We just spent another weekend in Chicago, mostly to see Arcade Fire. Here’s some of the food:
Asparagus salad at Acre
Aztec chocolate at XOCO
The rest are on the photo blog – and I didn’t take any pictures at Spiaggia Cafe.
It was almost like two trips – the extremely cold and rainy part, and the sunny & mild part.
We drove to Harvard IL, and took the metra train, arriving in Chicago in the rain, and cabbing to our hotel. We ventured out onto Michigan Ave. just a bit, then got cleaned up and into the outfits we had decided were appropriate for dinner in the casual side of a fancy restaurant, followed by a rock show in a university basketball arena, meaning I wore a tunic over jeans, and Mark & Ethan jeans and shirts with collars.
At Spiaggia Cafe, I toyed with the idea of getting small plates – I was thinking meatballs and a salad, maybe soup … but in the end I had the salad: Rucola – arugula, Capriole Farm goat cheese, Spiaggia balsamico and a pasta: Gigli – Manila clams, garlic, bottarga, parsley, bread crumb – but I had them leave off the bottarga (stinky fish eggs, mashed into a block and shaved onto my noodles – uh uh). I also got one of their Negronis to start, made with Campari, sweet vermouth & prosecco – what a good idea – they always come out so bitter made with gin. Mark & Ethan split one of the other salads, with frise & fennel, and Mark had the tagliatelle with spring vegetables – a few little fiddleheads in there, even. Ethan had the gnocchi with wild boar ragu – leaving me with the uncomfortable feeling that as the smallest person, I ate the most – but maybe not, because I only ate about half of my pasta.
It was really raining when we got outside, so we jumped in a cab – a Scion – and the cab driver actually asked me how to go, and followed my directions. But that kinda backfired when he asked us where we wanted to be dropped off; he made a left and pulled up in front the UIC Pavillion, and immediately got yelled at by a cop – “what are you doing stopping here”. I went back and say that I was the customer and I asked him to drop me off there, but that only got the cop yelling at me – “So what if you’re the customer – I AM THE POLICE”. But he let the driver go before we even got into the building. Shoulda tipped the driver a bit more I guess.
Saturday morning, the start of the sunny & mild part of the trip, was the peak dining experience – we went to Rick Bayless’ new joint, XOCO – Mexican street food, and stood in line for about 20 minutes for our table. Himself was there behind the counter in his whites – so he must like the place too. It was worth it. I got a torta – pork and black bean sandwich that came in a bowl of tomato sauce – good but messy. Mark got a dryer chicken torta, and Ethan had probably the best, at least the healthiest, choice, one of the Caldos, like Mexican Pho, rich broth with stuff in it, chicken and avocados and tortilla strips in this case. And, since the churros came three to an order, it seemed only right to split them. I saved a few slurps of my spicey Aztec chocolate to go with.
Churros at XOCO
Afterward, we walked and shopped and went to the MCA to see Jim Nutt. They had QR codes along with exhibition labels, so you could scan and see the backs of some of the pictures, or hear a curator talk about Nutt’s craftmanship, on your smart phone.
We ate an early pre-theater dinner at a place called Acre, nice neighborhood joint, used to be Charlies, I guess. The asparagus was the best. Then finished the night at The Book of Liz, a funny play written by Amy Sedaris. It was at this tiny indie theater way out on Irving Park Rd., tickets were only $18 each. Turned out Google maps knew what it was doing when it said to walk to the L – the 22 Clark, even though it was direct to our just off Michigan near North hotel, took longer because of all the traffic. Still, not a bad way to spend part of a Saturday night – watching the nightlife on Clark St. from the bus.
Book of Liz poster
