Robyn Hitchcock selfie, I think on the plane from the Twins to Chicago
I took a couple of days off from cookies to do a cultural weekend in Chicago.
I didn’t do any baking Friday, but I got my hair cut and then spent like 2 hours and close to $500 shopping for ingredients. I think I’ll do one last trip to Woodmans on Thanksgiving morning – they say they’re open till 1:45 – and I will have everything. I also processed some of the vegetables that came in my two giant CSA boxes. I blanched the two bunches of kale I got, one lacinto and one curly, and used some for dinner (made with whole wheat gnocchi & cottage cheese; not as good as the plain potato gnocchi & whole milk ricotta called for in recipe, but good nonetheless). I took the three giant squashes I had in the vetsibule – 2 from the market, one from CSA – and cubed and roasted the necks for quiche or quesadillas or maybe chili, and baked and puréed the bulbs for pumpkin pie, and scones. So I made more room in the vestibule for cookies.
We went to the farmers market on Saturday morning to get the turkey, and then took the train down to Chicago. We were trying to plot a pre-Robyn-Hitchcock dinner, but we sort of ran out of time. We considered this place and this one, where I think I’ve been before, but we ended up at the bar across the street, where we were able to eat and make it back with five minute to spare. I had a veggie burger, in Robyn’s honor. Or honour, I guess that would be.
It was an interesting show, too – I think he started with a new one – riding trolleys with his dad – “my eyes have seen the trolley bus”. It reminded me a bit of this interview from last summer, that I listened to, where he talked about his dad, and Percy. The first half was all Robyn (and Soft Boys, but that’s still RH), and there were a few I didn’t recognize, as much of a fan as I am. He came back for a lengthy encore, 8 songs, all covers, sung while drinking 1 1/2 plastic cups of the cheap red plonk they serve at the School. I joined setlist.fm and posted it.
We took the L back, Mark watched a bit of Saturday Night Live, but I just went to bed and read a bit.
In the morning we went to see the Bowie show the Chicago Museum of Contemporary Art. The much-hated audio tour headphones were a must. Mine got out of sync but then I changed them for a new pair, and was fine. I wish there was a little more late stuff, but, since Bowie himself seemed completely in charge, I suppose he’s saving that. I liked the glam rock, Ziggy, the best, but I always have. In the section on Bowie as other people, in movies, it was nice to see the clip of him as Warhol, in Julian Schnabel’s Basquiat, one of his best roles I’ve always thought.
We walked down Michigan Avenue, getting hungry, and stopped at Le Pain Quotidien, a Belgian chain with like four stores in Chicagoland. Mark cased it as a source of take home loafs, and we bought a baguette and a cookie to carry out. I had the Avocado tartine, and hot chocolate, which our friendly waitress said were their biggest sellers – I’m sure they say that to all the girls. The home, quick wardrobe change, and off to the Lyric for Porgy and Bess. Which I’d only seen excerpts of, or really, I just know the music, so seeing the whole story was kind of eye-opening.
When we came out it had started raining pretty hard, so we dived into the L, and back to the apartment to meet friends and go to dinner. I had a little Wisco spread – Willi bandaged cheddar, Potter crackers, and Giardiniera a la Mark Bitmann (I used cauliflower and peppers and carrots, no celery, added 2 teaspoons of sugar, and a hot pepper, and I didn’t chop the olives as they are clearly NOT chopped in the pic) that I’d made with veggies from my CSA box. We went to The Chicago Firehouse, good steak – my fillet was tasty even medium-well, as I like it. And we got to sit right next to the arched doors that the trucks used to drive through. Discovered I do not like rosemary in creamed spinach, and I think they did the restaurant trick of adding instant granules to the whipped garlic potatoes – to make them whip better. They were good, but had a bit if granularity on the tongue.
On Monday, it was still raining, so we stopped at Walgreens to get me a new umbrella – which I promptly left on the bus back to Madison at the Janesville bus switch. Oh well easy come, easy go – it was really hard to fold up, anyhow, making for awkward getting on the bus, train, and into a taxi, events. We sat in Intelligensia and had coffee, then Mark headed off to work and I started walking to Union Station, but ended up cabbing and had a nice woman driver, my first time for that in Chicago. I told her how I used to drive for Union Cab in Madison, and we had a nice chat. Then it was just the long sloppy bus ride back, the rain changed to slushy snow at Des Plaines. I caught up on work email and phone calls via iPhone. Back to work and cookies, that I will tell you about in the next post.
Avocado tartine at Le Pain Quotidien – I admired their smart ingredient sourcing – using mashed avocado for most of the sandwich, and only topping it with a few thin slices = less perfect avocados to purchase. I mean, the mashed part could even be made from frozen avocados.
