The Blue Door Pub, St. Paul

The Blue Door Pub is one of two St. Paul bars with Juicy Lucys to rival the Minneapolis originals

Minneapolis is home to the Juicy Lucy burger, a cheeseburger cooked with the cheese inside the meat. The melting cheese keeps the meat tender and delicious. A proper Juicy Lucy is served in a blue collar bar and washed down with cheap beer.

The Twin Cities restaurant scene can't keep anything sacred, and it seems like everything needs to be re-invented, or have a new twist, or served with gourmet accessories.

The Juicy Lucy is no exception and the Blue Door didn't just redo the Juicy Lucy, they serve around ten varieties of the humble burger and make special seasonal versions. There's a Luau version, for goodness's sake - can you get any more removed from a south Minneapolis dive bar than that?

I wanted to dislike the Blue Door for getting all pretentious with a inside-out cheeseburger. But, then bars and restaurants all over the Twin Cities get all pretentious with regular burgers, so what's the difference? Besides, a Blucy - a Blue Door Juicy Lucy, made with blue cheese, is a great burger. The hangover-busting Breakfast Blucy has bacon and a fried egg (bacon cures hangovers) and the fancy, worldly burgers sound like they could be good too. If you need an incentive to try them all, get a punch card that when you've tried all their Blucys, you'll get a free burger and a free limited edition Blue Door t-shirt.

As well as burgers, there's other fancied-up comfort food, a good range of local and national craft beers, and a cozy atmosphere. The place isn't very big, it gets busy and a line is common, but then it would loose the comfortable feeling.

There's a place for the south Minneapolis bar Juicy Lucys, and a place for the Blue Door's blucys. Vive la difference.