5/2/25 Des Moines Food News: The Travel Edition
How far will you travel for food, Des Moines?
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Gems: Tasty Tacos
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Love: Des Moines Food and Restaurant News
☕ denotes additional thoughts in The Chai below
Openings, Closings, and Such
5 Borough Bagels’ Jordan Creek location closed because their landlord kicked them off their lease early. Rude. (Reg)
Elena’s Desserts is operating out of The Mickle Center, likely to prep for the DTFM, as that’s one of this year’s Spark DSM businesses.
La Mie is taking over the Art Center’s eatery (Reg).
The Donut Den is an Indianola food truck selling mini donuts, smoothies, and coffee. You can find them on Facebook.
Chain news
News
Iowa’s 2025 Best Burger is from Halftime Bar and Grill in Pleasantville.
Iowa Capital Dispatch returns with the monthly dose of gross.
I don’t know anything about the Urban Bicycle Food Ministry yet, but it looks like a good thing regardless of religion.
Exile Brewing Company launched a new menu Thursday, which includes some of original Latin King dishes like their signature chicken spiedini. ☕
Wanna rent a chicken? (IPR)
Events
This weekend kicks off HOLY FUCK WE HAVE TO DO EVERYTHING ON THE WEEKENDS WHILE IT’S NICE OUT season. It’s impossible to keep up, so I might cut back on what I share.
The number one event I want you to know about is this. Dinner Delights is hosting The Next Course: Culinary Grief Therapy Group.
It is a gorgeous and brilliant combination of food and mental health. The 6-week course helps people experiencing loss learn how to cook in practical, easy ways. Dinner Delights chef and owner (and my friend) Andrea Love is curating the recipes and cooking instruction while local therapist Andrea Gustafson, LISW handles the grief assistance.
Dinner Delights will be hosting more of these types of classes. It’s one of the most community-driven, loving things I think a business can do.
If you do nothing else this week, please share the link with a loved one who might be suffering with grief.
If you’re planning on going anywhere this weekend, note that both the Kentucky Derby and Cinco de Mayo celebrations are happening.
Redditor limitedftogive’s weekly events list! Some highlights:
Barista’s Bouquet Book Swap
Iowa Food Cooperative’s Plant Sale
Saturday, May 3
Sunday, May 4
Science of Tea at the Botanical Garden
Wednesday, May 7
Capital Call x Lua Brewing Farm to Table Dinner at Middlebrook Agrihood
A word: Middlebrook Farm in Cumming has a fuckton of events, and I simply do not have the spoons to list all of them.
Thursday, May 8: Spring Rosé Dinner at Centro
Monday, May 12: Market at Oak Park
May 23 and 24: Celebrasian
Saturday, May 24: The Hello Kitty food truck returns
Thursday, May 29: Ashes and Diamonds Wine Dinner at Oak Park
Friday, May 30: Live, Laugh, Lamb from Crafted Food Services💚
Heads up! The Greek Food Fair is June 6-June 8 and is cashless this year.
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Where Food and Politics Intersect
Thank you for using Publicsquare for its most useful purpose!
If you’re at a central Iowa coffeeshop and see a newspaper-like zine called Emerald City (pictured below), recycle it, please. The creator, whose Reddit profile is on the right, loves to spew transphobic and white supremacist shit. Here’s the Reddit thread, tw // disturbing, transphobic, MAHA, etc.
Sometimes, I post thoughts on Substack Notes. Have you checked those out?
Good luck with your civil rights:
Donuts: Is Chu Chu Better than Linda?
Axios readers picked Chu Chu Donuts as the best in town. Linda Donuts was way down on the list. I love Chu Chu, but I’m so partial to Linda Donuts that I don’t even think about going back to Chu Chu. Should I?
Did you know this exists?
Barista’s Bouquet is mentioned in events above, but . . .
Where’s This?
Last week was Raccoon River Brewing Company, which was where Bubba is now.
How about this week? Pardon the shitty watermark correction.
Book Nook
Emergent Strategies: At first, I wasn’t into this book. Now, it’s deeply pushing me back to centering my values. I want you to read it. Very much so. Please.
Did you know Bookmarks exists? It’s an online, independent bookstore.
Life in General
Hi. Family Planning Council of Iowa volunteer here, and I LOVE THIS.
I want you in my community because you and I got some small shit to do:
Don’t Skip the Small Stuff
In 1997, a book called Don’t Sweat the Small Stuff . . . and it’s all Small Stuff was released. The first part of its title became a cultural mantra.
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☕ The Chai
Latin King/Exile Brewing/Maxie’s
While awaiting jury selection, I ended up chatting with the daughter of the former owner of Maxie’s Supper Club. She said the new owner of Maxie’s formerly served as Latin King’s manager. She said Maxie’s owner took some of the original Latin King recipes with her, and they’re now being served at Maxie’s. (Latin King is no longer locally owned.) I’d forgotten to mention this the last few weeks, and seeing Exile introducing Latin King’s old dishes reminded me. If you loved classic Latin King, you now have two options!
Inspection Reports
What is it with new restaurants opened by established restaurateurs having high violations? Cooper’s in Norwalk and Merll’s Pub and Patio both had seven or more violations. Odd, especially for Cooper’s.
Gross News Reporting
As far as I know, the family of Simpson’s president, Jay Byers, has not disclosed a cause of death. Yet both The Simpsonian and KCCI have the suicide hotline at the bottom of their stories about Byers.
That is absolutely not fucking cool. Unless they got permission from the family to do that, it’s a gross move.
Recs!
7 Stone Pizzeria
I don’t know their values stances (yet), but if you want deep-dish pizza, the answer is not Felix and Oscar’s. While theirs is good, the best place is 7 Stone in West Des Waukee. Their crust gets as close as you can get to Pequod’s Pizza in Chicago. It’s caramelized cheese, and good gob, I’d shank a bro for it. OK, I wouldn’t, but if I’m gonna wreck myself with tomatoes, this is the way to go.
Mekong Sandwich
I have not been to Mekong Sandwich (Google Maps) yet, but I have to share it because it’s one of the best secrets in this city. And by “best secrets” I mean you literally have to be told where it is, how to order, to remember to take cash, and what to expect. Otherwise, no one would believe that it’s real or that you won’t get kidnapped. If you’re not convinced it’s that unusual, check out this Reddit thread about it banh mi sandwiches.
💚
The green heart denotes my Trusted businesses. While I will not speak to anyone’s specific political or social beliefs because that’s not my place, I will tell you I am confident spending my money with the marked businesses.
If you followed me on Instagram, you know I had an IG highlight of Trusted businesses. I was in the middle of that work when Fuckerberg pissed me off enough to make me leave Meta. I’m working toward rebuilding that list here, and it will only be available to paid subscribers i.e. you!
Cash Mob!
The Trusted list brings me to cash mobs. Last week, I asked if my readers had heard of cash mobs. 31 people voted, and it was 100% no. Well, Gems, you are getting an introduction to cash mobs soon, but here’s the TL;DR preview. A cash mob is like a flash mob except a bunch of people descend on a small, local business and buy shit. This is something I have in the works. It’s my way of trying to boost business for local eateries. Again, only paid subscribers will have access to cash mob location and time drops. So, please stay tuned! This will be your push to get out and try new places!
Until next time . . .
