1. OLIVER WITH A TWIST
I don’t know where Oliver’s in the South Loop came from—not a PR firm, that I’ve seen—but Michael Nagrant says it’s one to check out:
I’d tell you that I had to “settle” instead for a plate of gnocchi. But, you don’t settle for a gold standard of pasta perfection, ricotta clouds dripping in whipped parmesan, comté, and truffle. Oliver’s co-owner Jason Weingarten delivered it to the table suggesting the restaurant was going to “ruin all other gnocchi” for us forever.
Honestly, he might have undersold it.
After all the gnocchi pillows were gone, I spooned the remaining sauce straight into my greedy maw. It seems absurd to suggest carb on carb violence like this, but if the OIiver’s kitchen served the pasta with a sidecar of toast for dipping into the remaining sauce (and also to minimize my shame for primally housing the rest with utensils) I wouldn’t be mad.
2. MAGILLA PERILLA
Anthony Todd on Perilla Steakhouse, a new all-day restaurant in a hotel near Michigan Avenue:
The two men behind Perilla Steak, GM Thomas Oh and executive chef Andrew Lim, also helm the acclaimed Perilla Korean American Fare in the West Loop, and both jumped at the chance to bring their family cuisine to a wider audience downtown. “The idea was that we wanted to take the idea of Korean cuisine, something we had been working on for years already, and elevate it,” says Oh. Wary of the overused word “elevate,” he explains: “When we say ‘elevate’ we are referring back to the old mom and pop shop, my mom’s old restaurant, the old Koreatown days.” They want to take the flavors and hospitality of those restaurants and combine them with high quality ingredients, service, and an epic design.
3. VALIANT IS THE NAME FOR HALLA
Grimod takes a look at how Valhalla has evolved, now that it’s in the former Mirai space. Here he is on a dish reflecting chef-owner Stephen Gillanders’ part-Filipino heritage:
Served upright with a few miniscule slices of avocado and an orb of trout roe sealing its end, the chef’s lumpia is picture perfect. Against your teeth, the fried wrapper emits a clean, textbook crunch. Doing so, it unleashes its melty interior of tuna and green onion (with a trace of that creamy avocado), which, with further chewing, moistens the crisp shards. The resulting flavor here is rather pure, with the pristine tuna only being offset by the subtle bite of the green onion. You might prefer the introduction of some soy sauce or, better yet, an outright sauce that would more comprehensively flavor the wrapper and allow the fish mixture to really sing. That being said, the chef’s lumpia demonstrates faultless frying technique and structure. He’s already mastered the hard part, and honing in on the right balance of filling and seasoning (a simple task) will make this item a star.
4. QUI ES MASA MACHO
At the Sun-Times, Maggie Hennessy profiles Oliver Poilevey, whose Mariscos San Pedro in Thalia Hall is the latest in his and his brother’s mini-empire:
When describing the tostadas they’ve dreamed up, Oliver drew comparisons to sushi rolls. He likened San Pedro’s in-house “Masa y Más” program to Italian restaurants’ pasta programs, in that they’ll pair different forms of nixtamalized corn with seasonal vegetables. Think mushroom tetelas with stretchy raclette cheese and salsa de molcajete. There will even be fish offal here — a la fish tripe tacos and fish liver mousse tostadas.
5. BAYAN KO-OWNERS
Speaking of part-Filipino, Mike Sula looks at Lawrence Letrero and Raquel Quadreny’s Bayan Ko Diner, and its evolution from the original Bayan Ko:
There are eggs for days—every day—on the menu at Bayan Ko Diner, from 9 AM to 3 PM, and no balut in sight (though I’d love to see what Letrero would do with those). Most notably, their fried sunny-side up eggs, over that garlic rice, in a quartet of silogs: the fundamental Filipino breakfast, with a choice of sweet tocino (basically unsmoked Filipino bacon), longanisa (similarly sweet pork sausage), soy marinated ribeye tapa, or fried milkfish.
6. SUPERDUPERDAWG
Bon Appetit has a nice video going behind the scenes at one of Chicago’s classic establihsments, Superdawg, including footage of the crinkle-cut potato slicer. Unfortunately if you try to watch it at Bon Appetit, you—at least I—get a Capital One ad that doesn’t seem to have any way of being gotten rid of, so go here, and you’ll have to sit through a different Capital One ad, but at least this one goes away eventually.
7. SANDY, DENNIS
Some years back I posted one of my favorite photos of all time, a panorama of smoked pork heads at Sandy’s Bakery & Deli in Portage Park. In the piece I wrote “I can’t remember if anybody, myself included, has ever written about Sandy’s Bakery and Deli.” Bizarrely, years later, it came up twice this week—once from another writer looking for a Serbian deli to include in a piece and the second from Dennis Lee in The Party Cut:
Skin-on roast pork is one of my favorite things in the world, and Sandy’s does it just right, with a crisp well-salted exterior. Even though we got a lean portion, it was still tender and pulled apart easily. I should have bought more to take home.
I didn’t pay any attention to the cabbage salad until I’d eaten more than a few bites of pork, when I realized that it wasn’t just there for show. It’s dressed in a vinegar-based dressing and serves as the acidic foil to all of that meat.
8. MAKES ME FEEL FINE
At NewCity, Friend of Fooditor John Lenart talks summer wine:
While rosé often claims the limelight, let us embark on a deeper exploration, seeking wines that not only quench but elevate the experience of summertime indulgence.
9. PASSING THE SAVINGS ALONG TO YOU!
Saw this on r/Chicagofood, from Bungalow by Middlebrow:
we listened to y’all and ELIMINATED OUR SERVICE FEE! and added roughly that amoujnt to the price of each item to support higher kitchen wages.
Despite my headline, I’m sure there aren’t any saving,s but I do prefer paying the honest price that something costs in 2024 and not being told it’s $2 less, and then getting a semi-hidden fee on the back end. I understand why restaurants did it, in a time of inflation and COVID, but eventually people were going to start scrutinizing those extra fees, and… looks like “eventually” is here.
10. LISTEN UP
David Manilow talks about the showmanship on display at Dearly Beloved.
En Process talks to Lorraine Nguyen (Impact Culinary) about her experiences going through The Hatchery.
WHAT MIKE ATE
Having a Filipino moment as we are, I went to my second Filipino bakery in a month or so. One is Del Sur Bakery, still doing popups but eventually to open in Lincoln Square; it seems an Americanized bakery doing French-style pastries, but with some Filipino flavors, like the inevitable purple ube. Umaga Bakery, part of the complex in which Seafood City sits (but closer to the Target end), seems more purely Filipino, certainly as you watch moms and grandmas stocking up on the sweet pan rolls they apparently sell by the gross. The place smells good with them being constantly baked, but I was more interested in the individual baked goods; I got an Ube Ensaymada, which I liked though being covered with what appeared to be Taco Blend cheese from a bag was odd. I really liked a savory Pork Bao. Basically it’s the Filipino equivalent of Chiu Quon Bakery; and worth visiting and exploring.