Editor’s note: The restaurant formerly called Big Star Tipsy Taco Bar “rebranded in response to trademark concerns,” according to a statement on April 9, and is now going by Hey Y’all Tipsy Taco Bar.
The Ferris wheel is (almost!) back in action at the former Betty Danger’s in Northeast Minneapolis, where Hey Y’all Tipsy Taco Bar opens this May. The new restaurant has retained much of Betty’s funky vibe—there are plenty of gloriously clashing color schemes‚ and the eight-foot gorilla statue still looms over the mini-golf course—but it has an Austin, Texas-themed spin. As far as the menu goes, expect hatch chili smashburger tacos and carnitas smoked onsite, red-hot skillets of queso fundido, and margaritas—not the same lurid pink as days gone by, but layered with orange demerara and dandelion.
Joe Raidach, formerly of Como Tap and Domo Ramen, is a first-time Ferris wheel owner. (Betty’s green giant is famously imported from Europe, where it was custom-built with small dining tables in each car.) But he says that what most attracted him to the property, which he bought for $3.5 million last December, was its bones. In the dining room, the dark wood fixtures have been given a fresh coat of red paint; the plaid, country club-esque wallpaper brightened up with a cherry print. The garden room has stayed much the same, save for some fresh furniture—the wallpaper was too good to replace, Raidach says. “It feels very much like a White Lotus vibe in here,” he says. “It was done in 2014, so I guess they were ahead of their time, right?”…