little ms foodie

Thanks for such a great blog Klary. Your party looked like it was a huge success!! And glad your little pet returned home safely too.

dayne made the brioche with garlic sausagae today. it was excellent!!

went last night with Della and Greg and had a wonderful meal. first off we learned that the murals came with the place and they are actually a historical 'landmark' and Fork had them restored. The menu has changed a lot from what I read others have had. no lobster corn dogs but Dayne found maybe the best starter to replace it- peppered gougeres with hunks of blue cheese and slices of grapes in a port sauce. I had the duck confit and goat cheese tart, greg had the smoked trout which came with little belini and fixins and della had a frissee salad with a beautiful poached egg, bacon strip and little slices of potatoes. entrees ordered were braised short ribs with gnocci and favas, the 50/50 poulet and the bbq duck with polenta and brussel sprouts. we skipped dessert. the prices were pretty good, reminded me of similar prices at Lark. The restaurant was full, our service was a bit spotty. they ran out of martini glasses and dayne's drink was served in a wine glass. fine but I expected them to comp that which they didn't. the chive and cheddar biscuits are indeed excellent. we'll go again definately.

Party Girl, can wait to hear how it all turned out!! sorry about the puffs but I wouldn't worry. when I have something that doesn't turn out I just serve more wine!!!

composed with things found in the house: spinach and red leaf lettuce, red onions, sugar snap peas, hard boiled eggs, tuna and lemon vinaigrette with both avocado oil and the oil from the tuna. grilled bread on the side.

forgot to post the shot of our menu

HKD- THANK YOU!! class will be held this weekend and I'll post the results. DAMN!

I have had those eggs at Arzak also and would love to see a little demo! I tried the cling wrap once but didn't do it correctly and had the water too hot

franks bundles are $2 ea. Sonsie's are $5 (they have them too)

The pizza really does look great. Wendy, I wish I had a "Dayne" who would cook to order for me. What a dream! I am preparing for my little guy's 3rd birthday which is this Sunday. For his party next weekend he wants all the kids to make their own pizzas. Pizza for birthdays...must be a Taurus thing! ← They are very rare Shaya, mine is a "Great Dayne" The only thing he will cook to order is pizza, pasta and pasteries. the 3 P's!

Chufi, your birthday dinner is going to be fantastic! I can already tell. and that pizza looks amazing, I'm going to show this to dayne and have him try to make me one. I have a question for you- yesterday we got our fresh produce delivery from our farmer and there were just 5 small stalks of rhubarb in the box. Neither of us really love rhubarb but we want to try something. What would your suggestions be to do with such a small amount? As always, wonderful pictures and narration!!!

especially at TRU where they have these amazing little parmesean biscuits!!

It was just the two of us, very decadent for sure! The room will hold up to six and I have to say if we lived in Chicago we would absolutely plan a dinner party in that room with friends. I know that the staff is somewhat formal but they were also very fun! I do the same thing tammylc, In fact I even remember telling a few chef's that they were more than welcome to serve me half or smaller portions cause I was just taking a bite of everything.

We went to Bricco on QA tuesday night and thought it was quite nice. The space, although big, doesn't seat that many people so it filled up quickly. It's also REALLY warm in there. When I inquired I was told that the ac is really loud so they don't turn it on. The windows in front don't open (like at Paragon or Sapphire) so the summer will be interesting for sure. They have a nice mix of wines by the glass ranging from $7 to $12 and some good food. We shared a couple of cheeses (they get a lot of them from Dennis at the Wine Cellar now). Then shared their house salad with is HUGE and has blue cheese, pecans and a nice viaigrette. Lastly we shared the duck in asian flavors and grilled asparagus. The asparagus was sooooo good! they season the hell out of it with s&p, finger licking good. All those with 6 glasses of wine for just under $100 we'll be back (on cold nights, in a tank top!)

TDOW forgot to mention the staff waving us a cab and handing us the individual bags of the ruhm baba cakes, we ate them the next day! And they also let dayne pick some chocolates which were boxed and made it all the way to Seattle. we ate them while typing this!

Our meal at TRU was incredible! and I was very skeptical I will admit. We booked the Chef's Table which sits in a room in the kitchen. surrounded by the chef's, the line, the pastry kitchen and the staff we had one of our best meals and experiences. We started with glasses of 1997 Bollinger La Grand Cuvee brut at the bar (soon to be remodeled to a lounge by the way) We were escorted into the kitchen by our hostess for the evening, Anna, and brought truffled gougeres with a mornay sauce inside- irrisistable! We spoke with the sommelier Scott and decided to put ourselves in his hands for wine pairings since we had no menu and were on the whim of the chef (Chef Joel in the house that evening) Let the games begin........ the TRU amuse bouche was crab "ravioli" (thin apple slices) served with a spring pea soup (cool) with lobster on top. very nice and refreshing. served with Hirsch Gruner Veltliner Heiligenstein Kamptal 2004 then the courses: Iranian Black Pearl Osetra Caviar, chilled cauliflower creme, lemon confit. excellent! reminescent of a dish we had last year, same time, at the French Laundry. served with Zeltinger Sonnenuhr Riesling Kabinett Selbach- Oster Mosel Saar Ruwer 2002 At this point the chef decided to do the 2 different dishes for each of us. We had given them no bounderies others than peanuts (allergy) Scallop Ceviche, Crispy Fried Oysters for one Seared Scallop, poached oyster, fennel and oyster cream for the other chablis Montmains William Fevre 2003 up next: Asparagus and mussel soup Roasted asparagus soup, lemon creme fraiche both of these were presented in Gales' amazing Versace hand painted china espresso cups- wow wow wow Muscat Grand Cru Goldert Domaine Zind Humbrecht 2002 then they served us both the Seared Canadian FoiI'e Gras, braised rhubarb, ramps, rhubarb grenadine syrup served with kracher Zweigelt Rose Trockenbeerenauslese #1 nouvelle vague Burgenland 1998 I'll just insert here that there was not a clunker in our entire meal, everything was perfectly excuted and the staff was really fun to be around. at some point around here they took us on a tour to stretch and take a breather. We walked through the dining room, upstairs semi private room and private rooms. back to the kitchen where we chatted with the chef and his team for a bit. An interesting thing that dayne noticed and talked to them about was that they had no open flame burners. everything was covered with steel over natural gas. very calm in the kitchen.

Very sad indeed! We were lucky to have just had an outstanding foie gras course at TRU last weekend, looks like it will be my last in chicago.

good to see you blogging Chufi! so are stroopwafels to Amsterdam as crepes would be to Paris? Your plants on your balcony look fantastic. Might inspire me to get some pots done!

And they did refund the room charge too. So we have $250 and 2 free dessert coupons!

I'm going to hedge that in little ms. foodie speak, "schmoo" means buffalo ricotta cheese with black truffle.. u.e. ← We like the word schmoo! but yes, the brownie has this soft buffalo ricotta cheese that is awesome, then they use it to secure the glass to the plate for the milkshake too!!!

WOW, WOW and WOW Michael and Nathan really know how to throw a dinner party. That is how we felt eating at Schwa, like we were friends and they were cooking amazing food for us. Chef Carlson asked if he could just cook for us and we gladly said yes!! My dining companion brought a bottle of Vueve Cliquot and a nice little white bordeaux, I brought an 02 single vineyard pinot noir from Cristom cellars. No photos as the lighting was too low and I didn't want to use the flash. Our amuse came out, carrot juice with cardamom foam + marshmallow, carrot and cardamom. it was more like carrot water- so pure and the flavor was amazing. celeric, apple and white anchovy salad- the flavors here just played off each other perfectly. All presentations are outstanding. bean soup with gigantic beans, cheese and roasted peppers. the beans and peppers were on the lip of the bowl and you moved them all in for eating! kick ass quail egg ravioli- better than you can imagine, nuff said. lavendar butter lobster with potatoes and swiss chard, this was one of the best lobster dishes I have ever had! duck breast, duck confit. I can't remember all the things on the plate! there was some wine involved remember?? perfectly seared beef with talaggio, honey and braised short ribs- why more chefs don't put some honey on the plate of a meat dish is a mystery to me know. this was awesome. brownie with truffle schmoo and truffle shake- TO DIE FOR!! everything about Schwa made me enjoy myself. I loved that it was relaxed and casual but the food was done with such passion. I loved the rock and roll playing in the same room as the cute little chandelier. And the bill was silly inexpensive. on another note, I had dinner at TRU on Sat. night and Chef Scott (I think it was) had just eaten there recently too and was very impressed! Thanks again to my great dining partner for such a fun night. I hope everyone gets a chance to go to Schwa!

grub that looks sooooo good! right up my ally. when do you add your saffron? in the very beginning or later?

Risotto is my go to meal, I make it often. Tonight was risotto with left over Easter ham and peas my absolutes for risotto are: 1) always toast the risotto rice in the butter/shallot mixture 2) always use 1 c. of white wine before the first ladle of stock 3) adjust the temp of the range as you cook it so that it will take the right amount of liquid, which is the flavor I LOVE risotto!!

damn it people, hands off the ramps!!! we need more suppliers!

great report you guys, I really enjoy when you both chime in!