Chicago for Memorial Day
Will be attending a wedding in Oak Brook over Memorial Day - we are flying in Friday and out on Tues pm - would love some recs. We have never been to Chicago before and want to know where the best Chicago foods are located. Since we are from Boston, we have never had deep dish pizza and want to try the "best." Not sure what other foods would be typical "Chicago" foods and would love to try them all. We plan to spend time near waterfront and in downtown Chicago it'self . We are staying out near Oak Brook.
Thanks
MeffaBabe
May 12, 2008 01:10PM
I think you're on the right track. IMHO the one "can't miss" specialty in Chicago is our Chicago-style deep-dish pizza. There are a lot of places serving great pizza here, and the chains (with the exception of non-downtown locations of Uno's) do quite a good job of maintaining consistent quality across many locations. Take your pick - double-crust "stuffed" pizza from Giordano's (my personal favorite), Edwardo's, or Bacino's, or single-crust "pan" pizza from Lou Malnati's, Pizano's, Gino's East, or the original location of Uno's - you can't go wrong with any of these. You can phone your order ahead of time if you want to avoid waiting 30-45 minutes while seated for your pizza to bake; you can find their menus and locations on their websites. All the above chains have locations in the downtown areas, and have websites with the obvious website addresses (URLs).
We have some wonderful contemporary American, casual fine dining restaurants. IMHO the very best ones fairly near downtown are:
one sixtyblue - www.onesixtyblue.com
Blackbird - www.blackbirdrestaurant.com
Aigre Doux - www.aigredouxchicago.com
Custom House - www.customhouse.cc
North Pond - www.northpondrestaurant.com
North Pond, in addition to having wonderful food, has an exquisite setting, too. It's right in the middle of Lincoln Park (the park, not the neighborhood), on the pond (the building used to be the place where people would rent ice skates in winter), with the city skyline as a backdrop at the opposite end of the pond. It's about three miles north of downtown, an easy cab or bus ride ( www.transitchicago.com ).
If I had to recommend just one of these places, it would be one sixtyblue for the food, and North Pond for the atmosphere, but there are lots of such excellent places; these are just the very best IMHO.
And, we have some excellent Mexican restaurants. Before you start thinking, "Oh, we have those at home", please realize that these feature very creative provincial Mexican cuisine. Take a look at the menus on their websites and you'll see what I mean. Ones near downtown include Frontera Grill and Topolobampo ( www.rickbayless.com/restaurants ), Salpicon ( www.salpicon.com ), and Adobo Grill ( www.adobogrill.com ). If you're staying in Oak Brook, you might want to try one of the restaurants in an outlying suburb or city neighborhood, such as Flamingo's Seafood in Mount Prospect, just northwest of O'Hare Airport. You can read more details about our Mexican restaurants at http://www.chowhound.com/topics/463572
Fox and Obel is worth a mention, too. It's an upscale gourmet grocery store, just a wonderful place to shop for prepared foods as well as basic ingredients. They also have a cafe in the rear that's open day for a meal or a snack. www.fox-obel.com
There are lots more places, particularly in outlying neighborhoods where you find more ethnic places (Thai, Indian, etc) but they involve some traveling from downtown (30-60 minutes via public transportation).
So those would be my first recommendations. You can find more detailed discussions about specific types of food here in these other topics:
Fine dining:
www.chowhound.com/topics/368683
Steakhouses:
www.chowhound.com/topics/359377
Seafood:
www.chowhound.com/topics/370202
Italian:
www.chowhound.com/topics/360990
Pizza:
www.chowhound.com/topics/327474
www.chowhound.com/topics/319254
Thai:
www.chowhound.com/topics/491970
Greek:
www.chowhound.com/topics/119233
Barbecue:
www.chowhound.com/topics/360674
www.chowhound.com/topics/453036
Tapas:
www.chowhound.com/topics/370492
www.chowhound.com/topics/366524
Burgers:
www.chowhound.com/topics/382781
Hot dogs:
www.chowhound.com/topics/364427
Quintessential Chicago:
www.chowhound.com/topics/372986
Brunch and Breakfast:
www.chowhound.com/topics/364403
Note that some of our restaurants are closed on Sundays, and some on Mondays. It's always a good idea to make a reservation or phone ahead to make sure a place is open, especially on a holiday. Many of our restaurants accept reservations on opentable.com
Bottom line, if you're downtown for two days, I think you could go to Lou Malnati's or Giordano's for pizza for lunch one day, hit one sixtyblue or North Pond for dinner one night, Flamingo's Seafood for dinner another night, and stop in at Fox and Obel, and you'll be having some of our best eats.
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Thank you so very much for taking the time to detail all this information. I knew I could count on my "Chow" friends. I am busy printing out all your links- it will make great reading on our flight out next Friday. We will be better able to plan our few days once reviewing all the menus.
If I am not mistaken wasn't that Lou Malnati's on one of the food channel's specials? Are they the ones that ship their pizza's around the world? Some how the name sounds familiar.
I will have to check back in after our trip to report on where/what we ate. Thank you again for all this wonderful information and tidbits about chowing in Chicago.
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Yes, Lou Malnati's ships their pizzas, via the tastesofchicago.com website. Giordano's ships their pizzas via their own website.
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