Rick Nelson
Minneapolis
Former @StarTribune restaurant critic. Co-author of "The Great Minnesota Cookie Book" and "The Ultimate Minnesota Cookie Book," both published by @UMinnPress.
Articles by Rick Nelson
Fair food favorites
Rick Nelson joined the staff of the Star Tribune in 1998. He is a Twin Cities native, a University of Minnesota graduate and a James Beard Award winner.
Understanding the Automotive SENT Protocol Explained
Get the basics on the SENT bus, which transmits sensor data to ECUs and other vehicle processors, one nibble at a time. How do you test the automotive SENT protocol? Test & Measurement Tips describes how to test the data bus. The Single Edge Nibble Transmission (SENT) protocol defines an approach to data communications in accordance with the Society of Automotive Engineers (SAE) J2716 standard.
What is the automotive SENT protocol?
Get the basics on the SENT bus, which transmits sensor data to ECUs and other vehicle processors, one nibble at a time. How do you test the automotive SENT protocol? Test & Measurement Tips describes how to test the data bus. The Single Edge Nibble Transmission (SENT) protocol defines an approach to data communications in accordance with the Society of Automotive Engineers (SAE) J2716 standard.
COLUMN: Start seeds in containers for best results
Once you have picked your garden location, the next step in preparation should be to find out the last average frost date for your location. This is the approximate, but very crucial date that is referred to on the back of many seed packets (for example, “Set plants out three weeks after last average frost date”). Keep an eye on the temperatures and how much they vary from the closest point listed on those charts.
COLUMN: Extension ready to help with lawn, garden questions
Do you have a lawn or garden question such as: • What do I plant? • How do I plant? • What is eating my plant? If so, contact the OSU Extension Office in your county, or if available, a member of the Master Gardeners program. Both are ready to help you solve your growing concerns. Whether you contact us by phone, email or in person, Extension is your source for non-biased, researched-based answers to your questions.
COLUMN: Give your houseplants best chance for survival
The same way outdoor plants do best in their native environment, one will have the most success with houseplants that are suited for a specific living space. Simply sticking a plant on a windowsill is not ensuring a plant’s best environment. Light, potting medium, water/drainage, temperature and humidity are key elements for plant health. • Proper lighting for your houseplants. Plants have different light requirements, from bright and direct to diffused and indirect or minimal light.
COLUMN: Potting soil can be reused if it is refreshed
By Rick Nelson For gardeners who want to reuse their potting soil but do not need or want to sterilize it, the focus should be on refreshing the mix. This is essential for replacing nutrients, reactivating the mix’s ability to retain moisture and enhancing the structure and stability of the mix so it is less likely to pull away from the sides of the pot. Whether you plan to grow vegetables, herbs or annuals, one will need to refurbish old potting soil before reuse.
What is a Smith chart and why do I need one? (Part 2)
Take a journey around a Smith chart to find capacitance and inductance values in a matching network. Before computers became ubiquitous, the Smith chart simplified calculations involving the complex impedances found in RF/microwave circuits such as the one shown in Figure 1. That circuit includes a source with impedance Zs, transmission line with characteristic impedance Z0, and load with impedance ZL. The Smith chart remains valuable in helping to visualize how such circuits perform.
Need a baking project? These two cookie recipes are your answer
Bakers in search of projects will enjoy the submissions of Annette Gustafson of Maple Grove and Connie Draveling of Hudson, Wis. Their recipes are highly creative riffs on classic sweets: Gustafson found inspiration in baklava, and Draveling recreated the festive flavors of stollen. Our judges were highly impressed with the flavors, textures and good looks of both cookies, but ultimately felt that the time-consuming and technically challenging recipes might be beyond the reach of most bakers.
10 favorite recipes from 20 years of the Star Tribune Holiday Cookie Contest
In the 20 years we've held the Star Tribune Holiday Cookie Contest, we've published 102 recipes — 20 winners and 82 finalists — submitted by readers from all over Minnesota. The goal of the contest has always been to provide our readers with compelling new recipes, and we're grateful for the endless creativity and enthusiasm. Each year, I prepared the winning and finalist recipes, several times, carefully testing them to ensure that the measurements and instructions were correct.
Meet the winning bakers of the 20th annual Star Tribune Holiday Cookie Contest
This season offers no shortage of reasons to raise a glass: spending time with those important to us, reveling in cherished traditions or just enjoying the fact that a new year is on the horizon. Today we're adding to that list by toasting the 20th anniversary of our annual cookie contest, which has grown into a holiday tradition that's close to our hearts.
Need holiday cookie ideas? Here's more than 100 of our best recipes to try
2003 winner: The look of candied apples inspires this great-looking caramel and walnut cookie. 2003 recipe from Sherryl Joos of Plymouth.
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There's a reason this plum torte recipe is a classic
I'd never tasted — let alone baked — the dazzling plum torte from the New York Times, despite its firmly entrenched role in the national baking consciousness. Fortunately, my pal John rectified that sorry situation. He's one of the most gifted and inspiring bakers in my friend circle, and last fall showed up on our screen porch bearing a gorgeous rendition of the torte. It was bewitchingly fragrant and still slightly toasty from the oven. One heaping forkful later, I was a convert.
Nicollet Mall, once an urban oasis, is now flowerless
If Nicollet Mall had a theme song, it just might be Pete Seeger's "Where Have All the Flowers Gone." Downtown's primary pedestrian thoroughfare is now five years into an overhaul designed by New York City-based James Corner Field Operations. The firm's $50 million remake is not without its strengths, but a major weakness is its depressing lack of greenery. Not trees. The new mall actually boasts twice as many trees as its predecessor.
The story behind the makeover of the 50-year-old IDS Crystal Court
When the IDS Center opened in 1972, the office/hotel/retail complex, designed by architects Philip Johnson and John Burgee, was showered with critical acclaim. While much attention was focused on the center's skyline-defining 57-story tower, admiration also rained down on the Crystal Court, the soaring interior piazza capped with plexiglass skylights. It's a rarity: a private space that feels entirely public. The Crystal Court has received its share of updates.
July is time to plant for fall vegetables
July will be a busy month for area vegetable gardeners. There are several things to do to make sure you have fresh vegetables for the fall. • Vegetables to plant in July. Set out broccoli, cabbage and cauliflower transplants for your fall garden. Protect them with shade cloth to reduce heat stress. Finish setting out transplants of brussels sprouts for a fall and winter harvest. Avoid transplanting seedlings during the hottest part of the day.
Minnesota honeyberries are bursting with flavor and possibilities
Jason Amundsen has a vivid description for the honeyberry. "It's like a blueberry that fell in love with a package of SweeTarts," he says with a laugh. "Some are sweet, some are sour and some are tart." He would know. There are 11,000 honeyberry plants at his Wrenshall, Minn., farm, which is about a half-hour drive from downtown Duluth. He and his wife, Lucie Amundsen, have been welcoming a growing number of honeyberry enthusiasts for the past several years.
The skyscraper that could have redefined downtown St. Paul
In the 1960s, St. Paul city leaders looked west for inspiration. If the Gateway District Urban Renewal Plan was good enough to fix an ailing downtown Minneapolis, then the Capital City was going to go for a similar clean slate. They called their effort Capital Centre. (The name should have been a red flag.
'Gay Pride was invented here': The origins of Pride in the Twin Cities
Jean-Nickolaus Tretter: It was a time for movements — the African American movement, the women’s movement. The Stonewall Riots [in June 1969 in New York’s Greenwich Village] were a kind of signal that we were going to have our own movement. Michael McConnell: The term “gay pride” was invented here. Thom Higgins had been raised in the Catholic Church and decided to come up with a means of countering the negative energy coming out of the church. So he paired two of the deadly sins: gay and pride.
Nostalgia helped fuel a second career of baking for an American in Paris
Author Frank Adrian Barron was missing home when he moved abroad, so he took to seasonal baking. Barron and his now-husband, James, moved to Paris 10 years ago. It was January, and when Barron, a transplanted Californian, hit the produce section at a nearby supermarket in search of smoothie ingredients, he was confronted by a distressing reality: no strawberries.
Nostalgia helped fuel a second career of baking for an American in Paris
Author Frank Adrian Barron was missing home when he moved abroad, so he took to seasonal baking. Frank Adrian Barron and his now-husband, James, moved to Paris 10 years ago. It was January, and when Barron, a transplanted Californian, hit the produce section at a nearby supermarket in search of smoothie ingredients, he was confronted by a distressing reality: no strawberries.
Nostalgia helped fuel a second career of baking for an American in Paris
Frank Adrian Barron and his now-husband, James, moved to Paris 10 years ago. It was January, and when Barron, a transplanted Californian, hit the produce section at a nearby supermarket in search of smoothie ingredients, he was confronted by a distressing reality: no strawberries.
For a better burger, use the stove
By RICK NELSON MINNEAPOLIS (TNS) — It sounds heretical, particularly since the outdoor cooking season is getting started, but here goes: For a truly delicious burger, skip the grill, stay indoors and reach for a cast-iron skillet. kAm%9:D 25G:46 :D 8=62?65 7C@> :?E6CG:6HD E92E x 4@?5F4E65 H:E9 >@C6 E92? `__ %H:? r:E:6D 4967D 36EH66? a_`b 2?5 a_`h 7@C 2? @?=:?6 4@=F>? 42==65 qFC86C uC:52J[ H96C6 x 5:DD64E65 E96 D64C6ED 369:?5 3FC86CD 6?4@F?E6C65 :?
Historic Purcell-Cutts house reopens for tours in Minneapolis
After a two-year pandemic-related hiatus, the historic Purcell-Cutts House near Lake of the Isles in Minneapolis has reopened to the public. The Prairie School jewel, designed by architects William Gray Purcell and George Grant Elmslie for Purcell and his wife, Edna, was built in 1913. The home was bequeathed to the Minneapolis Institute of Art (Mia) in 1985 by Anson Cutts Jr., son of the house's longtime owners, Edna and Anson Cutts.
'Absolutely exquisite' 1977 Minnetonka home by Ralph Rapson gets respectful refresh
Architect Charles Stinson's practice doesn't include a lot of house renovations. But for a 1977 Minnetonka home by modernist titan Ralph Rapson, Stinson made an exception. "When it comes to remodeling, we've been very selective about getting involved," he said. "They're not efficient, they're messy. But this made sense. The house is such a pure form, and it was done with such integrity and thoughtfulness.
Twin Cities' Urban Greens turns dreams of pesto into reality
Deeply fragrant, Minnesota-grown basil in March? Believe it. Urban Greens has made garden-fresh herbs a convenient, year-round reality. Co-owners Joel Love and Andrew Rescorla are childhood friends who grew up to be farmers, although they're not tilling soil. Instead, their agricultural medium of choice is water. At their technologically advanced Columbia Heights facility, a half-dozen varieties of herbs are cultivated, pesticide-free, in a hydroponic environment that's powered by renewable energy.
Tasteful refresh breathes life into IDS Center courtyard in downtown Minneapolis
At first glance, the recently remade IDS Crystal Court doesn't appear all that different. The key components — trees, seating, water — are still there. But take a closer look. "It was like pulling the old vinyl tile up on the house you just bought and finding beautiful hardwood floors," says Tony Layne of Perkins & Will, the architecture firm behind the $5 million rejuvenation.
6 questions with award-winning Minnesota landscape architect Tom Oslund
Twin Citians know and appreciate Tom Oslund's work. O2 Design, Oslund's landscape architecture firm, designed Gold Medal Park, the 35W Bridge Remembrance Garden memorial and Target Plaza outside Target Field, all in Minneapolis, and is responsible for the 2017 renovation of the Minneapolis Sculpture Garden. In the suburbs, O2 Design, which Oslund founded in 1998, is the force behind corporate campuses for General Mills, Medtronic and Allianz Life USA.
What happened to Minneapolis' famous 'Mighty Kimball' organ?
One of the largest pipe organs ever produced in the United States was the pride of Minneapolis when it debuted nearly a century ago. Audiences at the Minneapolis Auditorium didn't just listen to this thunderous instrument. They felt it. But the grand pipes of the "Mighty Kimball" fell silent three decades ago — banished to storage at the Minneapolis Convention Center, which now occupies the former site of the auditorium. And some wonder if it will ever be heard again.
Look inside three homes Minnesota architects designed - for themselves
When architects design homes, homeowners benefit. "We see things differently," says Stephanie Howe of Studio E Architects in Glenwood, Minn. "We're trained to not necessarily think out of the box, but to see the way things flow and make sense, and to see how something fits in the context of its location. We can customize for the family living there." Then, what happens when architects design their own homes? In these three instances, magic.
8 missed opportunities on the Minneapolis streetscape
Untapped opportunities abound on the Minneapolis streetscape. Tweaking outdated plazas. Boosting anemic riverfront amenities. Fixing poorly conceived freeway connections. The list could go on and on. Instead, here are seven suggestions for downtown improvements, plus one high-profile Chain of Lakes recommendation.
Remembering cartoonist Richard Guindon, a '70s satirist who laughed with us
From the late 1960s to the early 1980s, no one poked fun at Edina — or the Vikings, or local politicians, or the maddening absurdities of Minnesota Nice — with more insight and affection than cartoonist Richard Guindon. A fixture in the pages of the Minneapolis Tribune, Guindon wielded a distinctive drawing style that seemed to borrow in equal parts from Aubrey Beardsley and Peter Max.
Wisconsin rental cabin's tower architecture is 'part of the destination' Original
When Bruce and Ann McPheeters and their son Jeff decided to enter the vacation rental business, they wisely emphasized design as a strategy for differentiating their new enterprise from the competition. "We wanted the architecture to be part of the destination, part of the experience," said Jeff McPheeters.
Russian Ballet Theatre performs with the message: 'We Dance for Peace'
Last week, after the curtain came down on Russian Ballet Theatre's production of "Swan Lake" in Charlotte, N.C., the multinational company was hit with the news that Russia had invaded Ukraine. It was a devastating development for the troupe's 42 dancers, who hail from nine countries, including Ukraine, Belarus, Russia, Poland and Armenia.
2 down-on-their-luck 1890s Twin Cities apartment buildings are lovingly restored
The key corner of Wabasha and 7th streets in downtown St. Paul is minus an eyesore, thanks to developer Ed Conley and his smile-inducing renovation of what is now the Fitz Flats. The four-story Victorian Queen Anne structure dates to 1890 and was the work of developer Thomas Fitzpatrick. Its exterior is blessed with bay windows, a turreted corner, decorative arches and plenty of other good bones, and it landed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1990.
A role model for freeway design
When the Dale Street bridge over Interstate 94 in St. Paul was recently replaced, the design process — and, more important, the results — steered clear of the same-old, same-old. Thank goodness. Beautiful and meaningful site-specific artworks are an intrinsic component of the project. They're also a primary reason why the Dale Street bridge is a role model for future freeway overpass design. But the bridge's merits move beyond the visual.
Our best-to-worst ranking for mall walking in the Twin Cities
Forgive me. I'm one of those jerks who had long considered mall walking synonymous with, say, wearing sweatpants in public, or driving a car so dirty that its "Wash Me" finger graffiti was covered by another layer of grime. In other words, mall walking was the equivalent of giving up. I was wrong. Mall walking — no gym membership required! — is an excellent aerobic pursuit.
At the University of Minnesota's Pillsbury Hall, everything old is new again
Behind the familiar edifice of Pillsbury Hall lies an extraordinary transformation. Since the day the doors first opened in 1889, the building's craggy, romantic presence has made it the architectural soul of the University of Minnesota campus. On the outside, anyway.
Here are the 10 most popular recipes from the Taste section in 2021
These 10 recipe-related Startribune.com stories captured the most reader interest in 2021. A winning contest: The No. 1 entry underlines just how much Star Tribune readers love to bake, because, yes, the year's most-read recipe, by far, is the winner of the 2021 Star Tribune Holiday Cookie contest. It's Lemon Rosemary Cremes, by Minneapolis baker Cynthia Baxter, and it's delicious. Find the recipe here.
Our best Minnesota dining experiences of 2021
From old favorites to new places, dining out had a deeper meaning after a rocky 2020. Our food writers share their best moments. By Jon Cheng, Nicole Hvidsten, Sharyn Jackson, Rick Nelson and Joy Summers December 19, 2021 — 6:54am Alma Jon Cheng Many progressive, small-plate restaurants have popped up in the past decade. Make no mistake: The Twin Cities has become a more progressive dining destination because of it. Yes, much of what Alma chef/owner Alex Roberts offers is small-plates dining.
Ring in 2022 by baking cardamom buns, or buy them from these 6 bakeries
Ruth Raich has happy memories of childhood visits to Sweden, helping her grandmother make kardemummabullar. What the English-speaking world calls the cardamom bun is a core component of fika, the civilized Swedish practice of a coffee-and-snack break. What a treat! Cardamom buns are tender but chewy, slightly sweet and ringing with a bracing burst of cardamom. Just looking at these sculpted beauties, their tops glistening with sugar, instantly invokes temptation.
6 restaurants at the heart of their Twin Cities area neighborhoods
Diners benefited from a rise of home-away-from-home restaurants across the Twin Cities area. By Sharyn Jackson, Rick Nelson and Joy Summers Star Tribune December 19, 2021 — 6:56am All Saints Two industry vets — chef Denny Leaf-Smith and front-of-house whiz Kim Tong — joined forces to create a cozy vibe inside the former Bardo on E. Hennepin in Minneapolis with a menu that bops around styles and cuisine.
The 5 best things our food writers ate in the Twin Cities area this week
Pappardelle with Mushroom Bolognese at All Saints Less truly is more, as exemplified in this utterly irresistible exercise in restraint. "It's the most straightforward Bolognese recipe that I know," said chef/co-owner Denny Leaf-Smith. "I enjoy the simplicity of it all." Same here. First comes the onions-carrots-celery trinity, then garlic (prepared confit-style), wine and San Marzano tomatoes are nurtured on the stove for about four hours.
The 5 best things our food writers ate in the Twin Cities this year
The Taste team recounts their favorite meal of the year, from takeout to a communal spread. By Jon Cheng, Sharyn Jackson, Nicole Hvidsten, Rick Nelson and Joy Summers December 19, 2021 — 6:47am Honey and Cream Cake at Spoon and Stable I'm ashamed to admit that my first time trying Spoon and Stable is in its seventh year of operation. Much has changed since then — in and around Gavin Kaysen's seminal Minneapolis restaurant. The Honey and Cream Cake hasn't.
Bagel-maker Asa's Bakery is moving into the former Sassy Spoon in south Minneapolis
Asa's Bakery, the source for some of the Twin Cities' best bagels — as well as a rare producer of bialys — is moving to new and roomier digs, taking over the south Minneapolis address that was most recently home to Sassy Spoon. The move to 5011 34th Av. S. represents a big step forward for baker/owner Asa Diebolt.
Our 15 top cookbooks of the year cover everything from easy dinners to baking challenges
When someone asks a cook if they really need another cookbook, the answer is almost always yes. Why settle for one baking book when there are three more just as worthy? kAmqFE 4@@<3@@<D 2C6 >@C6 E92? ;FDE 2 AC6EEJ 4@G6Cj E96J 62C? E96:C DA@ED @? E96 D96=7] r@@<3@@<D 42? AC@G:56 2 D6?D6 @7 25G6?EFC6[ 7665 @FC 4FC:@D:EJ 2?5 65F42E6 FD[ ?@ >2EE6C 9@H =@?8 H6VG6 366? :?
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