The Capital Grille Awards

The Capital Grille Restaurant Review:

About the restaurant: You can get a comparable or better steak at any of the many steakhouses in the Twin Cities, but none of them make you feel like your company just went public quite like The Capital Grille. The clubby atmosphere (complete with stoic portraits of famous Minnesotans, like Hubert Humphrey) is intended to evoke smoky backroom political dealings, but the Armani-suited crowd smacks of recent millions. The super-connected store their wine in the restaurant's cavernous, climate-controlled wine kiosk, but even those on their first visit will feel well taken care of by the house's 300 selections from California, France and Italy.

Food:The manly, meaty menu (and the fact that steaks are dry-aged on the premises) means you can’t go wrong with, say, the signature 24-ounce dry-aged porterhouse, or a filet mignon---cooked properly and served simply au jus. But don’t overlook the seafood offerings: grilled swordfish with a fennel, herbs and lemon-shallot relish or the sesame-seared tuna steak on gingered rice. For an appetizer, splurge and start out with the cold shellfish platter, a gleaming silver tower of cold baby lobster, chilled Gulf Coast jumbo shrimp and fresh oysters.