re wondering) in this east metro suburb has that in spades.

In addition to hearty samplers of stews and braised dishes in the entree section that are served with injera flatbread to scoop them up with, this spot near Hwy. 36 and Geneva Avenue also offers an appetizer version. For $10, you get three types of vegetarian stews rolled in injera, cut into bite-sized pieces. It came with a nice range of flavors — Misr spiced red lentils in traditional berbere sauce that had a kick, Shiro chickpea stew that was rich and creamy, and a more neutral Kik Alicha split pea that tasted homestyle.

Ordering the appetizer version also left room for another equally enjoyable doro wat ($22), often referred to as the unofficial national dish of Ethiopia. The fall-apart chicken drumstick, perfectly complemented by a hard-boiled egg and deeply layered spicy red stew, reinforced that there’s something special happening in the kitchen here. It’s clear that dishes are made with love, patience and attention to detail — the kind of special touch that makes you feel like you were invited to someone’s house for a meal in which Grandma has been building the flavors in the kitchen all day long. (Nancy Ngo)

2649 7th Av. E., North St. Paul, bluenileethiopian.com

I love the personality of a great gin and tonic pairing. The aromatic opportunities for crisp and juicy flavors have expanded at an extraordinary pace since my early days of tippling.

Earl Giles, the distillery and apothecary in northeast Minneapolis, has all manner of herbs and tintchers at their disposal to build complex flavors inside a glass, as they do with their Spanish gin and tonic ($11). Everything is made in-house and garnished with fruit and mint. It’s a crisp quencher for the height of patio season. Plus, the large room is filled with plants, has garage doors that roll back to encourage soft breezes and offers plenty of seating for gathering a whole gaggle of friends to enjoy it all together. (J.S.)

1325 NE. Quincy St., Mpls, earlgiles.com