Barbette

	1600 W. Lake St. Minneapolis, MN 612.827.5710 barbette.com

Barbette is an eclectic bistro decorated with vintage French circus posters. The menu offers French classics like croque monsieur, stuffed crepes, nicoise salad and steak frites, and is served late. It also serves coffee, pastries and breakfast items every morning.

Many independent restaurants shutter on Mondays to give staff a much-needed rest and to gear up for the week, but not Barbette, which is open for every meal of the day, seven days a week. Even better, Mondays are prix fixe night, and for $32 chef Sarah Masters offers four-course tasting menus that reflect the eatery’s local-sustainable mantra. 
   
Prix fixe dinners are a fantastic way for diners to try something new that the chef is creating, but which might not yet have gone on the regular menu. And at Barbette, the kitchen puts a lot of work into the Monday menus. “I try to do really interesting things like game; we use meat from local farms and we get cool stuff like elk,” Masters says.
   
A recent menu included mache salad with dill vinaigrette and smoked salmon, a fish course of scallop with wild rice, an entrée of wild boar with sweet potato gnocchi and brandied cherries, and bouche de noel for dessert.