jesteinf

Bumping this thread. I'll be in Madrid for 2 nights in June. The second night we're there we're planning on doing tapas (Taberna Tempranillo/Txirimiri/la Camarilla) but I need some help with the first night. It will be our first night in town after flying in from Chicago. We'll want to do something casual and sit-down (rather than deal with tapas). I'd love to stick with something local/simple, maybe something seafood oriented. I was looking at Botin, but it sounds like it might be a bit of a tourist trap. Not sure where we're staying yet (I've narrowed it down to a few hotels). Any help would be much appreciated.

Anyway, the point is, pizza is one choice...there are many others. Some locals don't necessarily like Chicago-style pizza, others do, and that's fine. FWIW, I wouldn't necessarily recommend it, but that's a personal preference and I have no issues with others recommending it to visitors. Pizza, Italian Beef, Polish, Thai, regional Mexican, avant-garde cuisine, probably a bunch of other stuff I'm leaving out...all of it makes Chicago special. That's why they have 31 flavors

Doesn't Chicago have the largest Polish population in the world outside of Warsaw? On that basis, you could almost argue that Polish food is a local specialty (certainly better than what you would find in other big cities). It's kind of like Thai food. Sure, you can get pad thai in just about any major US city, but it's pretty hard to find another city in the US that rivals Chicago for more authentic Thai specialties.

Over on LTH, Cocoro and Ginza were just recommended for ramen: Cocoro 668 N Wells St (between Erie St & Huron St) Chicago, IL 60610 (312) 943-2220 Ginza Japanese Restaurant 19 E Ohio St (between State St & Wabash Ave) Chicago, IL 60611 (312) 222-0600

Another place I just remembered where you can eat VERY well for $50pp is The Bristol down in Bucktown/Wicker Park. Here's a recap of a recent meal I had there (this was for four people and our total bill including tax and tip was $200): Last night's dinner at The Bristol was really wonderful. This is a restaurant run by people who really, truly, love food and there are many rewards to be found for the patrons that share that love. We had 12 dishes with not a clunker among them. We didn't take a menu, so forgive some of the imprecise descriptions. Our first round consisted of three of the lighter dishes on the menu: Trout roe with pureed cauliflower and freshly made blinis - This was one of my favorite dishes of the night. The saltiness of the roe played beautifully off of the smooth puree. Also, the warm, just made blinis were the perfect vehicle for this little "snack". Goat carpaccio - Teeny tiny slices of seared goat plated nicely along side lentils and a bit of frisee(?). I've never had goat raw/barely cooked and I have to say I really enjoyed this preparation. The goat was nicely seasoned and the lentils were an interesting companion to the dish Rapini - This dish contained the only small miscue of the night, with the poached egg served on top of the rapini coming out a bit too poached (depriving us of the joys of the runny yolk). That being said the rapini was tasty enough to make up for the overcooked egg. Next we moved on to the more substantial: Chicken hearts - Not for the faint of heart (sorry). Just a bunch of chicken hearts on a rosemary skewer. Interesting texture, but the flavor was like nothing I've ever had before. I think we all agreed that the best way to describe the flavor was "intensely chicken-ey". Probably what chicken used to taste like before the advent of factory farming. The flavor that the hearts imparted on to the polenta was just brilliant. Outstanding dish, and good for The Bristol for serving it. Roasted chicken - As good a roasted chicken as I've ever had. Moist meat, crispy skin, what else do you need? How about some outrageously good broth for dipping your... Duck fat fries - Some of the best fries I've ever had. Thicker than the frites at Sweets & Savories, the fries packed a powerful taste and crunch. They were served with garlic aioli and a housemade ketchup. I wasn't nuts about the ketchup, but I loved the garlic (and I mean GARLIC) aioli. Roasted marrow bones - Again, hard to go wrong here. I slightly prefer the bones at Volo if only for the trio of salts that you get. Sweetbreads - Not the usual fried to the point of maybe being a Chicken Mcnugget, these bad boys were big and meaty. As Kenny said, you knew you were eating sweetbreads. Squash with ricotta - I'm not a big squash fan, but covering it in ricotta will at least maybe think about being a convert. And then, dessert: Chocolate sabayon with housemade nutter butters - Done, nothing else needed. Thank you very much. Meyer lemon panna cotta - Very good, nice and lemoney Pistachio tarte - Good if you're in the market for a more savory dessert. The Bristol 2152 N Damen Ave (between Shakespeare and Webster) 773-862-5555

No, nor corkage at S&S. There's something going on with their liquor license, so I'm not sure if this is permanent or temporary (or if it's temporary how long this will last).

Sweets & Savories would be a great choice. Really nice, high-end food and they just massively reduced their menu prices (plus they're BYOB for right now). You could do very well there for $50 pp. If you want to go downscale, check out Sun Wah for Chinese BBQ, in particular the Beijing duck which you'll need to call ahead for if you want it. You'll get a whole duck with pancakes, plus a soup and fried rice made from the carcas for $30...total. Sweets and Savories Website 1534 W Fullerton Ave (773) 281-6778 Sun Wah 1132-34 W. Argyle St (773) 769-1254

I think Burt's is outstanding. I'm not really a deep dish fan, but Burt's is just on an entirely different level than typical deep dish. The crust is great and, at least for the genre, the whole think is actually pretty restrained in terms of cheese, toppings, etc.

The "similar type place" was Moto. I think it was fine he didn't go to Alinea. So much has been written and discussed about it...it was nice to see some exposure for places that you don't necessarily hear about all the time.

Nancy - too funny they showed you as the walking wounded. The juxtaposition of you in a morphine induced haze and Cathy2 across from you in pizza induced ecstacy was pretty priceless. Me? I'm happy with my split second shot seated next to Fat Guy. Great episode. Tony did our city proud.

They were open for New Year's Eve the first year that the restaurant was open. I'm not sure about other years.

I would highly recommend the wine pairings. You can "upgrade" if you want, but I don't really think that's necessary (unless you are super into wine and want to go all out). Also, the last couple of times I've been I've done "split" wine pairings (no full pours). I've really enjoyed doing this since it leaves more room for food and my head stays a bit clearer throughout the whole meal.

I love Second City (just don't eat there), it's definitely not a tourist trap. If you go on Friday night, there's a free improv set after the late mainstage show. Sometimes some pretty famous alums will show up unannounced to perform with the cast. Depending on what time you finish up at Alinea you could try to make it (I think the improv set starts around 12:30am, but I could be wrong...it's been a little while since I've been).

Did you only just receive this confirmation, or did you get it a while ago? I received my rejection email log ago, but my partner has yet to receive any response, so I'm hoping they just haven't got round to sending the confirmation to her! Lee ← Got it this morning at about 5:30am Central time

In for 2 on June 24th.

Achatz has talked in the past about maybe opening restaurants in San Francisco and/or Tokyo but I don't think he's ever been too interesting in opening in NYC.

Great story! Thanks for sharing.

Metromix usually does a pretty good job of keeping track of NYE events at restaurants. I would start there if you're looking for ideas. You could also just pick up the phone and call any restaurants you might be interested in to see what they have going on.

There hasn't been a lot (or really anything I can find) about what's going on at Avenues now that Curtis Duffy has taken over from ChefGEB. With my family in town for the weekend I decided to book the small private room and give the restaurant a shot (if it sucked, at least it wouldn't be on my dime ). Well, it didn't suck. In fact it was pretty damn awesome, certainly different than under Chef Bowles.. The evidence of Chef Duffy's prior work at Trio and Alinea is on display for the entire meal. For some this may not necessarily be a good thing. If you didn't like Alinea than I would guess that you wouldn't like Avenues either as the style of a lot of the food is very similar. But, if you are a fan of the style of cooking at Alinea, than I would highly recommend that you go and check out what's going on at Avenues. We enjoyed a 9 course tasting menu (they also have a 4 course and a 15 course). I left my menu there, so I'll just give the highlights as best as I can remember: The first course was two different shot glasses. The first was filled with a hot asparagus soup. A parmesan cracker was placed over the opening of the shot glass. On top of the cracker was a serious pile of black truffle shavings. We were instructed to alternate taking sips of the soup and bites of the truffle covered cracker. The second shot glass was filled with white truffles from Alba (first of the season?) that had been steeped in milk to form almost a pudding. There was tapioca pearls in the pudding along with a bit of parmesan ice cream. Both were fantastic, with the asparagus soup serving as a real highlight. The white truffle pudding wasn't as strongly flavored as I would have liked, but overall the dish really worked for me. A couple of courses later came a wonderful scallop dish. A single seared scallop was served along side brown butter, bits of amaranth and some quail grass. There was a small deep purple sphere served next to the scallop. When pierced the sphere let out a wonderful huckleberry juice that really complimented the scallop nicely. The amaranth brought another textural element to the dish that made it a bit more interesting. Separating the fish from the meat was a dish of hato mugi, which I think is a type of Japanese grain (kind of like barley). It was served in a deep bowl with sorrel. A slice of melted manchego cheese was served over the grains. The dish was finished tableside, with our servers pouring manchego broth into the bowl. I liked this as a transition course but most at the table were not nuts about it. The highlight of our dinner was the Wagyu beef course. A small piece of Wagyu ribeye that had been cooked to a perfect medium rare on an open flame was served along side a thick puree of smoked coconut and another but of sauce made from basil (?). The beef was absolutely incredible on its own (it was very nicely salted), but was certainly elevated by both sauces. This was certainly one of the best pieces of beef I've ever had (and that was after having a 75 day dry aged ribeye at Primehouse the night before). Desserts were both fantastic. Our first was a banana noodle, served under a banana ice cream along with a bit of sweet curry and a crouton made from black walnut and banana. The second was a chocolate dish that blew everyone at the table away. A cylinder of malt was in the center of the plate surrounded by chunks of chocolate devil food cake, chocolate pudding, and random shavings of dark and milk chocolate. Nothing to complain about there. Service was dead on the whole night. We were given nice descriptions of each dish and a bit of instruction on how to eat each dish when necessary (done as unobtrusively as possible). Bread service was outstanding. Each savory course was paired with its own small piece of bread (ranging from a fennel/mint English muffin to a pretzel roll dusted with black lava salt to a butter roll made with goat's milk butter). Even though they weren't necessary three different "butters" were offered with the bread: salted cow's milk, goat's milk, and a nicely assertive olive oil emulsion. There were a few open tables last night which in my view is an absolute shame. There are some wonderful things going on at Avenues right now and they certainly deserve a lot more love than they've been getting.

I would second Avec and Schwa. I would also add Sun Wah to the list.

We went to Alinea last night for our first anniversary. They are obviously still clicking on all cylinders. Food and service are still unmatched in Chicago. What I think bears mentioning is the bread program. I haven't been to Alinea in about a year and a half. The last time I was there I think they were just starting to do their own breads in house. That program is now fully mature and a number of our courses last night had bread pairings. The breads really stand up to the creativity of the dishes they are paired with (for example, an oolong tea bagel paired with a short rib/Guiness dish). One of the more inspired pairings was with a dish built around "things that go well with butter". The dish had lobster, corn, popcorn and a few other elements. The bread pairing? Toast. Fantastic. We also got a peak at the Alinea cookbook. It is absolutely stunning. I'll be ordering a copy, and I have absolutely no plans to even attempt to cook anything out of it.

The greens pictured are called potherb. I was actually back at LSC last Friday and tried to order this dish. Our waitress reluctantly allowed me to do so. I'm not sure why she was so taken aback by my order, there are far stranger things on the menu there. Also, the $2 pork is key to the Ma Po Tofu. We had it without pork on Friday night and it just wasn't the same dish. Also, the prawns with chili are on the menu as "Dry Chili Prawns". That's one of my favorites at LSC. They're everything that salt and pepper prawns wish they could be. The fish dish is called something along the lines of "spicy fish". I can't remember the full name.

I'll be at Avenues the last weekend in September. I'll be sure to report back.

I haven't been to C-House, but Schwa and L2O are both excellent. I wouldn't worry too much about the mixed reports on either place (you can even find some negative reviews of Alinea if you look for them). If you liked Alinea, I think you'll be very happy at both Schwa and L2O.

The people you are missing are Neil (Amy Viny's husband), Amy Viny, and then me (Santo_Grace). The person next to jesteinf is my guest Steve. Also, judging from the serious look on Marisa's face, I know what she was talking so intently with Tammy about. ← Me, too, but I'm not telling... ← Hey, people on here are obsessed with food. My wife just happens to be obsessed with something else