Kevin Geisen and Joe KaseL have what Geisen likes to call the “tripod of business.” They are the owners of Eagle Street Grille, the Salt Cellar, and their newest venture, Ox Cart Ale House in Lowertown.
The two met as teens at Cretin-Derham Hall High School, and when they were 29 years old, realized they were already tired of the corporate world. Kasel was in pharmaceutical sales and Geisen was a retail manager at Home Depot.
“We were going to do something simple like a sub shop or a coffee shop or something like that,” Geisen says. But when they got the location directly across from the Xcel Energy Center downtown, they decided to go all in. In two weeks they revamped their concept, got a liquor license, built a full bar, and jumped in. “We just said, ‘We’re willing to lose everything and take a chance and go big,’ ” Geisen says.
It paid off. Fourteen years later they have three successful, and different, restaurants in Saint Paul. Eagle Street “has got fans and concert people,” Kasel says. “It’s more food as a sidecar to drinking. Whereas Ox Cart is more food and drinking combined, and Salt Cellar is food with an emphasis on wine and cocktails.”
And, Geisen adds, you’ll notice the service at Salt Cellar is top-notch. It’s a place to impress your date with their steak or charcuterie board. It’s the balance to Eagle Street, where you go to get a burger and beer before the game.
At the newer Ox Cart, it’s hard to say what the signature dishes are just yet, but the chicken sandwich, pastrami sandwich and burger are in the running—and don’t forget about the cheese curds and handmade sausages.
But as spring sets in, Ox Cart is sure to be a hit with its new rooftop patio. “We’ve got a full-size shuffleboard court up there,” Kasel says. The patio has restrooms and a full kitchen, making it basically another restaurant on top of Ox Cart. The patio menu will have more appetizers to choose from and no entrées. “People are going to be up there more to have light fare. When it’s 85 degrees, nobody wants to sit down and have a heavy meal,” Kasel says.
“This will definitely have the best view of the Twin Cities,” Geisen says. “You get to look over and see the stadium. You can see the air field, so it’s fun watching the jets and military helicopters flying around.”
It’s also got a view of the State Capitol, and overlooks Mears Park. “At night it’s really something special,” Geisen says. “It’s a great place to sit and watch rush hour.”
The main restaurant has its open-air perks, too. “The first time we walked through the space there were two things we noticed right away, [and one] was the big, sliding, open windows,” Geisen says. “The great thing about the open-air concept on the main floor is even on a rainy day you can still sit inside and feel the breeze and it’s really relaxing.”
Being in Lowertown, they’ve noticed some benefits of being close to the new CHS Field. “It gives you exposure where you’re not normally going to get exposure,” Kasel says. People come in from Minneapolis and suburbs who maybe have never experienced Lowertown, “and it gets them to say, ‘Hey, maybe I want to come back here not on a Saint night and spend some time down here,’ ” Kasel says.
And once those people experience the food, they’ll have to come back.
“When we hired chefs Alan Bergo [Salt Cellar] and Andy Lilja [Ox Cart], one thing I give credit to Joe and I for is, when we’re doing something new, we’re really good at listening to our team,” Geisen says. “We hired them for a reason, and they’re teaching us.”
“We give them the freedom to be able to be creative, and that’s what their job is,” Kasel says. “Be creative and cook something that they know that they’re capable of doing and capable of creating.”
Going from one to three restaurants in 14 years not only shows the success of the team, but it also gives a glimpse of their passion. “It’s kind of addictive,” Kasel says.
“When we talked about diversifying the business and how to better stabilize ourselves against the hockey freeze-outs, we didn’t know if we were still going to be here,” Geisen says. They played around with different ideas for how to make it work. “The bottom line is, this restaurant business has become our life. It’s what we know.”
Looking forward, the two have a few ideas up their sleeves. “We’ve been playing around with putting a small, three- or four-hole putt-putt course in” at Ox Cart, Geisen says. And don’t be surprised if the Salt Cellar has sidewalk seating this spring.
“[The business] is almost like an addictive drug,” Kasel says. “It makes you want to come back for more—what’s next?”
