Going Wilde

I have to admit, when Wilde Roast Cafe first opened its doors back in 2004, I was a little underwhelmed.

It was, for one thing, hidden — at the tail end of the "working" segment of East Hennepin, and turned sideways so it was hard to spot. Inside, it was quaint and roomy, with a fireplace and Victorian-style furnishings, plus high tables and Wi-Fi and monstrous desserts. But I just couldn’t figure out what it was.

There were salon nights, for one thing: gatherings to discuss books and topics of one kind and another. There was coffee, there was wine and beer. A limited menu of quick items. But unlike some of the other breakfast-to-bar-time spots that had opened in the same general time frame (Zeno comes to mind), there was nothing edgy about Wilde Roast. It was part library, part sandwich shop. I liked it, but I didn’t think there was anything special about the place.

Boy, was I wrong.

First, Wilde Roast is not just a coffeehouse that happens to serve desserts. It’s a restaurant that makes some of the most sumptuous pastries and cakes in the Twin Cities. You don’t have to take my word for it — I’m easy and would hock my grandmother’s silver for a slice of their amazing carrot cake — you can also call up the cover of the September 2006 issue of Bon Appetit, which featured "La Bete Noire," a flourless chocolate cake made on-site.

Second, the baristas here KNOW HOW TO MAKE A DECENT ESPRESSO. Sorry to shout. But I had a cup of the most godawful tepid water squeezed through inadequately ground beans at the flagship Caribou Coffee (44th and France, in Minneapolis) this morning, and I am sick and tired of paying $2.60 for a coffee drink that tastes like it came out of my teenage son’s shoe. I’m appalled by the way most shops fail to clean and time their espresso machines. But you can get a cup of something real — kaffe with a half-inch of beautiful tan crema on top — at Wilde Roast. Plus, they’ll put it on a doilied plate with a nice little wafer cookie on the side.

However, the best thing about Wilde Roast is something I couldn’t fully appreciate at the time it opened.

Because four years ago, we still had Oddfellows. Boom was operating. And there were one or two other clubs in town where straight couples and gay couples and straight singles and gay singles mixed together like they were all just, er, people. I miss that.

Today, there are gay clubs and straight clubs. Gone is the sweet little restaurant where two dads would hold hands and discuss their son’s soccer team at a table next to the one where a silver-haired man and wife were celebrating their 50th anniversary. There is nowhere else I can think of where it so wholly does not matter who you are or who you love or who you bed, you’re never on the outside.

I had high hopes for Pi, but frankly all those were dashed when my husband and I stopped by late one packed weekend night and were [glaringly] the only white, middle-aged, heterosexual couple in the entire place. Don’t get me wrong. Everyone was nice, the music was great, no one told us we should leave. But I’d been hoping for a true melting pot.

That, to me, is the real beauty of Wilde Roast. It is authentically inclusive. Here, you can step inside, have your perfect cup of espresso and a devilishly good pastry, then a glass of red wine, and feel as if we Minnesotans really maybe actually can get over ourselves and our stupid boundaries and mix like we’re all just weird, lost, fallible humans who need a soft chair and someone to talk to.

"Society exists only as a mental concept," said Oscar Wilde. "In the real world there are only individuals." In fashioning Wilde Roast, the proprietors Dean Schlaak and Tom
DeGree have achieved something we all need: a place where the society is made up of individuals. Imagine that.


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