Nelson Bros.

Heard so much about this "Truck Stop Restaurant"... I've never been to one, so I didn't know what to expect. I was pleasantly surprised! It's a beautiful, clean excellent restaurant, bakery, and souvenir shop, with great service! When we checked in, we got a buzzer, and we expected a long wait, but it was very quick. While we waited for our seat we enjoyed window shopping at their excellent Minnesota Gift shop. Lots of sweatshirts and Minnesota souvenir goods abound! Once we got seated, we had excellent service, and enjoyed their excellent food. My boyfriend got the Meatloaf dinner, and he let me have a taste of and it was so good! I was excited to find a Liver and Onions entree... I love Live and Onions, but most family restaurants don't serve this anymore. The liver even with the onions was a little dry , but fortunately, some A1 sauce, helped with that! The waitress was friendly and our coffee was always refilled. My boyfriend and I purchased an apple strudel on the way out for later, which was super yummy! We'll be back!

I my quest for a great pastrami sandwich in MN this was 2nd try. They don't serve them in their restaurant but there is a sandwich and pizza shop in another part of the Nelson Bros. travel stop.Ordering a sandwich is patterned after the way they do it at Subway but the bread is sliced rather than long subway buns.So I order a toasted pastrami and I unexpectedly hear, "What kind of bread?" and then, "What kind of meat?", What kind of cheese?", "Do you want it toasted?", "What kind of sauce?", What kind of vegetables?" All the questions you would hear at a Subway.The results were pretty good. The pastrami wasn't hot or even warm but with the mayo, mustard and lettuce and banana peppers and the fact it wasn't on pumpernickel it approached being what I'm looking for more closely than my last try at the Crossroads. I'll give it a 7 out of 10.The result wasn't to bad. The bread

Drive an hour to try the famous fritter French toast that we kept seeing in TikTok videos. Upon arriving, the parking lot was PACKED. We easily figured it would be a 45-60 minute wait. We were told 30mins. It is inside a gas station with a bunch of snacks and a whole bakery section which had its own line of people buying HUGE sized baked goods. They had the fritter breads for sale, as well as all sorts of donuts (XL and regular size), cookies (XL and regular size), some danish type pastries, and muffins. The restaurant staff was all nice, it's very country kitchen feeling. I ordered iced tea, because the orange juice isn't fresh squeezed sadly. I ordered the bro's choice which comes with 2 slices of fritter French toast (choose between raspberry, apple, blueberry, or cinnamon), 2 eggs your choice, hashbrowns, and sausage links which have wild rice cooked in. At first the sausage sounded weird but I'm glad I tried, it's delicious! The raspberry fritter French toast was the best choice. It has the perfect raspberry taste and it's so soft and fluffy. It does not even need syrup, it's great on its own. My bf ordered the bros choice with blueberry and bacon. And my mom tried the bros choice with the apple fritter (but think they accidentally gave cinnamon instead), because we didn't taste any apple and the apple fritter bread was filled with chunks of apple. The hashbrowns are nothing special. I wish they offered some type of house seasoned breakfast potatoes instead. Overall the French toast is delicious and I'd go back for it. Or to at least buy some of the bread and take it home. I did buy a loaf of raspberry bread to take home, it's $8.99 per loaf. They also have a caramel apple loaf that's available for purchase. I bought some other baked goods and sweets but have yet to try them, I'll update when I try them.

When you walk in, it's incredibly chaotic and very unclear where you go, what you do, where you pay, etc. so it was a jarring experience right off the bat.We ate in the restaurant, which was pretty dated. We sat at the bar and the bartender who was serving us was very kind and helpful. I got the Monte Cristo sandwich, which wasn't as sweet as you'd expect given its description. The jam it comes with was delicious and the French toast-like bread was really good. The highlight of the meal, however, were the delicious fries!After our meal, we went to the bakery for some sweet treats (that's truly the main reason this place is so busy!). The person behind the counter was super helpful and sweet. The selection was ENORMOUS as were some of their donuts! They have several billboards claiming they're as big as your head and they are not lying! When it comes to those huge donuts, however, they are not good. We got a cookies and cream and standard sprinkled donut. They were both super stale and bland. The sprinkled one had way more flavor than the cookies and cream one, surprisingly. The saving grace of our bakery selections was the cinnamon roll, which was delectable! Skip the donuts and get that instead!

This place never disappoints! I've been here several times . The food was good as always I had the walleye sandwich. It was excellent. It is a truck stop restaurant. .Expect to spend a little money, I think it is worth the money.The decor is for a dinner type restaurant and the service is excellent.

Where to begin? Truck stop restaurants conjure up certain images and expectations, and Nelson's went out of their way to make the dining area fun, eclectic (trees and a fish tank), and suitable separation of tables! Destiny (our server) is absolutely wonderful... even came back to the table before serving to make sure my multiple requests were properly understood!The food was better than expected. Oh, for certain, the portions are very generous. Flavor spot on. Hot foods were hot (not lukewarm or cold). Hubby had the meatloaf and I'm truly shocked he asked for a to-go box!!! I enjoyed the balanced flavors of chicken fried steak cooked perfectly. Don't pass by the bakery counter! Prices are reasonable and selection is quite varied. We will be back!(Sorry no pics as we dove right in )

my son and i stopped here after a weekend at the nearby scout camp.we rolled in around 930am on sunday. the place was busy, but we were seated immediately. as we were walking to our table, i did see someone having a blood mary with a small buffet of skewered items coming out of it. while it looked delicious, only coffee (aka "go juice") would work after a weekend of 5-11 year old kids running around yelling.the server took our drink orders - coffee for me, apple juice for the boy - and brought them quickly. now, i can't be certain if they always do this, or if she saw my fatigued state, but she left a full carafe at the table ((i'm guessing they always do this to save time). i promptly pulled out my emergency IV kit and poured it directly into my veins. the food - we both got biscuits and gravy and they arrived in a manner of minutes. it comes with eggs (we had over easy), hash browns, and your choice of bacon or sausage (we went with bacon). the biscuits and gravy was delicious, though i felt like the gravy could have used more seasoning. then again, i feel this way about any sausage gravy that i don't make at home. the eggs were cooked perfectly. the bacon was kind of floppy, and i prefer crispy. my son prefers floppy, so, i will disown him soon. the hashbrown were just your standard diner fare hashbrowns. i'm not a big fan of them in general, but i did try them for the sake of this review. they outside was nice and crisp, and the inside was just as you would expect. they also could have used some seasoning.the portions - we both had about half our order left, which made a good meal for later in the day.the service - just the right amount. our server came by often enough, but so often as to keep interrupting our conversations.price - biscuits and gravy were $13 each. with coffee, juice, and tip, the total was around $42. a little on the pricier side, but i also tip well.atmosphere - the restaurant is part of Clearwater travel plaza and it's just what you'd expect. nothing fancy, but nowhere near run down. they have a big fish tank that my son likes watchingextras - there's some claw machines as you enter which cost $1 (you have to get tokens from the machine). as we were being seated, they gave my son 4 tokens ($1 worth). i thought this was kind of funas we were leaving, we hit the bakery. they have a really big selection of sweets and breads. we opted for the giant cinnamon roll ($4.49). we had some when we got home and it was good, not great. good amount of frosting, but no overpowering. would like to have had more cinnamon/sugar in the actual roll though.we would definitely swing by again when we're in the area.

When traveling through Minnesota I don't know how you could miss the billboards-- ya know-- that one with the girl's beaming face behind the strawberry frosted sprinkle bespeckled donut? Yeah. That's Nelson Brothers-- and everyone knows about it-- and you know how I know that? It was PACKED at 11:00 am on Friday. The draw isn't the location-- it's essentially in a truck stop, and it isn't the ambiance-- it's the typical family restaurant deal. The draw is the food and the service! We were a party of 13, 4 of which were small children-- and our waitress handled our group with a grace and aplomb one should only expect from a seasoned stage actress. She was amazing! Patient, detail oriented, personable and attentive-- and fast. It was amazing-- and so was the food.Their claim to fame is something called "fritter bread." I got the fritter bread cinnamon French toast-- it came with eggs, hash browns and their wild rice sausage. The portions were huge-- easily enough for two people-- and that French toast! I see why that stuff keeps 'em comin'! The bread was like a light challa but marbled with cinnamon sugar, bathed in an egg custard then fried golden crispy brown on a flat top-- I slathered on the butter -- REAL whipped butter by the way-- and gave it a spritz of syrup-- it was like breakfast cake-- sweet, warm, and a little "wowww this is really bad for me, but it's so good I can't care about that right now," which is what I thought when I ate it all.The place was packed on a Friday at 11:00- so I'm thinkin' the joys to be found at Nelson Brothers is no secret-- but in case you were tottering on the edge of indecision, I thought I'd throw in my two cents-- and persuade you to give it a try.Nelson Brothers is good.

One of my favorite restaurant in Minnesota, food is very good & having a Tesla charger close buy is a plus, I hope soon the restaurant will be dog friendly.

i have gone here many times, but today was very dissapointing!!the food was not good medium at best. the wait staff congregated over by the kitchen talking very loadly and not taking care of customers. there was obviously no management around as the staff just did whatever they wanted. can't tell you hoe embarrassed i was taking my sister here for breakfast!!!! i wont be back and neither will my friends or family!!!11