We’re down to our final 64 food bracket competitors! That means it’s time to make some bracket predictions (the Gopher Gnomes have been pestering me to help them make their picks) and the start of regional voting rounds. Before we get to the full voting schedule and a revised #TDGFoodBracket FAQ, let’s admire the first ever TDG Twin Cities Food Bracket in all its glory!

And now the ever important details:

Voting Process

• A blog post for each matchup (#1 vs. #16, etc) will be posted each morning at between 7:00 AM CT. A poll will be included at the bottom of each post. Simply vote for the venue you prefer. It’s that easy!
• A summary post with links to all of the individual voting posts will launch after all the voting posts are live. This should make it easy to find your way to all the voting pages while the polls are open.
• A results post recapping the most recent voting results will post once the polls are closed.

Voting Schedule

First Round: 6/30 - 7/13

Each region will have it’s own first round voting period:

• Campus Region: 7am on 6/30 (Thu) until 7am on 7/2 (Sat)

• Maroon Region: 7am on 7/4 (Mon) until 7am on 7/6 (Wed)

• Gold Region: 7am on 7/7 (Thu) until 7am on 7/9 (Sat)

• St. Paul Region: 7am on 7/11 (Mon) until 7am on 7/13 (Wed)

Second Round: 7/14 - 7/20

Once we get to the second round we’ll combine regions, with 2 regions per voting period:

• Campus/Maroon Regions: 7am on 7/14 (Thu) until 7am on 7/16 (Sat)
• Gold/St. Paul Regions: 7am on 7/18 (Mon) until 7am on 7/20 (Wed)

Sweet Sixteen: 7/21 - 7/23

With the arrival of the Sweet Sixteen we’ll have all four regions included in a single 48 hour voting period:

• 7am on 7/21 (Thu) until 7am on 7/23 (Sat)

Elite Eight: 7/25 - 7/27

• 7am on 7/25 (Mon) until 7am on 7/27 (Wed)

Final Four: 7/28 - 7/30

• 7am on 7/28 (Thu) until 7am on 7/30 (Sat)

Championship Pairing: 8/1 - 8/4

• 7am on 8/1 (Mon) until 7am on 8/4 (Thu)

The Obligatory FAQ Section

• Why a food bracket? We at The Daily Gopher feel the only true way to figure out the best food serving establishment in the Twin Cities is to take a page out of March Madness. Also, it’s the off-season and it’s fun to argue about stuff on the internet.
• How was seeding determined? A dedicated group of professionals used complex #MATHS to determine the seeds. We compiled the nominated venues into a list, each blogger involved submitted their seeding order, and we averaged it. We know you hate our incredibly biased choices and we ask that you blame Gopher Nation for approving having no idea about the process.
• Y U NO INCLUDE MY FAVORITE PLACE IN THE BRACKET? Getting this out of the way early because we know we'll (continue to) hear comments like this. It's because we're mean, power hungry, internet blog fiends who take pleasure in ruining the world with a silly bracket.
• How did you determine the regions? This was hard. Campus was an easy one, as was St. Paul. But with over 70% of the nominations coming from Minneapolis and the West Metro we were in a bind for the remaining two regions. We decided to call them Maroon & Gold and split the nominations up between them. I can promise you that more thought went into this decision than the Big Ten’s put into Legends & Leaders.

Have fun voting in the coming weeks!