A pair of good meals in St. Paul and Minneapolis

I was just in St. Paul/Minneapolis for a few days and had some very nice meals. I'm posting about them since it seems strangely hard to find out about good food in the Twin Cities--not on this website necessarily, but anywhere on line. Many seem to think of the area as a vast cultual wasteland, which I didn't find to be the case at all! But I digress. Here are the two places that I went to eat out:

True Thai
2627 E. Franklin Ave
Minneapolis
(612)375-9942

Khyber Pass
1571 Grand Ave
St Paul, MN 
(651)690-0505

At True Thai we had a couple of appetizers and three main courses. My favorites were a Choo Chee curry with scallops, and a laab (salad) with faux duck.The sauce in the curry was great (love that kaffir lime leaf!) and the scallops themselves were fresh and tender, without that bitter taste that usually makes me wary of ordering them from restaurants I don't know. Luckily I was overruled. The faux duck salad also was really tasty, the texture of the "duck" was perfect, and while not spicy enough for me, the overall flavor was wonderful, a great summer dish. Everything else we had was quite good, just not as memorable. We didn't try to get anything "off the menu", and while not as revelatory a meal as I've had a few times at TAC or Spoon here in Chicago, it was very good.

Khyber Pass was another big hit. I've never had Afghan food before, so I was really looking forward to the meal, and I was not disappointed. The space itself was nicely designed, very "moorish" for wont of a better word--something like the Alhambra on a much smaller scale. It's small but nicely spaced, with high ceilings and archways, with Afghani rugs hung overhead. For an appetizer we had chive dumplings, which were dressed in a yogurt sauce and served with a cilantro/walnut chutney. Lovely. The dumplings looked like large, flat ravioli and the texture of the wrapping was al dente while the filling was tender and melting. My main was a stewed lamb over mung beans and rice, dressed with more of the wonderful cilantro walnut chutney. It's one of the better lamb dishes I've had in a long time. My friend had a beef kofta dish which was also delicious--dense "meatballs" of spiced beef with rice and lentils. All of our food was good, with lots of spice but not spicy, so I would say definitely kid-friendly. Also a decent selection of vegetarian options.

So there's my two cents worth about the Twin Cities. I'll be back there soon so I'll eat more and post again!

Sorry for the length of the post; I'm not used to writing about food. Just eating it (and talking about it).

edited to fix spelling of "khyber" (!!)

Thanks for the info, Geli. I am unclear on one thing, tho - are you apologizing because you think the post is too long or too short? Seems just write to me. Looking forward to more, because you just never can tell when the Twee Cities will call.