Beer of the Week: Brooklyn Brewery’s 25th Anniversary

We celebrate yet another Silver Anniversary this week, honoring Brooklyn Brewery’s fantastic, chestnut-colored lager, arriving in a large format bottle. The Hopleaf’s Michael Ropers says cheers to one of the nation’s most influential brewers.

Burnt Ends at Bub City

This resurrected concept from Team Melman and Lettuce Entertain You used to sit on Weed Street, in Lincoln Park in the late 80s (I fondly recall eating a mess of crawdads on a ream of newspaper after an Oingo Boingo concert at Metro in ’88). But the trend of slow-smoking pork and brisket was too much to ignore, and so, a few months ago, Bub City re-emerged as a River North honky-tonk, complete with live music, bourbon on tap and soon, a basement tiki bar called Three Dots and a Dash. Read More

This Weekend in Chicago: Cheese at Pastoral Festival and Pig at Cochon 555

Photo by Galdones Photography

The mission: prepare a menu from the a 200-pound heritage breed  pig, nose-to-tail. If you’re the kind of person who gets excited by pig butchery and cooking, and you’d care to participate in selecting a winner from five local chefs, check out tickets to this year’s Cochon 555 on April 28. Don’t want to buy any tickets? Then come to the  free cheese festival hosted by Pastoral at the Chicago French Market.  Read More

Hungry Hound Recap From Last Week:

Acadia’s burger (bar only) is worth checking out.

Due to the Boston manhunt, two of my stories were held from Friday, but we do have a pair of burgers worth shouting about. One is a Chicago legend – the Big Baby – now being resurrected in a Gold Coast hotel’s brasserie; the other (above) is from Acadia’s fantastic little bar menu, and I think it’s among Chicago’s best.

The Globe and Mail (Travel)

Click here to read my story in Canada’s national newspaper, about restaurants in Japan focusing on just one thing.

And The Winners Are…

Congratulations to Mary-Carol Riehs and Matt Dayton, winners of our 24-hour free tickets to Pinot Days tomorrow at Navy Pier. Mary-Carol whipped up this lovely little poem:

Once upon a Thursday dreary, as I bailed water, weak and weary,
Salvaging books full of forgotten lore,
Whilst I mopped, energy sapping, wishing I could be a-napping,
Dream of Burgandies I could be lapping,
Only this, a Pinot Noir.
Soggy boxes, scent like foxes, Are they truly full of rock-ses?
Shove that mess across the floor.
Loss of books, oh my, the sorrow! What will get me through tomorrow?
A quaff so elegant, delicate, scent of black currant it seeks to borrow,
Only this, a Pinot Noir!

And kudos to Matt, who came up with this clever haiku (5 syllables, 7 syllables, 5 syllables):

I’m a Pinot Fan
Russian River cools the grapes
Drinking wine is fun

You both win a pair of tickets to the event, which runs tomorrow from 12 – 5 p.m. You will be receiving an email link shortly. For everyone else who would still like to attend, you can get 10% off the ticket price by entering HUNGRYHOUND13 in the discount code section when you order tickets online. Cheers!