Dark Horse Bar & Eatery

Referred by a friend as the Lowertown pub/​restaurant to go to for food, but also an amazing selection of brews on tap, and more importantly, a really knowledgeable server who could help us pick out the ones best fitting our taste and complementing our food. We enjoyed the lamb burgers and the side of brussel sprouts, but there were a ton of other options. Treated myself to a new rye for «dessert» at the recommendation of our server. Ready to make this a regular hangout – might even ask them for a job someday!

Spent 100, every dish was kinda disappointed. When you spend 100 for just dinner and no drinks the good should be fresh and enjoyable. Otherwise a bar and grill would have satisfied the same flavor.

Decided to try Dark Horse on a Saturday afternoon before a wedding. We were expecting lunch, but I was pleasantly surprised when the waitress handed us brunch menus. My date ordered a bloody mary and I had a mimosa. The bloody was incredible. I love my bloodys spicy and this had the perfect amount. I got the biscuits and gravy with scrambled eggs and I couldn’t put my fork down. The portion was huge and it was incredibly delicious. My date had a breakfast sandwich, which he devoured. I can’t wait to come back to see the dinner menu and try out the happy hour. So happy to have more yummy spots in St. Paul!

I had my birthday dinner here last night and enjoyed everything: fish tacos, hanger steak and their tart for dessert with a gold candle for me to make a wish. The service was great and friendly, romantic casual vibe and parking was not too bad. I will bring more friends back this summer to enjoy their patio!

1. They serve food until 1:30am. In that area that’s unheard of! We just came in for happy hour and got to check out their fabulous patio. We kept it simple with fries and a spinach and mushroom pizza. Fries were good but that pizza! It fed 3 of us with leftovers and only $ 11 it was huge. And good cheese my biggest criteria for pizza is a real somewhat salty good cheese and it did not disappoint.

I can’t comment on the food as we did not partake, but the atmosphere and drinks were wonderful! I came here on a Thursday during happy hour as we had an event in the same building (A’bulae) later on. We were able to grab two spots at the bar right away.
Impressive tap list, and what is more impressive is that they serve Magner’s hard cider ON TAP! For a restaurant to serve Magners at all is rare, and what is even more rare is if it’s available on tap. As a non-​beer drinker I am stuck with only hard cider options, and it’s nice to see a change from the sickeningly sweet Angry Orchard.
Now to go back for the food!

We LOVED Dark Horse. On a walking trip, we decided to seek it out based on a friend’s review. We trekked the .80 miles on foot, and were extremely pleased with what we found. There is a bartender named Will that will not only figure out what you like, but will suggest other things that you may be interested in. He is charismatic and funny. Come to Dark Horse. If not for the food, for the atmosphere.

First time here during a relatively slow Monday lunch. We got the Turkish Fig Balls, which were very unique and quite good, the Coconut Lime Rice bowl, which was excellent, and the special chicken and bacon sandwich, which was also excellent.
We, being the beer geeks we are, also ordered 2 beers. Being a Monday, the beer menu was not yet printed for the day and the friendly and engaging bar keep stated this. So, we ordered two of the Schell’s Apricot Vistas after seeing the tap handle (a sour on tap in Minneapolis?). Check comes and I was unpleasantly surprised to find a charge of $ 28 for the two 12oz. beers. Let me break it down for you. That’s $ 14 for a 12 oz. pour of a LOCAL beer. A local beer that is $ 15.99 per bottle, not $ 50.
I like this place and was excited to have another place for good food and good food to go to in St. Paul. Even though the other beers prices were reasonable, I am so disappointed for finding yet another place overcharging beer, treating it like it’s wine.
Price for lunch: 2 entrees, an app and 2 beers — $ 76.75. And this is not fine dining mind you.
Environment, check.
Service, check.
Food, check.
Beer prices, SORRY, NO CAN DO

The historic building and the overall aesthetic and style inside the Dark House appeals to me. It’s big and I’ve never had to wait {bonus}. I haven’t tried enough dishes on the menu but what I have I can describe as your average restaurant fare, nothing to write home about but good. I did enjoy the seasoning in the mussels! One highlight is the happy hour menu; $ 2.50 cans of beer and $ 3 for a pint of Deschutes on tap. They also have a plethora of whiskey, notoriously a favorite of the owner! Stop in to check it out. Always fun to welcome another spot to hang in Lowertown!

They are putting something magical on the Yukon JoJos. Just delicious honestly. I’m not a huge seafood person, but a friend of mine had the fish tacos and was absolutely blown away. There were also a few vegan options so my bestfriend definitely enjoyed that. The Micro Shanks were just out of this world, absolutely amazing. Had a great experience here. They have Coors Banquet, which my favorite Coors, so they get points for that as well. Atmoshphere is a little darker then what I’d expect, but I’m sure that’s aesthetically pleasing to some people. Happy hour menu was pretty small in all honesty, but they made up for it with HUGE flavor. Definitely had a good time here and I’ll br back very soon!

Randomly ended up at Dark Horse for Sunday brunch because another restaurant nearby was full and it was the best thing that could’ve happened! The atmosphere was very chill and cool. Service was top notch. The brunch menu was fantastic! I love exciting menus with dishes that can’t be found anywhere else. All the dishes were very creative with exciting ingredients. I highly recommend La Petite Mort, a delicious sandwich with beignet buns that are rich and slightly sweet. The ham is salty savory and the raspberry jalapeño jam adds the perfect touch to tartness, sweetness, and heat that completes the dish and makes it out of this world! I also tried the Long Face Currito which was absolutely delicious as well if you’re in the mood for something heavier and rich and creamy. Will definitely go back soon.

So I checked this place out tonight and was really excited to try it. Now that I have, I’ll probably never go back.
As a picky eater, I asked for dairy free and onion free fish tacos due to allergies. The waitress made it a point to confirm onions in the slaw so she suggested lettuce and avocado as a topper which I was fine with.
My dining partner ordered the lamb burger. It came out looking like a gourmet fast food burger patty (thin and dry). Needless to say, he was still hungry after chowing.
Now my tacos were a mess. First they came out wrong with the slaw that was supposed to be removed. The waitress came over and I told her it was wrong and she seemed hesitant to send this back to the kitchen. So back it went while my dining partner awkwardly ate alone.
An over fried, dry 2 inch chunk of white fish of some sort with a little avocado slice and then I added some hot sauce. They weren’t good but I was starving. Did I mention not good?
The waitress never really seemed to care much after that. I’ll omit her name but she’s not my favorite and was not very friendly.
So I wanted to love this place but I’m going to pass. Maybe some drinks in the future?

I have been working over the last couple weeks to compile the «ultimate» list of restaurants to try in the Twin Cities. This was the first spot my girlfriend and I decided to tackle because of the sheer volume of positive recommendations we had received.
We stopped in last Thursday night around 10pm for a late-​night dinner date. It was relatively quiet (probably due to the hour and day of the week during which we were visiting), but that only seemed to enhance our experience.
We started with the Turkish Fig Balls. We both agreed we’d never experienced a combination of flavors and textures quite like it, but they were outright incredible. I had the Red Dragon Rice (with pork belly added in) and she ordered the Bucatini. Both were top-​notch and made for some delicious leftovers. We split an order of the Roasted Brussels Sprouts with bacon and kimchi relish as a side dish. They stole the show, in our opinion. Absolutely delicious. The Sweet Hummus Trio for dessert was a great way to end the meal.
Our waitress was great, ambiance was great, food was great. My only concern with beginning this culinary tour of MSP at Dark Horse is that I’m not sure that anywhere else we visit can live up to this meal.

Ordered their $ 20 pizza special of the day. Waitress dropped off the mediocre tasting pizza and by the time we got a hold of her to request Parmesan cheese… most of the pizza was gone. Oh yes, then they charged us almost a buck with tip and tax for the Parmesan cheese. Seems petty I know, but really? We live in the neighborhood. Pretty venue but will not return.
ps. Someone needs to let them know that their skinny font on the menu with descriptions in italic are very hard to read. Sometimes trying to be clever escapes the customers.

We were there on Saturday night (Valentines), with a party of 4. This was our first time. We didn’t have reservations and it was busy, but got seated pretty quick. The service was good, friendly, and knowledgeable. We ordered pizza, Brussels sprouts, Red dragon rice, and dumplings. Everything was very good. The sprouts were exceptional, and the red dragon rice was fantastic. We really like the décor, the ambiance, and location. They have a lot of beer on tap, and made good strong drinks. Definitely recommend. Another great spot for lower town St. Paul. Thank you CHS and Saints.

cool venue and I like the set up inside with the high ceilings and exposed brick, has a cool warehouse style vibe. Hard to compare Lowertown St. Paul to North Loop Minneapolis — definitely different crowds as Dark Horse was emptying out around 8/8:30 on a Saturday. Food was OK — wings are on FIRE, gnocchi’s were good, curry was decent. Decent place for the StP crowd but I probably won’t be back anytime soon.

Was very excited to check this place out with some friends on a Friday night. No problem getting a table which was nice. Went down hill from there. The restaurant is very pretty and well laid out. Bar area looked awesome to sit at. Our table of four was unfortunate as one table was taller then the other which made it awkward to sit at. To make matters worse the taller table was super wobbly and more than once did I almost dump my glass of beer on the floor because it was that rocky (very annoying). Our waitress was obviously in a bad mood as she greeted us with long face and not even a hint of a smile. She was very short with us and seemed annoyed (We just got there). Awesome tap list, I got the evil twin sour beer (yum!), After scouring the menu she came back to take our order and a few of us asked some questions about the menu, again she was very short and condescending (not exactly a good feeling before ordering food.) I ended up ordering the elk burger and a side of the yukon jojos because I was afraid to ask any more questions about the menu. The elk burger came with a little salad on the side of the plate and the fries with a side of dipping sauce. The elk burger was pretty dry and had no pink despite asking for medium. It also was very bland and needed some seasoning salt or just something in general. The jojo fries on the other hand were over seasoned and just seemed like too much going on there, I ate about half and regretted ordering them after seeing they were $ 5. This place looks really awesome and I was very excited to try it and I had high expectations but the food and service were very below average.
No desire to come back anytime soon, if ever?
2 stars for a cool looking restaurant and bar with a big tap list.
–3 stars for shitty service and food.

A group of friends and I meet up for brunch here yesterday, for a Saturday morning it was nice and quiet.
I ordered the curritos, a Korean inspired burrito. It was ginormous and full of flavor. My only complaint was the menu advertised it with sweet potato hash however when I cut into it, it was really just a chunk of steam sweet potato. Again, still full of flavor but I would have appreciated that textural difference crispy hash would have provided.
Someone in our party ordered the bulgogi taco. Although there were just two tacos, the sides were generously portioned. The sweet potato hash was actually hash, nice and tender.
Another person ordered the farmer’s, again, portion size was huge. The steak was alright, nothing especially special about it. It was a «safe» order if you’re wanting something more familiar.
The last person ordered the pasole, this was perhaps the only lacklustered entrée that we ordered. It was more… soupy than we anticipated. I’m not sure if it was the hominy or if they added flour into the dish as well but it had an overwhelming tortilla taste. In comparison to the other dish it was bland.
Considering we were picking off one another’s order, I would say brunch was a success here. The bloodies were good. The hostess was sweet. Our waitress was polite.

I ended up here on a work trip and I was impressed with the variety on the menu as well as the unique ingredients.
We started out with wings as an appetizer, we tried the dry rub and the salt and pepper. Both were very crispy and had good flavor. They were also the entire wing so the size was definitely sufficient.
I also was a fan of the atomosphere/​décor, definitely cozy on a winter night. For my entrée I had the posole bowl with pork. The flavors were very tasty and the pork was my favorite part, super moist/​tender and delicious.
They also had a good beer selection. I would come back here again.

First review of 2016: Oh Dark Horse I wanted to like you more than I did! I’m always excited to see something — ANYTHING — open up in downtown St Paul so I was excited to try this new spot. Five of us met up there on a Sunday morning for brunch a couple weeks before Xmas. We ran into some people that we knew, so that was a promising sign. The ambiance and décor is really cool, especially the light fixtures. Our server was funny and friendly and helpful.
I wish I could also say I loved the food, but we ordered five different things and no one was impressed. In fact my boyfriend’s sister said she was «disappointed» in her sandwich. The «it’s OK» response to the food is a common theme in other reviews as well. The menu is a bit scattered and I think Dark Horse would benefit from narrowing the scope. The Bloody Marys were great though and I’d consider returning for those. About a week after my visit some people at a party told me that dinner at Dark Horse is very good. The lunch and dinner menus do appeal to me more than the brunch menu did, so may be worth a shot.

Such a hot little spot. Fun. Trendy. Completely unexpected. The steamed dumplings were full of flavor with just the right amount of heat. Turkish fig balls were pure sweet chewy goodness. My salmon was cooked perfectly and a great healthy option filled with flavor and whole foods. My guests loved the super spicy red dragon curry and the dark horse burger. We finished the evening with a raspberry jalapeño cheese cake. The pie crust was not my favorite choice, but I found a new way to use pepper jelly! This place also has a great bourbon/​whiskey/​scotch/​beer list!!!

First time here was New Year’s Eve, after midnight. Wonderful service, limited menu. So happy to have a late night alternative to Bulldog (loud drunks) and Public Kitchen’s lounge floor (awesome but too pricey for frequent visits).
Food on New Years Eve was good… signature burger was a little disappointing, petite and hard to manage but tasty (Public Kitchen’s burger is awesome), but raspberry jalapeño cheesecake was very good. Service was fantastic after a rocky start.
Second visit: The hostess did NOT say «just 1?», bless her. I had the Posole with pulled pork. I debated about adding salt, but once I mixed it in the spicy broth, it was fine. It’s an unusual but wonderful dish. I sat at the bar this time, with solo men on either side of me. Both of them were attended to, while I was ignored. When I pointed this out to the bartender, he looked chagrined, but did not change his behavior. I was never asked about additional wine or dessert. He did, however, comp my last glass of wine and apologize at the end.
Pluses: great menu, good food, music isn’t too loud to talk (MAJOR plus!), pleasant and welcoming female staff, wonderful renovation. Warm, unpretentious and welcoming. Decent parking availability. Glad you have joined the Lowertown community.
Minuses: no «house wine» outside of happy hour. Sketchy location for those within walking distance, but that may improve over time. Pay attention to single women! We are very particular, and we have the funds and social networks to back it up! It’s a mistake to discount us. We are your Lowertown neighbors, and although most may not speak up like me, ignore us at your peril.
Visit #3
This could be my new favorite destination place if it weren’t for the new parking fees.
I had the boiled salmon tonight… a misnomer… And it was awesome. It was the best meal I’ve had in a while. Everything on the plate was awesome and «fresh from the grill» hot. I had the fabulous jalapeño cheesecake again. Ate at the bar. The bartender Christy was wonderful. The female staff here are definitely the stronger ones in terms of customer service and personality.
Side note: awesome music tonight. It was cranked up in volume about 6:30, which was unfortunate. But the selection offset the volume.
Note to future groom with future wife sitting next to me… RUN WHILE YOU CAN! If she’s this controlling now, you will only have scraped the surface with this one.

Firstly, I like the concept of Dark Horse — a cool recycled space, high ceilings, cozy ambiance, cool décor, open kitchen. I had the Dark Horse Burger, which was very good. The beer list is great, some of my favorite IPAs on tap like Bell’s, Steel Toe, etc.
The service however needs work. Our group of 4 got «lost» by the host, we saw another group get seated ahead of us and we reminded him we were waiting. He then seated us but we waited quite a while to order, quite a while for our drinks, quite a while for our food to the point where I started gnawing on the table out of hunger. The meal was over 2.5 hours long due to the slow service… for pub food. I’m hoping they can work this out because this is the kind of place you are rooting for.

I actually enjoyed my experience a lot, though my guests were pretty upset. We came for brunch and ordered Eggs Benedict and florentine.
The florentine was great. Warm, good, flavor combos was on point and the dill potatoes were astounding. My other brunch guests’ benedicts were stone cold. We could see it them sitting out for quite some time before the last dish was ready.
It also took maybe 20 – 25 minutes? We were stuck with just water that whole time. Meal timing needs a little work there
Service was fine, we were seated quickly, and the atmosphere was that typical rustic trendy look that’s so hot right now in Minnesota. I’d actually really like to come back, because I think that this place is onto something. There’s just some detail work.

Pretty good happy hour! $ 3.50 for Deschutes, all the other beers are $ 1 off. I can’t comment on the food but the service was prompt and our server was friendly, despite being so busy on a Friday evening. I enjoy the atmosphere too, it is dimly light and there are candles at every table. A place that I will definitely keep in mind to go back to.

Met up with the girls’ for dinner. We shared the Turkish Fig Balls and the Baozi, both were good, however I preferred the Baozi.
The Kale Quinoa was delicious. For our entrees, we ordered the Hanger Steak, Coconut Lime Rice Bowl and Sweet Corn Gnocchi. The gnocchi was chewy… probably wouldn’t order again.
The caramel macadamia nut tart and jalapeño cheesecake were incredible,

Met a friend for lunch at Dark Horse and would give my dish 3 stars, service 4 stars, so I rounded up from the 3.5 I’d like to have given. I liked the bright, open space.
I ordered the Indian Curry Bowl and loved the main dish (flavorful, fresh, and the egg on top wasn’t just trendy but added to the whole taste in a positive way) but not the sides. The fried eggplant was tough and I don’t think you should serve something that needs to be cut to eat it in a bowl. The naan was not terribly naan-​like. It was moist and not what I was expecting. The menu stated my dish was $ 14, but I was charged $ 12, not sure why.
I’ll give them another try, there were some other items on the menu that looked intriguing!

Service was fast and friendly. Space is truly amazing! They have an open kitchen, which I love.
The food was so meh. I got the Dark Horse burger. It comes on a pretzel bun that I was not impressed with at all. It’s small, hard and not user friendly. The bottom was soggy and the top was hard as a rock. I tried using a fork and knife, but that was even a challenge so I just gave up.
I kept seeing the burger on instagram… it’s truly beautiful and looks fabulous, so maybe my expectations were too high? Unclear. They just need a new bun, asap. The meat itself was just boring. They don’t ask how you’d like it prepared, which is sad because I’d like a little pink.

Great food, great vibe, great staff!
Gorgeous décor and fun/​relaxed atmosphere.
Amazing burgers and pizza. Bloody Mary was also on point.
This will be my go-​to spot in St. Paul!

Went here on Sunday for brunch spontaneously; brunch is served until 3pm. Nice ambiance, warm and modern décor with rustic wood touches, soft lighting, huge bar, and nice modern décor. Location is right on 7^th Street in Lowertown St. Paul and easily accessible.
I had a bloody mary and we ordered the Dark Horse Benedict (sausage, fried green tomato, beer cheese, american fries), Currito (three eggs, korean beef, coconut curry, sweet potato hash), malted waffle with bacon, goat cheese, smoked sea salt maple syrup, a side of sausage, and a side of English muffin.
The Dark Horse Benedict was mediocre. I was informed I should order a side of English muffin because the Benedict didn’t come with any bread of sort. Fail, IMO. Why create something on the menu knowing you’re going to suggest the customer to order something in addition as a side. Besides that, the sausage bland and dry. The Currito is basically a breakfast burrito with a curry side, the curry was again bland and flavorless, the Korean beef was just bland beef — nothing Korean about it. The malted waffle was very… what’s the word, oniony… yes, I said oniony. The menu did not say scallions were in the malted waffle, it was not something I expected and could have been executed well if it wasn’t so overpowering but I was sorely disappointed.
The food was less than mediocre and I would not go back, the service and people were great. The bloody mary was good but not fantastic. Overall, if you’re in Lowertown and want a nice looking restaurant to sit in and maybe drink a summit — try it but if you’re hungry and want good food than I would steer clear. Good luck!