Smoque introduced this city to peppery moist brisket, crackling barked ribs and silky pulled pork. In a city where waiting an hour to eat weekend brunch while nursing a hangover is pretty much a competitive sport, The Publican’s brunch is the Super Bowl trophy of brunch wait spoils.īefore Smoque, barbecue in Chicago was pretty much characterized by oven-baked meat-jello ribs dripping in sopping sauce, or aquarium smoked fatty cartilage-laden rib tips also soaked in a gloppy glaze. Today, the frites fried in beef fat, the pork rinds and the boudin blanc are as good as they ever were. If Avec planted the idea that it was OK for a fine dining chef, aka Paul Kahan, to throw down and go low-key, then The Publican - Kahan’s bacon, oyster and beer hall - blew the doors wide open for the casual dining movement. These days, I’ve had random cab drivers in New York ask me about Girl & the Goat when I say I’m from the Windy City. It used to be when people hear that I live in Chicago, they’d always mention Michael Jordan, Al Capone or Oprah. If you have the means, this is probably Chicago’s greatest destination dining desire behind Au Cheval. She’s found a way to make crispy pig face and vegetables as popular as pork belly. She is both America’s sweetheart and an American badass, a master technician and flavor bomb-throwing cook. Stephanie Izard: Top Chef, Iron Chef, goat girl, super fun, cool, humble chef. He serves fried uni shooters and ribs with equal aplomb, and the spaces he works in, whether that of his formative years at Lula Cafe and Nightwood or at his own place Giant, feel like a dinner party with the friends and family. But what I believe is that when he chooses to, he can be as technically precise and driven as, say, Grant Achatz, but he’s also proven time and time again that he’d rather be, and is, as accessible and straightforward as Stephanie Izard. Which is weird, because how could you possibly measure such a thing? There are so many variables. I am convinced that Jason Vincent is Chicago’s most talented chef. He cooks with a Michelin three-star skill in a one-star environment, which keeps Boka a desired destination. What’s compelling is that Boka’s current chef, Lee Wolen, is one of the most talented chefs working in Chicago today. However, that would just make it a historical relic at this point. It was also where Giuseppe Tentori of the aforementioned GT restaurants launched his career after being a key component of the Charlie Trotter’s kitchen team. They’re the guys responsible for GT Fish and Oyster, GT Prime, Balena, Momotaro, Girl & the Goat, Duck Duck Goat, Swift & Sons, Somerset, etc. But Bavette’s feels like a real speakeasy where you expect Capone could walk in at any minute.īoka was the flagship for Boka Group, the restaurant group helmed by Rob Katz and Kevin Boehm. Restaurant interiors, no matter how committed to authenticity, still often seem to have a modern veneer and feel a touch like a theater showpiece. You create a short rib stroganoff that tastes like mom’s, if your mom was Escoffier. You serve velvety foie gras with house-made jam. You serve just enough tasty beef to give that impression, but you add in fresh takes like the lobster cocktail. Except of course, you don’t open a steakhouse at all. What do you do when you’re being hailed as the fastest rising and most creative Chicago restaurateur since Rich Melman? If you’re Brendan Sodikoff, you open a steakhouse in a city of steakhouses. Since their original opening, they’ve spawned all kinds of talent and offshoot successes, including sister restaurants Aviary, Roister and Next. They’ve come back, bigger and better than ever. Even though it was top of the world and profitable, Kokonas and Achatz decided to tear it all down and reinvent the restaurant again from the ground up in late 2015. The entry hallway had a secret sliding door. They took one-bite courses of black truffle that blew up in your mouth. Diners ate off sculptural serveware and not plates. When they opened, Alinea was founded on the premise that partners Nick Kokonas and chef Grant Achatz were about to challenge everything you knew about eating in a restaurant. As much as Charlie Trotter’s made people realize Chicago was no longer just a meat-and-potatoes town, Gourmet magazine naming Alinea the best restaurant in the country in 2006 made Chicago a true international culinary destination.
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