Bellecour

A longtime lieutenant to the great Daniel Boulud, Gavin Kaysen left New York behind in 2014 to return to his hometown of Minneapolis. The first restaurant he opened there, Spoon and Stable, featured a mix of influences from Italian to Thai. “We didn’t want it to be pretentious,” Kaysen says. “It doesn’t have a label on it; it’s just good food.”

It is safe, however, to put a label on his second restaurant, Bellecour, located just outside of the city. He has honored his time with Boulud and his reverence for Paul Bocuse with a French restaurant and bakery that celebrates France’s traditional fare. “A lot of chefs are classically trained in French cuisine, and we don’t want to see that style of food go away,” Kaysen says. “I love to eat like that.” Enduring classics like coq au vin, steak frites, and duck à l’orange populate the menu. A must-try is Kaysen’s play on sole Véronique: trout Véronique. He replaces the traditional Dover sole with trout raised locally, steams the fish, and then serves it with Champagne beurre blanc and grapes that provide just enough acid to cut the richness of the dish.

Better yet, he’s managed to bring back these classics without any stuffiness. “We wanted to create a place for the neighborhood where you could go in during the day and casually have a coffee and croissant and come back at night and have a glass of red wine and cassoulet.”

—J.R.