Photo by Caitlin Abrams
Ingebretsen’s, the legendary south Minneapolis emporium of all things Scandinavian
51 Years Steve Dahl has worked full time at Ingebretsen’s—since he was 18. “Well, actually, longer than that,” he corrects himself. “I started when I was 12 doing weekends when I wasn’t in school, sweeping floors.” $1.99 Cost (per pound) of the Swedish meatball mix when Ingebretsen’s started selling it in the 1960s. (Now, it’s $8.99 per pound.)
East Lake Street has long been a welcoming place for immigrants and newcomers. And while today those populations are primarily from the East African, Asian, and Latinx diasporas, in the late 1800s it was Scandinavians arriving via the mighty Chicago, Milwaukee, St. Paul, and Pacific Railroad, which sliced through Minneapolis just a block north of Lake Street where the Midtown Greenway now resides.
Photo courtesy of Ingebretsen’s (archival image)
Ingebretsen's 1940
Déjà vu all over again: The meat counter, shown here in 1940, looks awfully similar today.
One such immigrant was Karl Ingebretsen Sr.—known more commonly as “Charlie.” Ingebretsen arrived from Norway in the early 1900s and opened the Norwegian-focused Model Meat Market on East Lake Street. MMM was eventually renamed Ingebretsen’s, and now, 100-plus years, a pandemic, multiple wars, a Great Depression, a Great Recession, and an uprising later, Ingebretsen’s remains—attracting multigenerational visitors from around the world and inspiring half-block-long lines of people clamoring for lefse and meatballs during the holidays.
The original butcher shop still stands, largely unchanged, but the shop has grown to four storefronts with the addition of a gift shop and classroom areas. But it’s never left the family. Julie Ingebretsen, Charlie’s granddaughter, now runs the gift shop, and Steve Dahl, whose dad partnered with Julie’s dad in the 1960s, manages the butcher area.
And they’ve never for a second considered leaving. “Especially since a year and a half ago, I’ve noticed how much more conscious people are getting about the importance of corridors and city streets like ours, and Broadway, and Central, and how important they are to the neighborhoods around them and to the city, and how it’s worth investing in them,” Julie Ingebretsen says. “And that reflects on stores like ours that have been around and are here to help new folks who come along.”
Howdy, Partner
Julie Ingebretsen’s father, Bud, asked Warren Dahl to partner with him in the 1960s. Dahl’s the person responsible for the Swedish meatball and sausage recipes the shop is known for today—and they haven’t changed since they first landed in the store. “They’re the same,” Warren’s son Steve Dahl, who runs the butcher shop, assures us. “We have his writing—it’s starting to dim, it’s getting hard to read, but I know them by heart.”
Call it Tradition?
Yes, Ingebretsen’s sells lutefisk—and it always has, of course. “The amount has gone down quite a bit since I started working here,” Steve Dahl says. “But we sell a couple thousand pounds in December each year.”
Holiday Cheer
“I think we could close the rest of the year as long as we stayed open in December,” Julie Ingebretsen says. It’s not unusual for the butcher shop to sell 1,000 pounds a day of Swedish meatball mix and sausages—or see lines around the block at opening—during the holiday season.
Destination Shopping
It’s not just Minneapolitans who visit the shop. “People come from pretty much everywhere,” Ingebretsen says. “Certainly all over the country. People come from Scandinavia, not necessarily to buy much except for food, but because they want to see what we’re doing.”
47
Years Ingebretsen has managed the gift shop. “I started doing that without knowing anything about business or much of the culture,” she says. “I learned fast!”
