The Pastry Shoppe

Jeanne's take:

We are on vacation in Lanesboro, MN this weekend for fishing opener. This town reminds me of Andes, NY.  We decided to try The Pastry Shoppe for breakfast on Sunday as it was recommended by the woman who owns the little motel we stayed at.

Paul picked this place

When we drove past this place on our way into town I noticed that the windows were cracked and it looked like they were covered with butcher paper. I didn't expect it to be a place that was still in business, but they are.
We arrived at about 8:30am and there were tables filled with older locals drinking coffee and gossiping. Only one person ordered food (something called The Hangover) and that should have been my clue to turn around and get out.
We wanted to sit in a booth, but the booth bench was so high that the table hit my knees when I sat down. We moved to a table that was crammed in to a bunch of other tables and was greeted by a server that was "brand new" to the restaurant. She was friendly and got us coffees right away, but we had to wait for silverware to stir in our cream and sugar. The coffee was pretty weak and nothing to talk about.
The big deal about The Pastry Shoppe is that there's no menu. The cook puts some specials on the board but you can literally ask him to make you whatever you want. I guess that would be a good thing if the guy knew how to make his food edible.

*side note*

The place was pretty dirty. I could see into the kitchen. No one was wearing gloves and stuff was spilled and there was an uncovered bowl of dough that had to have a dry skin on top from sitting there for god knows how long. The space was quite large but it was filled with those useless benches and round tables just shoved into a space. The pastry case was old and dirty and didn't make anything look appealing. Like I mentioned above, the large windows were cracked and patched with scotch tape and that butcher paper was actually old, yellowing curtains that haven't seen a washing machine in probably a decade.

*end side note*

Ok, so I ordered the Eggs Benedict off the board. Now, I know the server said she was "brand new", but she asked me how I wanted my eggs. When I said "Uh, poached?" she looked at me like I was just making up words. I told her that's how the eggs are made in a Benedict. She took Paul's order and gave the ticket to the cook. I also asked for a caramel pecan sticky bun. When it arrived and I took a bite I could tell there was no salt ANYWHERE in any part of the pastry or caramel. There was barely any caramel, either. Both of us took one bite and had to push it to the side.

No Salt. Yuck.

My Benedict came and right away I could see that the eggs were seriously under cooked. Not only that, the wheat toast that came with it was not even toast. It was just a big piece of bread with ham, eggs, and Hollandaise on top.

Why is there cheese on it?

I motioned the server over and told her that I did not like this at all and could she please have the stuffed french toast made for me. She looked at me like she was going to be fired if she did what I asked, but about 6 minutes later I got the French toast.

Looks normal, right?

I cut into it and it was clear that the cream cheese and berry compote were smeared on the inside BEFORE dipping and grilling. It was like eating bread with hot cream cheese and sour jam. I just couldn't. I had a few bites but it was just awful.

Nope. Just bread with hot cream cheese and jam.

We asked for the bill and I think the total was $20 for our dishes and two coffees. Paul left the server $5 tip because, of course, none of it was her fault. I have never wanted to run out of a place so fast in my life (well, until we went to The Branding Iron in Preston, but that's another story for another time). I'm sure the locals think this place is the tits (just take a look at Facebook or Yelp) but I found it to be a really bad dining experience, for sure.
-------
0 out of 4 stars
Will never return, ever
-------
Paul’s take
Well the motel owner said this was a good place to eat, that’s why I picked this place. She was wrong.
Now Jeanne and me know a few things about restaurants and all of the warning signals that we saw well, I guess we ignored. That was a bad mistake.
Like Jeanne said the tables and chairs were kind of a cluttered mess. The place was really a dump. We had to request silverware so we could stir our coffee. I had to send my fork back because it was dirty.
The kitchen was open and you could see right in. It was a nasty disgusting kitchen. Jeanne ordered a pecan roll but I thought that it looked pale and under cooked and like something was off. It had no flavor and it was undercooked and doughy.

Nasty kitchen

                                    

Check out the make up air coming in from this big air duct up by the ceiling. Nice!

I ordered the pastrami hash with my eggs over easy. The plate of pastrami hash with eggs on top had a oily looking ring around it, "WHIRL" yikes!

Bazaar oily puddle, slightly warmed wheat bread. See the bazaar blueberry compote in the portion cup?

The blueberry jelly was really just blueberry compote with not much sugar and all runny. I put a little on my luke warm wheat "bread" and gave it a taste. It was crap.
I didn’t finish my breakfast. The cheap hashbrowns waterlogged with whirl and mixed with salty pastrami really got to be more than I could finish.
No menus! Really?
Jeanne will make sure that I don’t forget that her choice for dinner last night was absolutely rocking and my choice for breakfast today was the wurst!

We saw this sign on a bench in here. It seemed to be speaking to us.

----------
0 out of 4 stars
Never again
-----------