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New member in Chicago

jim loellbach

By jim loellbach
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jim loellbach

jim loellbach

Posted
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Hi All,

 

My name is Jim Loellbach.  I've been a chef in Chicago for about 12 years, been lucky to have worked in some great places here: Four Season Hotel, the Pump Room Restaurant, and C Chicago restaurant.  I've been a butcher, line cook, banquet chef, sous chef, and pastry chef.  Before that i was an engineer (aerospace), so I like to use my techie background in the kitchen (not modernist stuff, just home-brewed equipment).  Recently I decided I'd given enough of my life to the restaurant world and have started my own business.  I set it up initially as a personal/private chef business, but I'm now leaning heavily toward an artisinal chocolate shop. 

 

My personal cooking runs the gamut in terms of cuisines, but my style is relaxed and rustic.  I love making charcuterie at home, fermenting (pickles, beer, cider), and working with chocolate.  I'm giving a class on chocolate this Tuesday at a community cooking school. 

 

I've visited these forums for a few years now and am happy to start interacting with all of you.

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Anna N

Anna N

Posted
Posted

 Welcome. You sound like our kind of being!  

Anna Nielsen aka "Anna N"

...I just let people know about something I made for supper that they might enjoy, too. That's all it is. (Nigel Slater)

"Cooking is about doing the best with what you have . . . and succeeding." John Thorne

Our 2012 (Kerry Beal and me) Blog

My 2004 eG Blog

Darienne

Darienne

Posted
Posted

Hello Jim and welcome to eG.  You are way out of my class and I know I'll appreciate reading your posts. 

I like working with chocolate but purely as a chocolate lover (dark chocolate, of course). 

Darienne

 

learn, learn, learn...

 

We live in hope. 

Deryn

Deryn

Posted
Posted

Welcome to eGullet, Jim. What an amazing culinary background you have!

 

I wish you well in your new business venture. I look forward to reading about all your culinary adventures.

Alex

Alex

Posted
Posted

Welcome, Jim. There are quite a few eG'ers who either live in Chicagoland or visit there regularly, so please keep us in the loop about the progress of your chocolate shop. Are you looking at any particular neighborhood(s) or 'burb(s)?

 

(This is the chocolate class, yes?)

"There is no sincerer love than the love of food."  -George Bernard Shaw, Man and Superman, Act 1

 

"Imagine all the food you have eaten in your life and consider that you are simply some of that food, rearranged."  -Max Tegmark, physicist

 

Gene Weingarten, writing in the Washington Post about online news stories and the accompanying readers' comments: "I basically like 'comments,' though they can seem a little jarring: spit-flecked rants that are appended to a product that at least tries for a measure of objectivity and dignity. It's as though when you order a sirloin steak, it comes with a side of maggots."

 

A king can stand people's fighting, but he can't last long if people start thinking. -Will Rogers, humorist

Smithy

Smithy

Posted
Posted

Welcome, Jim! It does sound like you'll fit right in here.  Since you're new here, you may or may not have discovered this topic, which may be of interest:  Planning: eG Chocolate and Confectionery Workshop (2016).  I look forward to seeing more of your posts.  If you have any questions about how to work the forums or where to find things, don't hesitate to check with a host.

Nancy Smith, aka "Smithy"
Host, eG Forums - nsmith@egstaff.org

Follow us on social media! Facebook; instagram.com/egulletx

"Every day should be filled with something delicious, because life is too short not to spoil yourself. " -- Ling (with permission)
"There comes a time in every project when you have to shoot the engineer and start production." -- author unknown

jim loellbach

jim loellbach

Posted
  • Topic Starter
Posted (edited)
1 hour ago, Alex said:

Welcome, Jim. There are quite a few eG'ers who either live in Chicagoland or visit there regularly, so please keep us in the loop about the progress of your chocolate shop. Are you looking at any particular neighborhood(s) or 'burb(s)?

 

(This is the chocolate class, yes?)

 

Yes Alex, that's the class.  Thanks for the advertising!  I'm gonna explain tempering and why it's necessary, show examples of tempered and untempered chocolate, and give a tempering demo (seeding with 1% microplaned chocolate).  Then we'll have a bunch of inclusions so the students can make clusters and rochers. 

 

I live in Printers Row, just south of the loop.  I'd like to open a shop near home.  I would need such a small space, it's hard to find anything small enough.

 

Smithy: I did see that post and it sounds interesting.  Toronto in May?  Sounds good to me!

Edited by jim loellbach (log)
Alex

Alex

Posted
Posted

Ah, Printers Row. A good number of years ago we stayed there, at Dearborn and Congress. For the life of me I can't remember what it was called back then, but it's now the Hotel Blake, formerly the Wyndham Blake. In the hotel was an excellent restaurant run by a well known chef, but of course I can't remember those names, either. I do remember what the place looked like, though. O.o

 

There used to be a little Leonidas chocolate shop on the ground floor of -- I think -- the Rookery Building, at LaSalle and Adams.

"There is no sincerer love than the love of food."  -George Bernard Shaw, Man and Superman, Act 1

 

"Imagine all the food you have eaten in your life and consider that you are simply some of that food, rearranged."  -Max Tegmark, physicist

 

Gene Weingarten, writing in the Washington Post about online news stories and the accompanying readers' comments: "I basically like 'comments,' though they can seem a little jarring: spit-flecked rants that are appended to a product that at least tries for a measure of objectivity and dignity. It's as though when you order a sirloin steak, it comes with a side of maggots."

 

A king can stand people's fighting, but he can't last long if people start thinking. -Will Rogers, humorist

Kerry Beal

Kerry Beal

Posted
Posted

No full itinerary yet - but to date it will be Morato Thursday evening, Soma and other chocolate shops Friday (possible Master's Class Friday but not decided quite yet), Friday eve show and tell and drink until our check liver lights come on if desired,Saturday am didactic, Sat afternoon and Sunday - play and teach each other, Saturday evening dinner.

the Chocolate Doctor
www.thechocolatedoctor.ca

www.eztemper.com

 

Confectionary Course • Confectionary Course Q&A
eGullet foodblog 2006 • eGullet Foodblog 2012

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