Tom Douglas

Thanksgiving in Chicago/ by Shelley Lance, Blog Editor

My husband, Frank, and I flew to Chicago to spend Thanksgiving in the northwest suburbs with my family.  My amazing sister, Marla, cooked the whole meal (for 18 people) from scratch in her newly remodeled kitchen.  In the photo, left, my beautiful mother is in the back and my beautiful niece, Elyssa, is off to the side.

Instead of staying in my parents’ spare bedroom the whole time, Frank and I spent one night in a hotel on Rush St, near the Magnificent Mile (the Conrad- which I highly recommend- we snagged a luxurious room for a great price!), so we could check out a few Chicago restaurants at our leisure without having to drive all the way back to the burbs.  My cousin, Penny, and her husband, Steve, took us to Davanti Enoteca in University Village (a new name for the gentrification of an old Chicago neighborhood near U of I campus and the old Maxwell Street.)  Davanti is Penny’s latest favorite joint, and since she’s the dining editor of the venerable Chicago Magazine, who better to decide where to eat?  Davanti is owned by the white-hot Chicago chef, Scott Harris, who also owns, or co-owns Mia Francesca, Nella, and the Purple Pig.

Davanti turned out to be a cozy, neighborhood joint serving Italian comfort food with a more than reasonable wine list.  (They have a retail license to sell wine, so all wine in the restaurant is sold at the retail price with $7 corkage. On Sunday, when we dined, there’s no corkage fee.)  My favorite dish was the first thing we tasted- focaccia di Recco, which is Ligurian style and nothing like the yeasted focaccia I’m used to.  Two thin, flaky sheets of pastry held a layer of creamy, fresh cows’ milk cheese.  Delicious, surprising, and unique! (photo below left)

We also ordered the mascarpone polenta with Berkshire pork ragu (photo above, middle).  The waiter makes quite a production of spreading the polenta on a platter and pouring the ragu from a small saucepan. Finally, We shared an excellent grilled half chicken, ‘Pollo Sole Mio’, which was moist and perfect.  But the most amazing thing of all was the check- about $100 for dinner for four (before tip) with one bottle and one glass of wine. Crazy cheap for the quality and abundance or our meal.

The next day, after walking up and down Michigan Avenue and briefly popping (pun intended) into a Garrett’s Popcorn store (photo above, right) -drawn in by the heady caramel corn fragrance you could smell from a block away-we discovered that the Purple Pig was only steps from our hotel, so we headed over for a late lunch. The Purple Pig has a convivial bar atmosphere and serves small plates with a porky (lardo, pig’s ear,etc) emphasis. Packed, noisy, and popular, the Pig was recently chosen one of the ten best new restaurants in the country by Bon Appetit magazine.

My favorite items from a trendy and very creative menu were the delicate winter squash arancini with sage pesto (photo above, second from left) , and the sepia (cuttlefish) with almonds and fried rosemary (photo above, third from left).  For dessert we had the “Sicilian Iris,” a fried brioche bun- greaseless and light as a cloud- filled with ricotta and chopped chocolate (in the photo above and to the right, it’s on a plate below the espresso cup).  Our excellent server overheard me saying it was Frank’s birthday, so he sent out an espresso cup of pistachio gelato with a candle! A sweet end to our day in the city!

December 5th, 2010