1. OH FINE

I ordered takeout from a new Thai restaurant called Eat Fine a while back, and it was fine, but didn’t make me want to do it again immediately. Which apparently I can’t anyway (they got rid of carryout for a while). Anyway, it was John Kessler who put me on to it, and at Chicago mag he tells you the plays to make:

My advice? Assemble a group of at least six people and go, because dinner here is a blast and a half. This restaurant specializes in two things: delightfully over-the-top presentations and regional dishes from around Thailand.

My group of six probably ordered twice as much food as we needed but wouldn’t have done it any other way. The highlights for me were a Massaman curry made with nuggets of sweet/funky durian fruit and a hilariously over-the-top fried noodle dish erupting out of a Cup Noodles container. It was delicious, to boot, with tender pieces of braised short rib and fistfuls of green peppercorns. Jumbo prawns served inside a flaming volcano dome also merited that one-two reaction: first, peals of laughter and then mmmmm sounds as we attacked the enormous crustaceans lurking under the dome. The restaurant is BYO and just a block down from the terrific Door 24 Wine.

2. A VOID

That’s not actually a comment on Void, a new restaurant—it’s a reference to a Georges Perec novel. Anyway, Michel Nagrant checked out the place, which as he says, “there’s DNA here from Middlebrow, Sepia, Violet Hour, Warlord, Rootstock, Analogue, Lost Lake, and Wyler Road. If restaurant heritage alone can kill, Void should slay the city’s culinary scene.” And it reminds him of many of these places, and more:

Back to the Rootstock vibes, we got airy focaccia that I housed in three seconds due to a funky fermented garlic honey butter slather despite telling myself I was only gonna take a few bites to save room for pasta.

There was also crudo, pristine slivers of ruby-fleshed tuna, glinting with funky anchovy aioli and a mound of grassy salsa verde weeping olive oil in the Rootstock-style.

…The hen of the woods mushroom served here, slightly charred, deeply savory, well-seasoned is the maitake execution I was looking for on a similar dish at Valhalla. Void doesn’t swizzle their shrooms with delicate sauces, but instead flanks them with brightly dressed bold chicories and lithe frisee. The Void menu is a vegetarian’s delight without compromise.

3. OCEAN’S ABALONE

You probably read John Kessler’s review of Ocean Grill & Bar, and you should have gone there already, but if you need more motivation, Steve Dolinsky provides visuals at NBC 5, starting with the pho:

Beyond the soup, there are dozens of seafood options, most of which are grilled, fried or tossed in a wok. Grilled clams get some punch with scallions, as well as crushed peanuts and fried shallots. Same goes for the large oysters, charbroiled and topped with the same garnishes, served piping hot.

“Since we’re in Chinatown, we do have Chinese dishes for the lobster, ginger-onion, same as the crab,” [owner Ricky Dinh] said.

4. ELINA ELINA

Titus Ruscitti talks about an Italian place that’s been around a couple of years, Elina’s:

Elina’s opened on Grand Avenue in West Town back in 2022 and it’s been pretty busy ever since then. The owners / chefs honed their skills at multiple Michelin starred spots in New York City and Chicago including the ever trendy Carbone. According to one article I read the goal of them was to create a neighborhood red sauce Italian spot that both the neighbors and gourmands from across the city would like. Walking into Elina’s definitely has the feel of the type of spot they described. It’s dark, it’s slick, there’s leather booths lining the walls and Frank Sinatra is blasting in the background. The menu is a nice mix of red sauce classics that have kept customers coming back as planned. Like every classic Italian American spot your meal starts with a complimentary course – here it’s a trio of garlic bread, salami and beets all of which hit the spot. We also got a Caesars Salad to start which had good anchovy flavor and just enough sauce to prevent the lettuce from getting too soft.

5. CARIDAD

The Infatuation goes to Cariño, and gives it 9 out of 10, about as high a rating as I’ve seen there:

A michelada-inspired oyster cameos on both the $190 tasting menu and the $125 taco “omakase” at Cariño. It’s also the dish that captures Cariño’s best traits: playful, sophisticated, and delicious. At this intimate Latin restaurant in Uptown, a Bad Bunny playlist serenades couples while chefs in faded Nike caps crack jokes from behind the counter. With its casual-swagger approach to fine dining, Cariño is a refreshing change-up from stuffier spots that also love tweezers and edible flowers.

6. YOUR WIFE IS SAFE WITH TOSTINI

I don’t link every edition of the Reader’s “Reader Bites” series, but this one made me want to go check it out for lunch:

The first time I tried one, a friend and I were rushing to a PO Box Collective class and desperately needed a quick bite. Tostini looked like a cozy respite from a rainy summer day. The chef greeted us at the front counter and, without hesitation, we ordered two coffees. Thinking we weren’t that hungry, we also decided to split a köfte and potato tostini.

As we sipped our coffees, he brought us our tostini, wrapped in red-and-white checkered paper on a gray cafeteria tray. My friend had the honor of the first bite, and the minute he took it, he looked up at me wide-eyed, then silently walked up to the counter to order a second tostini.

The place is called Tostini, at 1622 W Morse.

7. IT’S EXPAT

Anthony Todd’s piece on Bonhomme’s Expat, an all-day cafe in the Loop, makes an observation about all-day cafes:

…lots of places start with big all-day service ambitions, only to turn into dinner-only spots within a few months as the reality of staffing sets in.

Which appears to be the case with Johns Food and Wine, which now opens at 5 pm. Anyway, back to Expat:

Beverage director Brian Sturgulewski worked with [owner Daniel] Alonso to pull favorite signature drinks from famous expat bars from around the world. Think of a Bellini from Harry’s Bar in Venice, or a Papa Doble from the Floridita in Havana. Each of these drinks has a story.

However, the day at Expat doesn’t start at happy hour, it starts around 11 a.m. Alonso observed the patterns of the neighborhood and tailored the start of their breakfast hour to when locals seemed to be stepping out for their second cup of coffee of the day, or when they were heading home from a workout. The breakfast menu is full of classics like housemade pastries, blueberry and banana pancakes, and a mushroom and goat cheese toast with thyme.

8. DUNNING CRUDO

I love pieces that explore neighborhoods people rarely check out, so I was iummediately excited by Maggie Hennessy checking out the Dunning area on the northwest side for WTTW. I knew some of these, like Pho No. 1 Brewing (there used to be a hamburger joint in the space I would take my kids to), but had no idea about this:

We weren’t sure we were in the right place when we walked up to Yakup Bey; the shop still sports signage from its sweets-and-nuts predecessor, The Nuts Castle. The interior unfurled as a visual tidal wave of shelves and glass display cases laden with candy-colored powdered teas, spices, nuts, baklava, and Turkish delights of every color and shape. We ogled apple and rose candies coated in pistachios; sugar-dusted mango-, lemon-, and hazelnut-studded plum jellies; slabs of springy marshmallow layered with chopped nuts and chocolate; cigar-shaped sweets rolled in sesame seeds or stuffed with nougat; and soft, sticky baklavas that were stacked, rolled, and folded from sheets and shreds of honey-oozing phyllo.

9. AWARD PRE-SEASON

It’s still early in the year for year’s end awards, but we’re starting to see them. Food & Wine named its Best New Chefs—none of them from Chicago, though. Michelin announced three… something; probably not stars, just entries in the red book: Anelya, Bayan Ko and Beity. And Akahoshi Ramen made Bon Appetit’s list of the 20 best new restaurants in the U.S.

10. LISTEN UP

At Steve Dolinsky’s Pizza City USA podcast, he spoke with Chicago food legend Rose Barraco George. Who, you ask? Maybe you know better the name of the place her family started: Vito & Nick’s.

David Manilow at the Dining Table talks to Thai Dang, who experienced the closing of Embeya when his partner ran off with the money, and his comeback at Hai Sous.

WHERE MIKE ATE

I’ve been to a few tasting menus this year, but they’ve tended to be the new ones working in a different tradition of cuisine than the French/fancy American one we see the most of. I wanted to see what the state of that kind of tasting menu was in 2024. Something new—so no going back to favorites like Oriole or Schwa. I considered Feld, for the sheer bejesus of our most controversial restaurant of the moment, but if ever there was a place where I wanted to see how it settled out after a few more months, that’s it. What did that leave? The obvious choice, to me, was Esme, ex-Next chef Jenner Tomaska’s fairly new (it opened in 2021) restaurant which aims to meld cuisine with the artists featured on the walls, who change every couple of months.

The current artist is Meghan Borah—who does simple, slightly primitive-crossed-with-new-age scenes of people and nature. Some early dishes were designed to reflect the colors or imagery of the art, though I assume many of the artistic touches—like the manmade bush on which the first few courses are served—are the restaurant’s own idea of how to serve creatively (and not terribly different from what you might see at, say, Ever). In any case, these starting bites seemed to sum up what was to follow: one, a kind of custard on top of a rabbit stock, in an eggshell, was exactly what you want to see as a starter in this kind of meal. The stock was rich and deep; the custard was delicate; there was a hint of an Asian flavoring to it that made it more complex—terrific. And it was small, and over quickly—leaving you curious for what’s next. But alongside it were things that were just odd—thin slices of wagyu formed into a rose, topped with caviar. In other words, luxury ingredients setting the scene for the meal, but it’s basically an mouthful of raw meat, first thing.

That’s kind of how the meal went throughout—some dishes were complex, subtle, refined in a way that suggests his training in the Alinea Group world. Those parts—like a partridge dish with chanterelles and a cherry sauce, classic 19th century cooking, which came presented inside a clay pigeon, cracked and served at tableside—fulfilled the idea of a playful modern take on classic cooking. Another mixed watermelon and tomato in various ways in the process of offering a crab dish; the most creative aspect was a wedge of watermelon, part of which had been replaced with a clear tomato aspic or gelatin; it reminded me of Alinea’s version of pumpkin pie, which turned out to be pumpkin seasoning in a clear gelatin. Other dishes were oddly heavy-handed—another rose, made of scallop, seemed like a cool idea, but for some reason it was overwhelmed by oregano in the seasoning of the water it sat in, reminding you of pizza.

So, a work in progress, but aren’t we all. At its best Esme seemed capable and refined in a way I haven’t seen for a while, apart from a dinner at Ever some months back. At its weakest, it was trying to wow us with luxe ingredients while maybe not thinking through how to get the most from them. Anyway, it’s a pretty, minimalist room, the pace of the meal was pretty perfect—never rushing us or making us visibly wait for the next one—and service was very friendly, a bit chatty, but certainly taking good, and not overly formal, care of us.

Some shorter accounts of other things I’ve had lately:

Bisous is a chic yet homey bar in the same block as Rose Mary, from Peter Vestinos (Sparrow bar). I ordered the silliest thing—a Pink Squirrel—but it was nicely balanced, and very pink.

I had a pastrami sandwich at Schneider Deli, located in the restaurant space of the old Ohio House motel. The rye bread and the pastrami were fine, but felt like what it is—somebody else’s premade pastrami warmed in house. (Steve Dolinsky told me where they get it, but I forgot.) Not the most amazing deli sandwich I’ve had, but I’d have it again if I was in the area.

I eat breakfast out a lot lately, not sure why I fell into that habit, but I can tell you two duds I tried recently. I had high hopes for Istmo, a new Oaxacan spot in Lake View, but when I got there, to a mostly empty restaurant, they directed solo diner me to the bar without really asking me if that was what I wanted, and the bartender could hardly come by to offer me coffee because he was doting on two influencers taking pictures of their 9 am cocktail. Eventually I got some chilaquiles which suggested that no one in the kitchen had ever had chilaquiles—it might as well have been just slightly wet tortilla chips. I’d love another place for real Oaxacan food, but this place did not convince or impress me, and won’t last long if the service staff continues to hang out, chatting, by the far end of the bar, rather than attending to customers. And Stay Cafe is a breakfast cafe that kind of looks like a bar, offering slightly upscale breakfast choices; I’d have liked my Sicilian omelet with sundried tomatoes and goat cheese if not for the fact that the eggs were grainy, like the eggs at a motel breakfast buffet, which I take to mean they used liquid eggs out of a carton. For $20 for breakfast, the least you can do is freaking crack a few eggs, real ones.