a love note to chicago
and the best meal i had goes to...
my most vivid memory of chicago, the first time i went, was drinking too many gin and tonics at a bar in wicker park because i was nervous and i felt unsure being amongst people who seemed so much more worldlier and cooler than me. i was young and naive, far away from home and i needed something to do to keep myself busy so i drank more than i was used to. or rather, more than i really wanted to. i remember the bar being loud and packed, so much so that people spilled out onto the sidewalk and i ended up sitting on the curb later on in the night. i was staying with a gay couple, one of which was a painter, in their beautiful basement apartment a couple blocks away from that bar. their apartment was spacious and the walls were littered with beautiful paintings, some were works of their own and other paintings were done by their fellow artist friends. the painter was painting my then boyfriend; a huge painting that stretched almost from the ceiling to the floor. the painting was of my ex-boyfriend perched on the edge of a stool, completely naked, with a rubber horse mask on. this couple was obsessed with him and couldn’t care less about me.
that night after the bar, after drinking four or five gin and tonics, i woke up from a restless sleep in a cold sweat. i stumbled through their spacious and open apartment where there were no walls, just curtains, and started gagging before making it to the bathroom. my gagging was loud and raucous, i probably sounded like i was dying as i tried to stifle my crying because i always cry when i throw up. i stayed in their bathroom, puking for what felt like hours before half crawling back to the bed they made for me on the opposite side of their apartment. the next morning, they treated me coolly and didn’t say a word about it. as we sipped our coffees in near silence, the looming portrait of my naked then boyfriend with a horse head mask on seemingly hovering over us, i promised myself i would never drink gin again. i remember almost apologizing to break up the tension but i stopped myself. i already felt humiliated and they didn’t care about me, anyway.
even still, i loved chicago. my clothes were simultaneously not cool or warm enough. not cool enough for how cool the people were and not warm enough for the wind that would spontaneously rip through the city. as my teeth chattered while walking underneath the roaring L, i told myself i could live here. i didn’t know what i could do there but i tried convincing myself that it was a city i could grow into. it’s been years since that first visit and although i’ve visited chicago a couple times since then, this was the first trip that felt like i was experiencing chicago. as soon as we landed at the airport, traveled on the L for what felt like an eternity and finally landed in the west loop, we were enveloped by the humidity of a hot chicago summer night and i felt bliss.
as we lugged our luggage from the L to where we were staying, the air was heavy with the smell of food. i told jeremy that i feel like chicago is the city of food. as we walked the few blocks, i rambled saying milan smells like expensive cologne and cigarettes and gasoline. i associate paris with a distinct expensive perfume-y smell of a parisian hotel lobby along with the faint scent of piss and slightly sweet mustiness. to me, new mexico smells like hot sand and oil. but with chicago, i associate it with the deep smells of a slow cooking tomato sauce that wafts through the air, something that smells deeply savory and rich mixed with the scent of pavement and exhaust. as we walked, one of us would ask: is that pizza?
after we landed, we walked to au cheval. there was a wait but it went by fast while downing 2 aperol spritz, people watching as my berkeley-everyone’s-in-bed-by-9-pm-and-everything-is-closed-by-8-pm-ass was in awe of seeing how lively the streets and restaurants were at 10 pm on a wednesday and eavesdropping on the conversation between the most clean girl aesthetic i have ever seen outside of tiktok and a guy who i thought was her father but was definitely not her father. her eyebrows were thin and perfectly arched, her skin was pure and makeup less, her hair slicked back with no baby hairs out of place in a perfect french twist held with a claw clip, and a pristine white tennis dress with kitten heels. she wore one dainty van cleef and arpels necklace that rested right at the base of her throat. i couldn’t help but be both fascinated and bored by her.
au cheval had the best chopped salad i’ve ever had in my life. the iceberg lettuce was perfectly chopped (really important when it comes to a chopped salad) and chilled, the ranch was fucking serious with springs of dill and reminiscent of a ranch that could be considered ‘bad’ for you, the blue cheese was crumbled small enough where it wasn’t overwhelming and i didn’t get suddenly grossed out by the funk of it which sometimes happens to me when i eat blue cheese, the chopped thick cut bacon was abundant, still warm and slightly sweet. was i just really hungry? was it the humidity and heat of the city after being trapped on a plane for 4 hours that had me going feral over this cool and refreshing chopped salad?? it was insane. i ordered their single cheeseburger with no egg (i guess au cheval is known for their eggs) and it was exactly what i needed it to be: not a smash burger, well seasoned, american cheese, good mayo, good mustard, good pickles. jeremy ordered the same but added a runny egg which was beautiful and a sight to see but i love my burgers classic with no additions. i thought au cheval was a perfect late night meal and i’ll remember it fondly forever. it felt so vibrant and alive and maybe i was just delusional because i was exhausted and sweaty and starving but i loved the music that was playing, i loved the late night diner feel, i loved that the lights are dim and low, i loved that you can watch the burgers being flipped, i love that fucking salad.
the aperol spritz were also not bad which i think is important to note.
we chose 3 arts club at random, or rather, jeremy chose this place at random after we had walked 6 miles in the humidity and the heat. he was showing me around his old neighborhood and i was getting a little cranky at our indecision and our lack of planning for lunch even though i rarely plan anything. we didn’t know it was a restoration hardware restaurant but as soon as we stepped in and saw the oversized furniture in every shade of a neutral palette known to mankind accented with ginormous crystal chandeliers and sleek lighting fixtures, i knew exactly where we ended up. when we realized where we were, we had a really good laugh and i was convinced that the meal was going to overpriced and mid, at best. the space is beautiful and i would be lying if i didn’t admit that. it does manage to feel luxurious but in a way that doesn’t fully feel authentic and it’s very faux european but californian at the same time. it kinda makes you want to drink 10 cocktails along with a salad. if i still smoked, i would have wanted to light up a cigarette. i started thinking about my mom and how she would love a place like this and i thought about how i should take her to the one in napa when i get back home. we weren’t starving so we decided to share the lobster roll and shrimp cocktail (shrimp cocktail is one of my favorite dishes ever) with a side of fries. i literally cannot say a single bad thing about the meal. shrimp cocktail was snappy and chilled perfectly and the cocktail sauce was spicy enough. the lobster roll was buttery and the lobster was tender. the fries were simple but good. they had the best cappelletti spritz and against my better judgment i had two at lunch, despite walking around the heat all day and knowing there was still more walking to be done. i would not come here again when we go back to chicago but i thought it was a funny and surprising experience and i understand why people enjoy coming here. it is really pretty, it’s a fun place to have a flirty little cocktail, eat some shrimp cocktail, people watch the other tourists and like i said, the food was actually good.
i really don’t love barbecue, american or korean. but we’ve been obsessed with watching barbecue showdown on netflix which made me wonder if i could like barbecue or maybe i’d like it more now. i requested one night of barbecue since this isn’t something berkeley has a lot of and the show really had me craving a platter of meat. jeremy took me to green street smoked meats and once again, i was just so surprised at how many people were out on a thursday night. especially at a barbecue place! the place was packed but we got lucky and only waited in line for 30 minutes or so but the line soon snaked around the entire building and i guess the wait was closer to an hour. we ordered ribs, sliced brisket, a hot link, macaroni salad, spicy pickles, cornbread with honey butter and banana pudding. i got every sauce available: spicy, sweet (which tasted like curry but it was really good), carolina gold and vinegar. it came with sliced white bread and pickled onions.
ribs: 4/5
sliced brisket: 4.5/5
hot link: 3/5
macaroni salad: 4.8/5
spicy pickles: 2/5
cornbread with honey butter: 1.5/5 (the cornbread was a good texture but there was such a strange, weird, uncomfortable aftertaste that we couldn’t figure out)
banana pudding: 2.5/5 (jeremy liked this way more than i did)
sliced white bread: 5/5 (just kidding)
i enjoyed eating this a lot and it was delicious but i just don’t know if i love barbecue. i think i love the idea of it (especially learning how barbecue is truly an art) more than i actually enjoy eating it. i started feeling a little sick by how much meat i was eating after eating a couple ribs, few bites of the brisket and a few slices of the hot link. i did love the macaroni salad so i ended up picking at that for the rest of the meal. the barbecue made us feel a little crazy at the end of the night but it was worth trying and i’m happy we did.
i was a little skeptical of monteverde because they were selling branded sweatshirts in the front of the restaurant near the hostess stand (which i ended up buying because a ‘mildly windy’ chicago night felt freezing to me). jeremy was the most excited about this place because he had heard good things and read the eater articles (he reads the eater articles, i do not). it is clearly a very well liked restaurant as it was really crowded and we didn’t have a reservation so we knew there would be a wait. the wait was closer to an hour but the bar seating is first come first serve. i sat by the entrance with a glass of wine while jeremy circled the bar, hoping this girl sitting with her parents would finish up after their third espresso martini. we were eventually seated (girl with her parents at the bar must have ordered another espresso martini and rightfully so) and ordered their sunchoke and artichoke truffle crostini, broccoli and cheese arancini, agnolotti, bistecca and a blueberry lemon sundae for dessert.
jeremy loved the crostini a lot and i liked it very much. the arancini was a must for me. i loved that it’s kinda a childlike combination of broccoli and cheese but made into this sort of adult appetizer. the arancini crust was so crisp (insert the this is spectacular, give me 14 of them right now audio). i’ve only had agnolotti with a rich brown butter sauce, something that’s glossy and very savory. this agnolotti was not my favorite because it tasted a little bit like pizza which i didn’t love. it was a little strange. the agnolotti itself was delicious but i didn’t like the sauce it was paired with and it made me miss belotti’s agnolotti. i also hated the fact there were mustard seeds on top! for me, it was a weird slimy texture and added a little bit of a strange bite. i also wish restaurants didn’t put microgreens on top of pasta. pasta doesn’t need microgreens. i can’t think of a lot of dishes that require or are enhanced by microgreens. the bistecca was perfect and i loved the onions it came with. it was tender and so flavorful and would absolutely order again if we came back. our server guided us to the blueberry lemon sundae after i asked what dessert is being served in a goblet after seeing so many goblets being served to many of the tables. our server told us it’s the best dessert on the menu and although we tend to sway toward something chocolatey, i’m so happy we ordered this. it was a vanilla, lemony ice cream with a blueberry compote, little chunks of cake and crispy wafers.
the branded sweatshirts didn’t mean anything because the food was actually quite good and i would absolutely come back.
the only place we got coffee in the mornings for the 4 days we were there was at good ambler because it was conveniently in the neighborhood of where we were staying. it was at good ambler where it dawned on me that this part of chicago, at least, was so full of people in their 20’s-40’s. i told jeremy that i feel like i hadn’t seen one elderly person which is unusual for us because berkeley just feels so old sometimes.
we normally get a chicago dog from portillo’s but because we were walking near the lake, we randomly stopped by relish hot dog stand and got nachos with the fake cheese and jalapeños (honestly hit) and a chicago dog which is one of my favorite things. i don’t love add-ons on my burgers and like them pretty simple and classic but the same does not go for a hot dog. i love, love, love a chicago dog.
brasero was my favorite meal in chicago. i didn’t really know what to expect but i was so pleasantly surprised by how good this meal was. i also loved the ambience; a little dark and a little moody. i love nothing more than a very crowded, busy, bustling restaurant on a saturday night. we ordered the pão de queijo which came with an herby cheese and a jalapeño sage blueberry jam. we really could have ordered another one of these because they were so, so, so good. kind of mochi in texture, piping hot, perfectly salty, very savory and so good with the blueberry jam. the heirloom tomato salad with iberico ham and almond pesto was really simple and really nice. the grilled quail (my first time having quail) was delicious. sweet and salty and the quail was so tender coated with a sauce that was really quite addictive. the coal roasted sweet potato with cheese and hot honey and pumpkin seeds and peanuts was something jeremy loved a lot. i love the sweet potato itself but didn’t love the cheese. however, i would still order this again because it was creamy and sweet. for our shared entree we ordered the moqueca which is a stew with a variety of seafood like mahi mahi, shrimp and mussels in a coconut broth with rice. it was perfect and my favorite dish at brasero.
brasero is a restaurant where i wish we had something similar in the bay area in regards to service, ambience, the food, the other guests. it felt exciting and good to be there. seeing every table full and the bar full just added to the experience. next time we go to brasero, i would want to try their grilled prawns, the pork fried rice, the whole fish and the picanha.
also, their aperol spritz was 5/5.
some random notes about chicago:
there are so many attractive men and women. is this true or was i imagining things? especially at the logan square farmer’s market!!
i’ve never seen a city do the clean girl aesthetic so well. i know aritizia and reformation is scared to see these girls coming.
the mca has some really good exhibits on right now. especially the arthur jafa exhibit showing his selected works.
we waited in line at lula cafe because it was so highly recommended but after waiting 90 minutes and still not being sat, we had to randomly go to same day cafe across the way before heading to the airport. so on a sunday for brunch, i guess if you plan on going, expect a two hour wait or so. i was disappointed but i’m excited to try to go there again the next time.
i love, love, love, love, love how lively the city is even on a wednesday or thursday night. it’s so nice seeing people out past 8 or 9 pm and seeing the streets full. i think chicago in the summer is just really special and despite the heat and humidity, i want to come to chicago every summer.
This makes me want to move my whole life to Chicago.
chicago is such a fun city to eat in