Casper’s and Runyon’s Nook

I don’t give a lot of 5 stars.
A friend was in town from Ohio. I took her to a late lunch 1:30ish on a Monday (yesterday). Construction on Randolph, took a nice detour without signs. Acquired a parking spot and table no wait.
Burbon bacon chicken sandwich and I the Paul Moliter.
Normally I avoid fresh-​cut fries, soggy and gross.
The reviews are right!!! IMPRESSED! Get the seasoned sour cream.
I started on the fries to let my cheese filled burger cool, I ate them all, we both did!!!
We both slowed down while eating the sandwich/​burger but could not stop!
So full for hours and no supper.
SCORE!!!

Great burgers for a great price! Overall great experience except for parking!!! Otherwise they’d be a 5 star Bar!!!

This place is just amazing. Been here a couple
Times and each time it is positive experience. This place has the best stuffed burgers around and they have a ton of beers on tap

WOW! Every time I go out to eat I always ask for the Tabasco. No surprise I also asked this time as well. However, this burger, the Nookie Ultimate Burger, DID NOT! I still tried it before I finished and to my surprise the Tabasco killed the awesome taste of the burger. I consider my self a big time foodie and claim this burger to be one of the top five best burgers I ever had. The only down side is it does take some time to get your food, but once you taste it, it was well worth the wait!

Amazing!!! Jalapeño popper dip was great!!! Had the Guy’s Big Bite burger. Top three burgers all time for me! Hope some day I get to come back.

Top-​notch curds, top-​notch burgers. I’ve not been in a while, but having tried both a Juicy Lucy and a standard burger from the Nook, you can’t go wrong here. This is one of the few places in the Twin Cities where you can get one of those amazing, juicy, pink-​in-​the-​center burgers that you can find commonplace in other Midwestern metros.
I absolutely love the juicy nookie, from the firm, chewy bun to the molten cheese bursting with flavor into every bite, you can’t go wrong there. Curds-​wise, they fry ‘em up as crispy and in great numbers as well as, if not better than, other burger spots in the area!
Just call ahead, you may be waiting a while :)

The Nook has been serving its cheeseburger and hand-​cut fries for more than 70 years. Current owners, Mike Runyon & Ted Casper acquired the business back in 2000 and have kept the hometown feel and delicious fare rocking and rolling. It’s hard to say which of the creative burgers is my favorite, because they are all SO good. The juicy style burgers (in my opinion), are no doubt the best the Twin Cities has to offer. Sorry Matt’s fans!
The business itself was remodeled due to a building fire back in 2010. The duo did a great job refurbishing what they could and seemed to acquire lots of cool memorabilia to replace that in which was lost. Does it sound like a have a soft spot for the Nook? Fair enough, I am a Saint Paul girl who loves the Nook. I grew up going here with my dad who would tell me all sorts of stories about the neighborhood and his old high school, located across the street.
The good: Whatever you order, you will enjoy (seriously)
The better: Bowling lanes downstairs (F-​U-​N!)
The best: Shamrock’s located off of West 7^th (it’s sister location) has tons of room, and an awesome Irish pub type feel. We all know when the Nook is packed, Shamrock’s can accommodate larger parties during these times…

I love this place. One of my favorite restaurants.
The food is awesome, traditional Minnesota fare here with comfort food aka burgers fries, and other traditional treats.
–Fries are top notch.
–Wings are some of the best I’ve had!
–Juicy Lucy is my fav in town, it’s a stuffed burger oozing cheese. Must try.
–The bowling alley down stairs looks fun.
–The atmosphere is so nice for a dive bar, has some kinda home feel to it.
This is one of my top places to go, I really love the food here and always come back when I’m in town.

A triple D’s stop. Had Guy’s favorite bite, and it was filling. Nice to see it come out hot and fresh. Service was great, and felt welcome for not being a local. If you are checking off triple D locations. Then you must stop on in.

This is my new favorite spot! My boyfriend and I came here after a late concert. They were the only place that was still serving burgers/​food on a Sunday night after 10pm! You know how sometimes really late food isn’t always great because the burners have cooled down, or it’s the end of a day, and the cook is tired and doesn’t care or he’s really impatient and the food isn’t as good? This so wasn’t the case. My bacon cheeseburger was superb, and so were my boyfriend’s onion rings! We’ve been dreaming about the food ever since, so we decided to check it out again last weekend. This time I had the juicy nookie, and the beau had a California burger, no cheese. Again, I was kicking myself that I didn’t upgrade to the onion rings! Next time. Hopefully sooner than later!

This is the home of one of my top three favorite burgers of all time! What’s cool is that this place has a kick-​booty bowling center attached to the pub.
The inside has this low-​key, and relaxed sports bar kind of vibe and the food is absolutely amazing– no neat eating here, folks!

Any place with Juicy Lucy’s and waffle fries is good by me.
But the Nook takes the cake as my favorite place.
The service is always quick, and friendly. And they make a wonderful Mimosa.

I was skeptical of another great Juicy Lucy place but the Nook didn’t disappoint! The place is small — we waited 45 minutes after arriving at 4:30PM but it was worth it!
We tried the Philly Cheese and the Guys Big Bite. OMG — the big bite — with all the roast beef on it — by far the most amazing burger at the restaurant. Arrive early but enjoy the food — the portions are large and you won’t leave hungry!

Do you need a burger right this darn minute? C’mon over to The Nook because they got you covered.
I came in right as my pain meds for my latest injury were wearing off, and I needed a good burger to improve my mood (and to fill my tummy for the next round of pain meds). Weekday lunch is surprisingly not that busy. I stole a table all to myself, and there was a good rotation of tables while I was there. My server was lovely, despite my somewhat surly attitude. She got me everything I needed when I asked for it without a delay. My order went in right away, and it came out pretty fast. The place certainly wasn’t empty, so they’re doing something right with their timing.
The burger list was pretty large, but I went with the Tuesday special: The Triple B ($ 7.95). Bourbon Bacon Burger, om nom nom. It splooged a bit on my hand and was a bit difficult to eat, but I also only have one usable arm right now so, if you have two arms and hands to wrangle these burgers with, you’ll probably have an easier, less messy time. The smoked cheddar and the bourbon sauce oozed around with the fried onions in a delicious mess on top of that burger and thick-​cut bacon. Lawd, yes.
The fries are nothing to write home about. Indeed, I didn’t much care for them when they were served to me. However, I did bring them home (ketchup solves everything, lbr) and the remaining fried onion, cheese, and bourbon sauce soaked into the cold fries, and now they are delicious while cold. FYI for future discriminating fry peeps!

This is it. The best juicy Lucy in Minnesota. I believe the Nook has a better Lucy then Matt’s, 5.8, Blue Door, etc. I’ve tried it all and The Nook comes out on top.

Just saw this place on travel channel and I can’t wait to visit this place… I give it 5 stars just watching them cook and eat this Nookie Burger on TV ! Yum.
We also just found out my son will be play summer baseball on the Wilmar Stingers team, so this will be the first place we go when we get off the plane from Cali ! (He played in Wisconsin last year so, jury is still out on the cheese curds in Minn.)

Sears service just keeps going downhill. We bought a 5 year maintenance contract on our Kenmore high efficiency/​low water washing machine in 2013. Recently, the paint began to chip off on the inside of the lid. Rust formed, and rust particles are falling into the machine. So I called Sears, expecting they would replace the lid with one on which the white enamel had been baked on in such a way that it wouldn’t chip off when exposed to (gasp!) hot water. No, says Sears. They don’t even want to look at it because, «Rust from the machine falling into the wash is merely cosmetic! So the service contract doesn’t apply.» (By the way, Sears no longer allows customers to comment on its Facebook page. I’m guessing they feel their customers should just buy the product, put up with its defects, and not complain about it.)

I found this burger joint after researching about restaurants in St. Paul. Supposedly in the top 10 best burgers in the country. I have no complaints about the food. The burger was awesome. The cheese curds were even better. I just wish that there was more of a beer selection. The atmosphere was fun downstairs next to a bowling alley.

Uh — sorry Matt’s and The 5 – 8, The Juicy Nookie is definitely the best «Juicy Lucy» style burger in town. Order it medium-​rare with caramelized onions. You won’t be disappointed. Plus the fries are out-​of-​this-​world good. Hand-​cut and cooked perfectly crisp (If you’re one of those crazy people who don’t like crisp fries you won’t like these…) Be prepared to wait for a table. This place is very popular and also very small.

As the ongoing debate for the best Juicy Lucy continues this place seems to keep getting over looked. And that will always puzzle me because this place has some of the best and most innovative burgers around! Their Juicy Nookie burger is fantastic along with just about anything you buy from here! Don’t skip this place if you’re on the look for the best burgers… You have no clue what you’re missing until you stop in!

We moved to Florida, but every holiday I come back to our original home St. Paul, MN and the Nook is the first place we head to eat. They some how are so consistent in their amazing burgers and I am never disappointed. I love this place! I wish I could take them home with me. If you get there and the upstairs is full, ask to be seated in the lower level where the bowling alleys are. I personally like that area anyway because I enjoy to see everyone bowling and having a good time plus all the dollar bills posted on the ceiling.

I can’t say enough about the food here. The burgers are great. The fries are great. The atmosphere is one of a kind with it’s bar/​bowling alley/​sports theme.
Always had to wait, but it’s always been well worth it!

Well it’s been a few years since the olé Rick has been here and it certainly did not disappoint. The burger we tried was The Spanish Fly which is half Spanish chorizo and half ground beef stuffed with molten hot queso served with fries. So the meal was great in stuff then I found a bowling alley down stairs with another bar ! Love this place, make sure you try a new burger each visit !

I feel like the midwest is the only place you’re going to find a neighborhood bar with a second bar and bowling alley in the basement and that’s why I love it.
We headed here to try their version the juicy lucy (juicy nookie). Maybe the sandwich itself is overhyped, I don’t know, the manfriend thought it was ok, but not worthy of his best burgers list. He went traditional with the juicy nookie. While we’re both cheese lovers, I don’t think he loved the messiness of the burger either, which doesn’t skimp on the cheese, spewing it out like lava. Not being a beefeater, I went with the black bean burger made like a patty melt. I thought my sandwich was really good and was impressed at the creaminess of the cheeses on it.
Maybe we went on an off afternoon, but we both agreed, the fries were kind of bad. I think we got a mix of old and new fries — some were over-​fried and hard.
If you’re in the MSP area, this is a unique old school neighborhood haunt that’s worth a visit.

This has got to be one of the best burgers in the cities. They live up the hype and I can see why they have been voted «Best Burger».

Won the HotWing Challenge in half the time allotted (9:32)!
What wonderful flavor, to say the very least!
Who knew there were lanes downstairs for some amazing bowling alongside the best food in town…
My previous review raved the staff and owners. Nothing has changed. :)

Another amazing neighborhood place which makes St Paul so special and unique. Almost too many burgers on the menu to make a decision but great quality.
Believe it was renovated in the past years after a fire so the place has a relatively newer feel but still fits old school st paul.

Perhaps these juicy lucys aren’t my thing. But who am I to say this? I’m not even a true Minnesotan. After two juicy lucy attempts, I am still far from being blown away by it. In the end, I prefer my bacon guac burgers over any burger filled with melted cheddar.
The juicy nookie is better than the one at Matt’s bar and the servers are MUCH more friendlier. Service can still be approved, at Casper’s and Runyon’s, they need more servers and possibly a hostess to seat people. But again who am I to judge? This is Minnesota, this is a bar.
On to the food now, after my first not so great experience at Matt’s. I learned to be extremely cautious with juicy lucys/​nookies. I thought waiting a couple more minutes and biting slowly and in smaller bites would do the trick but NOPE hot lava cheese still burned my thumb anyways.
The meat could be more juicy ironically. The cheese doesn’t do much, plus I’m not a big fan of cheddar, I prefer swiss or mozzarella.
Portions are pretty big though, much bigger than Matt’s, plus it includes a huge side of fries.
The Wisconsin cheese curds are the first I’ve ever tried, they remind me of mozarella sticks but saltier. I sure hope the bacon ones are less salty. I recommend eating it with ketchup because it balances out the saltiness. The sauce it comes with doesn’t compliment it too well.
All in all, I’d say it’s only worth trying if you’re visiting. It’s kind of a gimmicky thing to eat.

Forgive me, Burger Father, for I have sinned. I went to 5 – 8, not once, but twice, thinking that that was where I could find a decent Juicy Lucy. I confess my ignorance, and I have since seen the light… shining out of a Juicy Nookie at The Nook.
I feel like Lucy has cursed me. Whenever I try to get a Juicy Lucy, I am the one who gets shafted with the deflated cheeseless burger. It’s really quite sad and it causes me to reflect on the lengthy list of what I could have done to deserve this (But we don’t have time for that right now). But at C & R’s Nook, I finally found redemption in a glorious velveeta-​combo cheese filling that flowed out of the patty like delicious… yellow lava goo stuff. It was great too that there were more toppings beyond one pickle slice (I got grilled onions and several pickles). The service is usually great here too. I could drink their ranch, that pairs dangerously with their perfect cheese curds.
One time, I had the honor of witnessing Sam W. kick the Hot Damn Wing Challenge’s ass — he housed down 14 of their devilish chicken wings within 20 mins, sans beverage, dipping sauce, or joy. Well that deal with the devil backfired, as Sam enjoyed the flavor, did not find them that hot, and went home with a sweet T-​Shirt, bragging rights, and a Porky Pig bobble head that Jenny bought him there. It was very impressive and entertaining.
The Nook can get crowded, but at least there are two levels. The downstairs is mostly a bowling alley, though. This isn’t a full five stars because though it can be considered charming, being packed in that dingy setting can also be… kinda gross. But it’s got character! I’ve also had a disappointing and flavorless chili cheese dog there before, but I’ll stick to the heavenly burgers from now on.

The Nook is hands down one of the best burger joints in the Twin Cities. The Nook offers a divey vibe and cozy feeling to the hungry and burger lovers of America! Don’t come here for a salad; come to The Nook for greasy, filling, belly loving American Food. How can you not appreciate a place that sticks to what they know and has cheese curds that are almost as good as the Minnesota State Fair’s? Psssst the Nook has to die-​for Maple Bacon Cheese Curds, no lie! The staff is friendly, the owner’s are down to earth and the menu has something for everyone (except for people that only eat rice cakes and almond butter). Although my favorite Juicy Lucy goes to Matt’s Barr, the burgers are on point and will make your stomach happier than a bagel in a cream cheese factory.
Word to the Wise: The restaurant is small and popular. On nice summer nights and weekends you’ll more than likely have to wait outside in a line. Street parking only; work on your parallel parking. You can sometimes get seated faster if you eat downstairs in the bowling alley area.
The Nook is definitely on my list of top ten places to eat in Minnesota and should be added to your foodie bucket list immediately!

This place is so legit. Worthy of every star. My burger was TO DIE FOR. I am not exaggerating at all. Even my kiddo, who is hard to please, said his burger was the best burger he’s ever had and he liked the fries a lot «even though they aren’t McDonalds» so that is saying a lot coming from him.
Word on the street was that they had a Homer Simpson burger for the month of April as a special. I even called ahead of time to confirm. My dreams were coming true. A burger with a DONUT for a bun? I put on my leggings (fatpants) and away we went. Sunday nights after 4 pm is kids eat free and I am frugal, so we showed up right after 4 pm.
I ordered mine to be a bison burger instead of regular beef (trying to make a donut burger healthy. Lol) and it also came with cheese, bacon, and I added an egg to it because eggs on everything make it even better. All on a donut. It was intense. And sweet potato fries.
I told my kiddo that this place was known to be some of the best burgers in MN and he agreed with that statement. I’ve been here before for Lucy’s and turkey burgers and they are all amazing as well. Service was great– I am a pain in the ass to wait on sometimes and I know it but my server took my indecisiveness well and was great.

We wanted to unwind after arriving to St. Paul, and found this place on Unilocal.It was only a few miles so decided why not.
The Nook has a charm to it, kind of like your neighborhood «Cheers».
Service was so attentive even with the place being a bit loud.
I had the bacon cheese burger, the beef was well cooked but dry. What caught me off guard was that the waitress asked me if I wanted my onions raw or sautéed. Well when I got my burger it only had pattie, bacon and onion. I was taken back a bit.
My partner in crime ordered the juicy Nookie burger and it was medium (as stated in the menu) that is a turn off for me). Again, only onions. I’m thinking what the hell?
I was going to give them 3 stars but then a week later, the Nook was featured on triple D and only onion is their signature trademark.
The fried cheese curds were great and the beer on tap was refreshing.
The nook was a nice place to spend our first evening in St. Paul.
Oh yes, there is a bowling alley in the basement, how cool is that?

The juicy lucy burger I got was off the chains. I mean chedder cheese melted on top of roast beef on top of a juicy lucy patty stuffed with pepperjack! WTF? The hell did I just eat?! A damn good burger. That’s what went in my belly.
Don’t even get me started on their honey glazed bacon bitty cheese curds. Their burgers are out of this world along with their crispy and fluffy fries. Sometimes words don’t do justice and this is one of those times. You ought to try this place out.
There really is no good time to go there because it is always packed. It’s well worth the wait though. Parking can be difficult. Just find a spot to park. It’s worth walking a mile to get to this place. Even in minus 20 degrees.

Everyone should go to the Nook. I met about 30 other guys there on a Tuesday night, we called ahead and rented lanes it was easy, peasy. The bowling alley is full of nostalgia: you get to keep your own score, the lanes are well oiled and the mechanics mostly work. And then there is a full bar and food that will be delivered to your lane. The beer selection was ok; I always prefer more local craft options on tap but there were a couple. I tried the Spanish Fly, a juicy lucy that is half beef, half chorizo with pepper jack cheese in the middle. It was ok, the burger itself was a little tough, I know making a chorizo burger that holds together can be hard, the meat seemed overworked. The fries were phenomenal, one of my friends ordered fries with a cheese sauce that was out of this world.
We had a fun night and I will definitely go back, Guy Fieri says they have the best burger in America so I will have to try more to find one I like.