Bites Grill and Bar patrons will be greeted by a new face as Daryn Steinert and wife Sierra purchased the business from Roger and Wendy Hoplin on March 19, 2024.Travis Grimler / Echo Journal
New 'Bites' owner no stranger to Pine River
Daryn Steinert returns to the community where he went to school as a child.
When Roger and Wendy Hoplin bought Bites Grill and Bar in Pine River in 2013, it was just a story of one Pine River boy returning home as a business owner. History repeated itself on March 19 when Daryn and Sierra Steinert completed the long anticipated, and rumored, purchase of the business.
When Hoplin bought Bites, he had just returned to the community where he was raised and graduated. Steinert didn't quite graduate from Pine River-Backus High School, but he still spent enough years in the district to consider it home.
"I was born in Aitkin and we moved to Pine River when I was probably about seven or eight," Daryn Steinert said. "I went to grade school through sixth grade at Pine River-Backus, and I think right before the start of seventh grade we moved to Washington and I've been gone ever since."
It has been about 24 years since then, but during that time neither Washington, nor his next haunt, Texas, quite lived up to his needs as a business owner.
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Paul Bunyan has been in Minnesota folklore history for over a century. The earliest printed stories about him and his infamous blue ox, Babe, date as early back as 1906. He was a legend in the logging community and an integral part of Minnesota’s heritage. Kind of like ice fishing, log cabins, the loons floating on the lakes and rivers and lastly lutefisk dinners put on by area groups throughout the lakes area.
Bites Grill & Bar is located on the beautiful trail of Paul Bunyan right out front of Bites parking lot and game patio. Bites is not hard to miss as it’s built out of logs and the Paul Bunyan trail passes right in front of big picture windows.
Bites log building was constructed around 1997 with locally sourced logs made from aspen, birch, red oak, and Norway pines sourced from the George Kinney Memorial Forest located in Crow Wing County Minnesota. They have beautiful pictures of the process it took to make Bite’s reality. From the logging of the wood right up to the finished masterpiece that is Bites today.
Throughout the year customers can witness the ever changing seasons of Minnesota life. In the fall the leaves will be in various shades of yellow, orange, and red creating a scene straight from a postcard. The fireplace will be lit and if you time it just right you can get a stunning picture of those magnificent logs with the sun setting behind it. Or if you’re an early riser you can sit inside and look out at the sunrise with your morning cup of coffee and newspaper. During the winter you will see snowmobiles coming in off the snow-laden trail warming their hands by the roaring fire, grabbing a bite to eat to fill their rumbling stomachs and telling stories of their various adventures. And in the spring and summer the snow will have melted and made way for flowers to blossoms, the deer to roam with their new offspring, and the bikers to visit. With the Paul Bunyan trail right out front there’s endless things to do in the sun or snow. So no matter which season you find yourself at Bites, make sure you run your hands over the beautifully crafted log walls, venture out on the Paul Bunyan trail taking pictures of the seasons and grab a bite to eat. And just maybe you will feel the spirit of Paul Bunyan and Babe as you sit besides the fireplace warming your hands or while you stop in for a refreshing drink and bite to eat after a stroll on the trail.
Stop in today and say hi to the owners, Roger and Wendy Hoplin. Bites Grill and Bar won the Minnesota Restaurant Association’s new award, the Restaurant Neighbor Award, in November 2016.
RICKI HAD THE DUCK, VERY DELICIOUS ! RICE PILAF AND SWEET POTATO AND FINISHED WITH TURTLE CHEESE CAKE YUMMY
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TERRIFIC FOOD, GREAT DECOR, FRIENDLY STAFF.ANDREW