The Twin Cities is not a 24-hour town, but a small set of kitchens stay open well past 11pm. These are the places to know when the show ended late, the bar is closing, or you just landed.
The 24-hour 1939 railcar diner on the National Register of Historic Places. At any hour the booths have absorbed every kind of human drama. The corned beef hash is the late-night order.
Big slices, novelty toppings (mac and cheese, gyro, chicken alfredo), and a counter that stays open well past midnight on weekends. A Dinkytown rite of passage for U of M students.
The downtown flagship runs until about 2:30am most nights, with a full kitchen serving wings, sandwiches, and the city’s most familiar specialty pies. Reliable last stop after a show at First Avenue.
A Lake Street counter open until 2am weekdays and 3am weekends, which makes it one of the latest kitchens in the city. Tacos al pastor, tortas, and Jalisco-style birria are the standard order.
Open until 1am daily, with the full menu running until midnight and a long late-night happy hour. One of the few places where you can still get good seafood and a careful cocktail close to closing.
Open from 8am to midnight every day, with a menu that has stayed mostly vegan and vegetarian for decades. The kind of room that has its own gravity, with strong coffee and a long counter.
Open until 2am with the kitchen cooking until 11. A workable late stop if your group still wants to grill meat at the table after most other rooms have started flipping chairs.
Isaac Becker’s North Loop room serves until midnight Mon-Thu and 1am Fri-Sat. Late-night plates from a James Beard-winning kitchen are a rare combination anywhere in America.