eat + drink

Great wine lists are a dime a dozen in the Twin Cities. The Wine Spectator lists more than 30 local restaurants with award-winning wine selections. But great beer lists are a lot harder to find, and the Happy Gnome has one of the best.

The new neighborhood tavern, which has replaced Chang O'Hara's on Selby Avenue in St. Paul, offers 24 draft beers on tap and more than 70 bottled beers, ranging from Great Divide Yeti Imperial Stout from Colorado to De Troch Framboise, a traditional Belgian beer made with raspberries.

For a neighborhood tavern, the food is pretty impressive, too. Chef Camille Opland, a veteran of Lucia's Restaurant in Minneapolis, raises the bar for bar fare with a repertoire that ranges from spicy orange soy chicken wings and Polish sausage sandwich with red cabbage and onion sauerkraut to a beef carpaccio with capers, lemons and smoked salt, and a vegetarian entree of seared polenta with mushroom ragout, arugula salad and basil pesto.

What is perhaps most surprising about the Happy Gnome's beer selection is how many of the world's great beers aren't offered: no Pilsner Urquell, no Guinness Stout, no Bass Ale -- but maybe that's the point: You can get those beers at dozens of restaurants around town. Instead, the focus here is on harder-to-find American microbrewery beers.

Leaving the more famous beers off the list makes room for some wonderful brews you can't find elsewhere, such as Avery IPA from Colorado and Victory Hop Devil from Pennsylvania. As a self-confessed hophead, I was especially impressed by the Surly Furious, from the newly opened Surly Brewing Co. in Brooklyn Center. It's an extremely hoppy ale balanced by plenty of malty body.

Some of the starters sound like typical bar fare, but they are all given a creative twist: The calamari (also available as a salad) are deep-fried in a beer batter made with Hoegaarden's famous fruity wheat beer, the pizza is topped with gorgonzola, pears and a mixed green salad with balsamic dressing, and the bruschetta, sliced grilled bread, are topped with a messy, very tasty pile of stewed white beans, tomato and herbs. The crab cakes were small, but consisted of generous amounts of crabmeat and minimal filler.

The half-dozen sandwiches range from a Polish sausage with red cabbage and onion sauerkraut to a hearty grilled cheese made with Black Diamond Cheddar, fresh tomatoes and roasted onion, plus a couple of burgers: an Angus burger with pickled aioli, or a bacon bison cheeseburger with horseradish mustard.

Only four entrees are offered, including almond-crusted walleye, Amish bone-in chicken breast with couscous and dried fruit, seared polenta and a bison sirloin, plus a daily pasta special. Of those I sampled, my favorites were the seared polenta, crisp on the outside and creamy at the center, topped with a lively ragout of mushrooms, tomatoes and basil pesto, and a pasta special of al dente fettuccine, with shrimp in a light and delicate lemon white-wine butter sauce. Desserts come from the Piece of Cake pastry shop across the street, and change often. If the strawberry rhubarb tart is available, don't miss it.

Beer-tasting dinners, held about once a month, give chef Opland a chance to stretch. For a dinner earlier this month that showcased the brews of Pennsylvania's Victory Brewing Co., Opland paired an appetizer of prosciutto, melon and Schwartz Weiss blue cheese from Iowa with Victory's sweet and spicy V-Twelve Belgian-style ale, and an entree of Dusseldorf-style Ten Years Alt with a bison sirloin.

Service is casual and friendly. Until the end of the month, the Happy Gnome will have a smoking area, including the bar, but the nonsmoking section is pretty well separated and ventilated.

More good flavors in town

As long as we are on the topic, a couple of other taverns with great beer selections deserve mention: The Muddy Pig, a few blocks away at 162 N. Dale St., has some of the same owners, and nearly as many beers available and even more European beers. And the Acadia Cafe, 1931 Nicollet Av. S., Minneapolis, has an excellent selection of draft beers and a good, but much less ambitious menu of soup and sandwich fare.

Happy Gnome ** 1/2

Location: 498 Selby Av., St. Paul, 651-287-2018.

Hours: Kitchen open Sunday 11:30 a.m. to 10 p.m. , Monday through Thursday 11:30 a.m. to 11 p.m., Friday and Saturday 11:30 a.m. to midnight. Bar open Sunday through Thursday until 1 a.m., Friday and Saturday until 2 a.m.

Atmosphere: Classic neighborhood tavern.

Sound level: Loud when crowded, but not unbearable.