Oak Park Farmer's Market 5th Try
7/2/05

It was a very good day to be in Oak Park. At 8:30 or so, the market teemed with people, circling the stands, gathered around the musicians, sitting at the metal tables. Across the street the little league played their all star game, and with banners hanging and a roaring crowd, the whole area felt alive. The early season heat dissipated but left behind a reward of fruit and vegetables.

Blink, and the market will look very different. Although one vendor carried big water-logged left over strawberries, those things were of the past, as was asparagus. Replacing the early season crops were tons of cherries including dark bing and paler Queen Ann (with no shortages of sour cherries in this market) plus blueberries, black raspberries, red raspberries, tayberries, and quite surprisingly, white peaches. On the vegetable front, Nicholl's Farms had the first, fresh dug, new, new potatoes. I got a basket. (Although when I got home I realized I had only enough 'taters to accent some dish.) Nicholl's was also showcasing their variety with three colors of cauliflower. Around the market, there was bundles of zucchini, baskets of fava's, bunches of beets. Green beans piled high. Even jalepeno peppers to buy. Blink and it's summer in Oak Park.

See ya next week.

4th Market
Oak Park Farmer's Market 6/25/05

Once again I am woefully late with my market report. And I had all sorts of things to say. Funny how a week's worth of cleaning in anticipation of the in-laws visiting takes the spark outta blogging. But now that the bungalow is absolutely sparkling, I can at last chronicle (very quickly) the news of the market.

Good News
The first berries. Skibbes Farm had tayberries, looking like mutant raspberries and tasting a bit like what bug juice was made from (but better!) and Berry's Berries from Michigan had the first blueberries I've seen. Also, lotsa cherries, including sour cherries. In fact the aforementioned Skibbes Farm was marketing cherries as sour and tart. When I asked, they said, "well some are sour, some are really sour." Nicholl's Farm winning strawberry of the week was Ovation, but the best berries came from Farmer Vicki's Genesis Farms. There was the last of the asparagus and the last of the spinach but the first of the fresh favas. It's funny, favas are considered the archetypical spring veg, but they do not show up fresh (as in local) until late June. The very hot weather was rushing to market stuff like zuchini and cabbage. On the cutesy front, Nicholl's Farm stocked carrots in five colors and varieties including fat Tom Thumb. We bargained and got one bunch of each for $6 total. They also had oh so gourmet baby zuchini with flowers attached. Still at 3 babies for $3, I passed on those.

Bad News
The donuts were pretty crappy this week, not the least bit of crust.

Best News
Well, who should just make my day? Totally un-expected, I found my favorite farm family at the market. The Wettsteins now appear once a month in Oak Park, carting coolers of organic pork, chicken, beef, lamb and eggs. We got the eggs and some chicken livers. We wanted a whole chicken, but they were sold out. Instead we got a bag of chicken backs and necks for stock making.

See ya in a few days.

If you found yourself in Valparaiso on Tuesday...

...You would know this county seat of Porter, Indiana offers not one but two places that offer Serrano ham. In fact one could get a full blown Spanish meal at Don Quiote, whose owner, I learned has inhabited Valparaiso for 20 years but has also opened a shop importing Spanish goods. Valparaiso is also a town where one could get a bottle of Montalcino de Brunelo at the corner drug store, cupcakes with towering spirals of real buttercream, and visit more than a few espresso parlors. It was tropical night at Old Style Inn, with all that implies, but it should be noted that if one wanted to skip the pu-pu platters, there was genuine Northern Indiana fare there like buttered perch and pan fried blue gills. Still, if one wanted to really taste the taste of Valparaiso, one would skip all of the above and head a mile or so east of town to the Strongbow Inn.

Strongbow Inn was at one time, really an inn or at least a motel with a restaurant or at least a turkey farm with a motel and a restaurant. One inspired the other which inspired the other. Still, over time, the restaurant has won the attention of the third generation of family owners.

Say chicken at the Strongbow Inn and they cringe the way witches and wizards cringe at the expression of Lord Voldemort. If you organize your existence around turkey, you stomach no mention of her squatter cousin. And if you organize your existence around turkey, you sell not just year round turkey dinners, you sell turkey soup, turkey pate, turkey pies, turkey wings and turkey legs. You get cranberry sauce, mashed potatoes and bread dressing and gravy because these things go with turkey. You can, of course, jump ranks, and have chautebriand for two. I have never known nor seen anyone visit the right side of the menu, the evil non-turkey side.

I cannot vouch for the turkey pate. I can say everything else is satisfying in exactly the way it should. As a food writer might say, it is a true expression of its locale. I can also nip around the edges. The gravy is mostly just there, a moistener but not at all interesting or robust. The noodles for the soup are so clearly and visually homemade, and they have that toothsomeness that I love in homemade noodles, but they are also a bit mushy. The crust for the turkey pie lacks the structure or crispness of crusts made with butter or lard, but that does not mean it lacks for flavor. The potatoes are real as that implies but a bit on the bland side too. The house rolls are yeasty and soft, not at all like white bread. Luckily they require no lubrication because I'm not a lover of the margarine served along side. I must confess that my favorite thing at Strongbow is actually their salad dressing. The house dressing, a mysteriously simple garlic vinaigrette with crumbled blue cheese, is gosh darn nearly the best salad dressing I know. Lest you think I am overly critical, I will tell you that I'd be happy to return to Strongbow Inn next time I'm in Valparaiso on a Tuesday.

Strongbow Inn
2405 E. US 30
Valparaiso, IN 46383

Dick Durbin should have checked with Erik Zorn First.

Sane advice.

Third Market
Oak Park Farmer's Market June 8, 2005

Thursday, Thursday, there was a time when I tried to report on the market as soon as I got home. Let me just say that certain members of my family did not appreciate a detour in the middle of an otherwise busy weekend, so I am left to blog the market when I get around to it. Luckily, I have the steeltrap memories of the Chowhounditas to remember what we bought.

Strawberries. This was another week of strawberries. Nicholl's Farms gave out tastes of about six varieties of strawberries. We liked the intensity of Noreastener, but as we were taking samples from the last available pint, we did not want a short stack. We settled on two: Idea and Sparkle. Idea had a distinct and strong undertone of funk, what sophisticates call plummy, what realists call barnyard and what those without subtly say, tastes a bit like sh*t. But of course, all in a good way. Complex. Special. The guy at Nicholl's said they were considered the closest to the wild strawberries of France. Sparkle were much opposite. Super-sweet like bubble gum but with enough nuance that they did not seem cloying.

While strawberries dominated the market, the first sweet cherries appeared at a couple of vendors. Fresh local cherries sing the way cherries trucked in from long distances cannot, but the first of the year are less than juicy, harbingers for what will come. Otherwise, pretty much more of the same, a lot of lettuces and related greens, snow peas, sugar snaps, shelling peas, rhubarb, spring onions. I should report that Nicholl's Farms had a few small containers of fresh red currents, perhaps to show they can then because there is a real market for fresh currents. The first crops of fresh flowers gave the market a much fuller look.

The bad news of the market: I spoke too soon on the faux vendors. Buried in the plant shop at the Southeast corner of the market is the dreaded supermarket produce. I guess it makes people feel good about buying consumer level stuff at a farmer's market, but these buyers are really not supporting the Farmer's Market. The good news: The donuts were better than last week, a real nice crisp crust against a light and fresh inside. I do note that we got to the market much later this week, after 9 AM, and the donut line was huge. I wonder, however, if the donuts get better as the day progresses. Maybe the oil gets seasoned?

See you next week.

Second Market
Oak Park Farmer's Market June 11, 2005

Sorry for the delay. I've been eating thin crust pizza and otherwise getting bogged down in various foodie forums.

Week two brought slight but distinct incremental changes in the market. In fact the whole point of blogging weekly is to capture these slight but distinct changes, because I think otherwise they get lost easily.

By week two, the market looks bigger. Empty spaces fill with Michigan fruit vendors who now have a crop to sell. Strawberries or asparagus. In fact if you went around to all the vendors, it was Christmas in June in Oak Park. Pretty much the entire output of the market was green or red. Of course Oak Park's premier vendor of variety, Nicholl's farm, offered a wider range of spring items. There was the first sugar snaps and shelling peas of the season. Nicholl's Farm, as they are wont, offered not just strawberries, but varietals of strawberries including "All Star," "Prime Time," "Honeyoye" and "Jewel." Amongst the other vegetable vendors, one could find the first broccoli, lotsa greens, radishes, snow peas, and these. We actually got these turnips the week before, but they are wallowing away in the fridge as I cannot decide what to do with them.

We went to a dinner last night for the group, Seven Generations Ahead at 312 Restaurant. This dinner featured dishes from Oak Park's market: a tart from Nicholl's Farm's garlic shoots and greens, roasted Nicholl's fingerling potatoes (keeper potatoes!), a dish of Nicholl's beets with goat cheese (what an advertisement for beets), another salad featuring Genesis Farm's asparagus and mizuna greens and a final salad of Nicholl's peas over lettuce. I joked that there was about $100 worth of peas on my plate given the high price of farmer's market peas. For dessert there was strawberry tarts and rhubarb cobbler and a rosemary panna cotta (which was gone by the time I got there). If you all do not believe that there is a significant taste advantage in fresh, local produce, well you should have been there last night to try.

I should digress to point out that while Seven Generations Ahead is an Oak Park based group, and the farmer's who provided the produce for the dinner, Nicholl's and Genesis Growers, are at the Oak Park Farmer's Market each week, the food itself was donated for the event by the Green City Market, where Nichols and Genesis also vend. Also, the dinner featured roast pork from Wettstein's Farm. Again, what an endorsement for non-commercial stuff. Chef Dean Zanella roasted the pork with nothing more than salt and pepper. Really allowed the natural pork flavor to shine. The pork was actually a bit leaner than I would have expected, but as I said, it was much more delicious than typical pork. Chef Zanella also served on side, the crisped up skin. Crisped up natural pork skin. Obviously, I took seconds.

OK, let me return to the market with this important note: the donuts were better this week. There was a clear layer of crisp against a softer donut, just what I like in this breed of donut.

See ya next week.

Blogging the Market
Oak Park Farmer's Market June 4, 2005 - Opening Day

Editor's Note: Three years ago (and I cannot believe it was really 3 years ago), I attempted to report weekly of the Oak Park Farmer's Market, capturing why I wanted to go each week (as well as what was there each week, which was not always the same thing). Here's an example of a weekly report. I had a lot of fun doing it, but it also became a bit of a chore. By the end of the season, I actually felt that I was not doin' the market justice. The next year, I started bloggin' the market again, but for a variety of reasons, my heart was not into it, and by last year, I was not doing it at all. I am gonna try, however, to do it this year. On one hand, I want to try to invigorate some of the things that made the summer of 2002 special for me. On the other hand, I am not gonna sit down and try and write a essay each week. I'm aiming for the something is better than nothing approach. Also, the VI family is planning a few summer excursions, including, hopefully, to Indianapolis, so I do not expect to get to every market.

On to the market:

The first few weeks of the Oak Park Farmer's Market always have a slight feeling of incompleteness to them because several vendors do not yet appear. Especially glaring, is a big space in the middle of the market where The Farm will later park their corn truck. Still, this seemed the biggest opening day I remember. The market was full of stuff already: early strawberries, the first sugar snap peas, bags of baby lettuce, turnips, mustard greens, left over keeper potatoes, asparagus, smaller beets, hot house tomatoes. One Michigan fruit vendor supplemented their meager offerings with dried fruit and another Michigan vendor brough along a full range of canned goods. Nicholls was selling tomato plants. Oak Park now has Heartland Beef. The is the local, ultra-light Beeline Honey instead of Oak Park's own Avedon famous beekeper. So, all in all, it did not seem vacant at all. One could spend a lot of money on Saturday. We did.

We pulled in three versions of the strawberries. I would say poor, OK and darn good without revealing all the vendors. Well, I will say that Mr. Skibbes near the donuts had some darn good strawberries. We picked up lettuce and argula from Farmer Vicki and Japanese turnips from Sandhill Organics. At Stovers, we got some asparagus they assured us was picked just the day before. And to show support, we got a chunk of meat, sirloin roast, from Heartland. Oh, and some cheese from the cheese people.

Local lore has it that the famed donuts need a few weeks running to get out the kinks, to perfect the recipe, but this week's donuts were plenty fine if not quite as close to the grease (i.e., had been sitting a bit too long) than ideal.

One more thing to add, the market police seem to have finally nipped the faux vendors, the vendors whose merchandise never quite seemed to match the seasonality of the other vendors and whose produce looked a bit more uniform than the other vendors. There will be no bargains this year.

See you there next week.

Scafuri Bakery

Scafuri is an Italian bakery in the heart of the old neighborhood on Taylor Street. And for something this old, it has recieved scant attention on LTHForum. I put it into the search engine here and only a few mentions, and really nothing of the fare--as if people *knew* about the place, but no one knew about the place. Perhaps, I can correct that.

There are two impressions one gets upon entering Scafuri. One, what, the pessimist impression, might be put off by the enormous spaces between offerings. And the Italian bread does look a bit sad. They might not get anything at Scafuri. On the other hand, the bright-siders, will notice that there are two or three pastries that are so intensely hand made, so real looking. And the Italian woman, house dress and all running the show, straight from a cameo in a Scorsee flick, makes you feel quite at home. Be an optimist.

I've only tried a few things so far, but they are all as special as they look. Scafuri makes a bunch of pastries with a very short dough, do not tell the trans fat police, but this stuff is highly delicious. As I note above, it tastes like Momma made it, not a professional baker. Inside this dough comes various packages including a light sweet cheese. I've found the "strudel" highly addictive. I note this strudel is shaped long like a strudel, but the package is not a true strudel (i.e., from filo type layers). Still good.

Scafuri is a long way from being the best (surely not the best stocked) bakery in Chicago, but should be on your short list of places to try.

Scafuri Bakery
1337 W. Taylor St.
Chicago, IL
312-733-8881

Market Follow-Up
The Season's First Bitter (Big) Salad

Salt, sweet, sour, bitter. Eaters tend to rejoice with foods full of the first three basic flavors. Yet, how many diners do you see, pushing themselves back from the table, satisfyingly wiping their lips and say, "boy that was bitter." I mean, how many people just winced at the word bitter? Do not fear bitter. Two of the best things to consume are dominated by bitter flavors: chocolate and coffee. And lettuce, dressing tends to tame lettuce's bitterness, but underneath that dressing is some pretty bitter stuff. At Green City Market the other day, we picked up a bunch of mixed seasonal lettuces from Growing Power, the farm located in the midst of the city of Milwaukee. I was a bit skeptical of this lettuce because Growing Power had a lot of hothouse tomatoes. They insisted though, that the lettuce came from the ground. I believe them now.

This was lettuce to tame your fear of bitterness. And of course, high advertisement for farmer's markets. I made my first big salad of the year. I love big salads. I take a bunch of items found in the kitchen, typically farmer's market produce and leftover meats, then chop it as well as my poor knife skills allow. I confess that what I love most about the big salad is just shoving all the minced stuff in my mouth like a squirrel and enjoying the way it interacts. In fact, I do not think I could eat a big salad in the company of others because the puffed out cheeks would be so impolite. OK, I am getting off subject. This big salad featured leftover pollo rostizado from Carnercia Jimenez (not the best I've had from them, too salty); Costco miracle bacon (i.e., their pre-cooked bacon that lasts for 8 months and is really, really good); Caputo's roasted red peppers, the Condiment Queen's famous tapenade (so good the chowhounditas demand it for breakfast, with goat cheese, at least once a week); and some crumbled blue cheese, with mustard vinaigrette. Oh, and that Growing Power Lettuce, at the end of the day, with all those things faded into the background. I mostly tasted the lettuce, a deliciously bitter lettuce. I finished that big salad, pushed myself away from the table, wiped my lips, smiled to no one, and said, boy was that bitter.

Additional follow up: We made the Wilmont Milling polenta last night. It took a long time, much longer than promised, but at the end of the day it was worth the wait (if you like your polenta heavy, intense and tasting like corn.)

Chicago's Green City Farmer's Market
Always Gettin' Better

We missed the first couple of weeks of Chicago's Green City Market, but it took only one visit to convince me that it is better than ever. From its start, Green City has included vendors selling produce both organic and unique. That makes it a very good farmer's market. Yet, it did not stop there. Over the last few years, Green City has added several vendors offering local, organic meats such as Piedmontese style beef. And we are not talking a few chickens and a bunch of eggs. One could get bratwurst made from Illinois pork, bacon, parts including liver and kidneys, heritage turkeys, etc. More, more, more. A couple of years ago, Traderspoint, an organic dairy based in Indiana began offering their freakishly good milk and yogurt. How could they top it in 2005?

How 'bout stone ground organic grains from a water-run mill? 2005's Green City Market now has an array of products from Wilmont Milling Company (est 1840!). Grits made from white popcorn, polenta from yellow corn, even a grind made from Indian corn (also oatmeal, bread flour, rye, etc.). I found, that at $8 for 24 ounces, it was not a bad deal at all. I have yet to make it, but it looks great (and I doubt I will ever do a direct taste test with some of the mail order stone ground grits guys out there). Still, it adds to the completeness of the Green City Market.

Of course, I like my Oak Park market the best (which this year will include meat and eggs), but I like it for reasons not just food. I am most impressed with Green City.

NB: Wilmont Milling will only be at the market on Wednesdays. On Saturdays, they will be at the Indianapolis market.

What's Interesting at Caputo's This Week

Black radishes, roughly the size of turnips, looking like something used in the filming of Schindler's List. Got look carefully though. They are in a bushel basket underneath the bananas.

Why Go to Reuters Bakery Tomorrow (Saturday)

Every morning at Reuters, the fresser gets confounded with wonderful choices: multiple versions types of coffee cakes, seasonal rhubarb tarts, strudels, sweet rolls, but on Saturday morning, the choice is that much harder. On Saturday's Reuters bakes a kinda coffee cake loaf (in four varieties!). It is a yeast dough, ever so slightly dry, like a coffee cake, but overcome by various fillings like fresh blueberrys or pie cherries and topped with either icing or sugery crumbs. Slice it like bread. Toast it. But do it in a toaster oven with a tray 'cause the sugar will melt all over every thing.

Ripped Off!
Lunch at Osteria via Stato

First, let me note that the Condiment Queen did not hate Osteria Via Stato quite as much as me. Second, on a dinner visit, Mr. Barolo wrote on LTHForum that he had a more pleasant experience. But I got the keyboard in front of me.

Did I mention that I hated Osteria via Stato? Aside from accusations of deliberate food poisoning, I s'pose that calling a place a rip-off is about as bad as you can say. No?

Granted, to be ripped off, one has to be willingly gullible, to expect something nice from LEY places (and I have defended them over the years), and to buy into this "more Italian" experience they were promising at Osteria via Stato. So, maybe it's my fault.

I expected to be impressed with lavish platers of attractive antipasti: vibrant salads, luscious meats. I expected the pastas to be deliciously simple, emphasizing the grain as much as the condiment, and I expected a good if small main course or secondi. Of course, based on all the hype and such, I was also expecting a price fixe menu. (I also expect in a pretty empty restaurant to not be led to a table in the corner abutting the computer, but that I remedied with a bit of vocalization.)

It turns out at lunch they do not really serve the price fixe anymore. It was all ala carte, but I made a little stink (called threatened to leave), and voila there was still a two course set deal for $19 (give or take a dollar I forget now). Should have stuck with the ala carte. Here's what we got. Two bowls of asparagus soup--I mean two bowls with a little bit of asparagus soup in them; two playing card thick slices of baked fennel; and an overdressed green salad. That was our wow-us first course. We were then allowed to pick from the pastas or entrees. I chose the "homemade" paparadelle with meat ragu, and my wife chose salmon with green sauce.

The soup was good enough, it was more a chicken veloute with a few slices of asparagus than a soup that really brought out the spring flavors, but it was very much wrong as the first thing served. The fennel tasted fine, but the way it came, so tiny, on a tiny plate, made eating it seem so joyless, and the salad, surprisingly enough was pretty bad, you would think green salad how can they do that, but it was overdressed and overdressed with a too sweet dressing. But c'mon, where was the house cured salmon I've heard about, the salumi, the proscuitto*. I've had glorious antipasti in Italy, and this felt more like what a place would give you as nibbles with a glass of wine.

And you know I am not gonna like the pasta. It may have been made in house, but I suspect it was done either with an extruder machine or an Atlas machine (if really made in house), because at the end of the day, it had none of that toothsomeness, that feel of real home made pasta. Like so much of the lunch, it seemed lifeless and joyless. And (of course) it goes without saying that it came way over sauced (and the sauce was nothing special either). My wife did enjoy her small piece of fish. I did not taste it, but visually, it did look well cooked.

Perhaps because they sensed my misery, they decided unannounced, to bring us some sides near the end of our meal. We got a polenta that was cooked well but was exceedingly bland, and some nice local asparagus that even they could not ruin.

On top of all of this, we were dumb enough to go with the bring us wine program (abet at the piker $15 option). It was an especially dumb call, cause they offered us a glass of wine with the set lunch. Instead, we got three mediocre glasses of wine. The first, a Sicilian white from Cusamano had a nice floral nose, but was vapid on the tongue. The second, a red Sicilian (Nero d'Avola) also from Cusamano was just vapid, and the third, a Puglian wine (Uva di Troia) from Santa Lucia had that bubble-gum-y taste of a bad Beaujolais noveau. We left most of the reds un-drunk.


*One of the first visual cues that things were not all they should have been at Osteria via Stato, is that when you walk in, you see a display of a bunch of the antipasti (as well as a few of the raw materials with labels of origin). I'm not gonna comment on the wrinkled eggplants, but the ham. It is displayed prominently, shown off. Yet, it is shown off in a machine slicer, actually a show-off machine slice with a vivid paint job. It's really meant to catch your attention, show off. But all I think is, who really wants to show off machine sliced prosciutto. Would not a place that aspires to what they aspire to, hand slice the ham? Is not prosciutto SUPPOSED to be hand sliced...

Al Pastor es La Ley

A few weeks ago, I mentioned that my luck in chowhounding has a lot to do with the eagle eye of the Condiment Queen. There are times, however, when I do OK as well. As we have discussed on these boards before, a good signifier to me has always been home-made-y looking signs advertising regional/obscure specialities. La Ley at the intersection of Grand and Austin has several big hand painted signs telling the passerby of their barbacoa de borrego estillo Durango (steamed lamb as done in Durango, in the north of Mexico). I've been wanting to go here for a while. And as so often the case. What took me so long.

The first thing I saw upon entering was a very robust cone of al pastor pork. I knew what to have with my barbacoa. When the CQ opened her menu, she knew what she would have (after seeing a tiny piece of paper advertising carne en su jugo). My ony decision, get the al pastor en gordita or not. With a bit of half-assed Spainish, I learned that the gorditas were hecho a mano, handmade, and I was set on lunch. Truly great al pastor. Ideal al pastor in the sense that the meat was throughly crisped up from the spit cookery, not hung to dry and fried on the griddle. The gordita was huge, like a masa sammy. The two tacos de barbacoa were just as good, the kinda fatty, near gelatonous taste that leaves your lips greasy (but in a good way).

All the stuff was enhanced by a trio of salsas, each hotter than the next. I was especially keen on one made mostly of charred jalepenos, but a thinner green sauce, and a red sauce with a strong smokey element were about as good. The carne en su jugo was not quite as complex as some I've had, but what it lacked nuance, it made up for with muscle. A very strong bowl of meat, bacon and beans. Ms. VI gave it the esteemed comment, "it does not taste like restaurant food." Unlike most carne en su jugo I have had, the meat was soft and rich instead of grilled. They had no take out menus, so I do not currently have the address or telephone number. I cannot vouch for anything else on the menu, but I was pretty blown away on this, my first visit.

After eating here, I was most interested in the opinion of Rich4, a hound rather obsessed with tacos al pastor. Well, it seems he likes the place.

Taqueria La Ley
6000 W Grand Ave
Chicago, IL
(773) 385-9878

What's Interesting This Week at Reuters Bakery

A yeast coffee cake made with fresh rhubarb. A bit pricey at $7, but surely a repersentation of the season.

What's Interesting This Week at Caputo's

Organic "mini-watermelons". Also available at Goodness Greeness (although I do not know this place). See here for details.

Also, fish. I've been very impressed with the looks of Caputo's fish department. Right now they have whole "toto" fish. Beats the heck out of me, and sea snails too.

Missing Information

Cynics might suggest the lack of posting stems from two weeks of drubbing in the Phil Vettel game (e.g., review AND mother's day listings...). No, I can and will give Phil credit for his victories. Rather, I have been bedeviled by the twin demons, work and wrecked computer. Work's still there, but the computer problems have been mostly fixed (for the time being). Look forward soon to plenty of vital information:

The Czech paradox...opinions on three leading Midwest deli's; the strata of Milwaukee dining...Michigan style coney dogs and coney burgers...a like new version of the ice cream listing (with data on the superb south side ice cream gems like Gayety and Cunis)...reviews of Apple's America and the Stern's Roadfood (neither hits the sweet spot)...lunch with the big shots at Gene and Georgetti's...

Stay tuned and sorry for the missing information.

Bourbon Blogging

I'm the last to know all the cool blogs. Learn about whiskey from Chuck.

Bourdain and Bulli

Apparantly Tony Bourdain did a one hour program on Ferran Adria, but it's been embargoed from US consumption.A Chicago foodie got his hands on the tape though. He gives a re-cap here.

A link for people with BitTorren familiarty is provided at the end of the post.

What's Interesting This Week at Caputo's

Onion sets. Very, very tiny baby onions, white.