New Plush Restaurant Offers ‘Good Vibes’ in Brooklyn Park
If you’re looking for good music, good vibes and fancy cocktails, you’d normally have to go to downtown Minneapolis to experience that kind of atmosphere.
But local entrepreneur Anthony Thomas wanted to change that.
“The food is good, the ambiance is good, the vibe is good, we love it,” said Thomas, the owner of Plush, a soul food restaurant that opened in a Brooklyn Park strip mall last March.
It’s the kind of place where the inside looks nothing like the outside.
The inside of Plush has a purple and gold color scheme to make customers feel like royalty.
“We kinda got the look from down South,” said Thomas. “A lot of restaurants down south had this type of vibe where you come in — from the outside doesn’t look like much — you come inside you’re like whoa,’ and like it’s different.”
Thomas and his wife, Malinda, spent the better part of a year remodeling the venue to give it a “plush” look.
“You know, purple and gold represents royal,” said Malinda Thomas. “We want everyone to feel royal with they come in here.”
Malinda came up with the idea for the furniture, the tiles and the chandeliers. They’re all designed to create an atmosphere that makes people say, “wow.”
“When they walk through this door, I want them to give the reaction that you gave: ‘wow,'” she said.
‘Wow’ is also the reaction they want from people about the food.
Soul Food
The menu consists of items like dirty rice, candied yams, fried catfish, lamb chops and wings.
Essentially, it’s food designed to fill your belly and soothe your soul.
“This area is so diverse,” said Thomas. “There’s so many different restaurants, so many different ethnicities out here. It’s just, soul food needed to be in Brooklyn Park.”
Pair the soul food with a craft cocktail, and you have a business that proves you don’t have to go downtown to enjoy a night out.
“For it to be in Brooklyn Park and not downtown, people love [that]. You don’t have to pay for parking, you don’t have to deal with the traffic downtown. You don’t have to deal with all the extra stuff downtown. So they love coming out. They say ‘hey, it’s worth the trip,'” said Thomas.
Lamb chops, mac & cheese, dirty rice and cornbread at Plush. The restaurant is located at 8578 Edinburgh Centre Drive in Brooklyn Park.
Related: New Brooklyn Park Restaurant Plans To Serve ‘Soul Food With a Twist’
