Results tagged “burgers”

It’s not often that we give a positive review to a restaurant that started flooding during our meal. Heck, it’s not often that we EXPERIENCE a flood during our meal - though the urge to pair up and make like Noah’s animals gave our date a certain sense of urgency. But Paramount Room is an exception. An upscale pub from the group behind the popular Roscoe Village spots Kitsch’n and Volo Restaurant Wine Bar, Paramount Room is a dark, atmospheric dive that, in another time, would’ve been filled with smoke and gangsters.

   

We work during the day near downtown Evanston, so we've become familiar with the available lunch options. The suburb seems to be turning into a new center for good burgers using quality ingredients. Readers got a glimpse of Edzo's Burger Shop a couple weeks back; Ed Lakin and crew are now open for business. We've also extolled the virtues of Wiener and Still Champion in the past. Best known for a good hot dog and owner Gus Paschalis's willingness to deep fry anything once, WaSC also makes an amazing burger. There's another burger joint we've been enamored with recently that does its best to put out a good burger, if not rise to the level of Lakin and Paschalis.

Ever noticed that fast food never looks quite as... appetizing as it does in advertisements? We've all heard food stylist horror stories about shaving cream, glycerin, paints, oils and all the other fake things used to make food look just so for photo shoots. But this piece from The Guardian's food blog puts it all in perspective: side-by-side pictures of fast food advertisements vs. reality. Yuck. We're especially disturbed by number 4, the canned whole chicken. Though, we suppose anyone buying a canned whole chicken is getting what they deserve. If you're on a diet, bookmark this page - anytime you're tempted by fast food, just take a peek.

From the "calm the fuck down" department: Jeff Ruby's list of his 30 favorite burgers turned the echo chamber at LTHForum up to 11, much of it centered on why Patty's Diner (3538 Main St., Skokie, 847-675-4274) didn't make Ruby's cut. Some samples (emphasis ours):

Who would've thunk that burgers would be one of the year's big food fads, although we should have seen it coming with "the Cheeseburger Show?" (No offense, Pang).

As if Kuma's Corner couldn't get any more packed on the weekend, now the venerable burger/beer/metal/biker kitsch bar is throwing a block party to celebrate its fourth anniversary, which should just send fans of Kuma's monster burgers into DEFCON 1 mode.

        

Since entering the market last autumn, the DC-based hamburger chain Five Guys has garnered the kind of media (over)exposure that fast food franchises crave. After hearing good things about Five Guys from Kevin and Marcus while they were in the District for the inauguration, and one fair-but-not-supportive review from Mike Nagrant, we knew that we had to find out for ourselves if Five Guys was worth the hype. in such markets as . The walls of its tiny space at 2140 N. Clybourn are loaded with testimonials lavished upon it from other cities such as Roanoke, Tampa and its home base in DC, apparently waiting for a glowing review from one of our own.

• In the wake of an article calling hamburgers "the Hummers of food," Helen Rosner lists local restaurants that source the beef for their burgers from local farms. Why Paul Kahan isn't getting his lamb from Mint Creek Farm, only he knows. [MP Chicago]
• Speaking of localvore issues, check out the expanded version of the Local Beet.[The Local Beet]
• The fine folks at Drive-Thru have been very busy this week. Chris Brunn and Cinnamon Cooper offer a couple vegan-friendly recipes; Cooper infuses vodka with her namesake spice; and Robyn Nisi made the mistake of replacing real lemon juice for her lemon ricotta cookies with ReaLemon. [Drive-Thru]

We were stoked when the news broke that John Manion of Nas and Old Oak Tap was taking over as Executive Chef of Goose Island Clybourn that we made it a point to pay a visit last weekend to see what changes were happening to the menu.

Kuma's Corner is jumping on the Blagojevich train, as if you needed another reason to head to Kuma's this month. Their January special is the "#@(*&%^ Blagojevich." This gubernatorial-inspired monstrosity is made with a 10 oz. hamburger patty, thick sliced bologna and yellow mustard between two grilled cheese sandwiches (made with American cheese and wonder bread). When the burger comes out, one of the sandwiches has a large dollar sign written in mustard. The cost of this beast: $10, but Kuma's is "negotiable."

Sometimes you just need to check your pride at the door and do what must be done. Which is why we found ourselves Saturday afternoon at Macy Field's, Christmas shopping and looking for a nosh. The Walnut Room is still the Walnut Room, and the seventh floor food court is still dominated by fast food concepts from celebrity chefs. The newest, from Marcus Samuelsson (C-House), is probably the best of a lot that includes Rick Bayless Frontera Fresco and Takashi Yagihashi's Noodles by Takashi. Incidentally, all three chefs are members of Macy's Culinary Council, dating back to the store's days as Marshall Field's.

The California-based burger chain Fatburger will be opening its first Chicago-area outpost in Orland Park next month and its second on 95th and Western come January, all thanks to Kanye West. West owns KW Foods LLC, which has the rights to develop 10 Fatburgers around Chicagoland. That guy is everywhere! [Crain's]

From today's Tribune, Chris Borelli does a fine job interviewing George Motz, the man behind the film "Hamburger America" and its new companion book listing the top 100 burgers in the country. Like most on the East Coast, Motz thinks that Chicago is too "hot dog crazy", not to mention being hung up on "that stupid pizza thing," to have a hamburger identity.

To paraphrase Merle Haggard, "It's not close, but it's not bad." A Sonic Drive-In franchisee has chosen to set up the first greater Chicago area franchise of the venerable fast food chain in Aurora, in a retail development at Kirk and Butterfield Roads anchored by a Wal-Mart. You know, so the NASCAR set doesn't feel homesick.

No, it isn't us; we'll get there soon enough, thank you. The Big Mac, one of Oak Brook-based McDonald's signature hamburgers, debuted forty years ago this week. The sandwich was created by Jim Delligatti in Uniontown, Pennsylvania. Even though the Big Mac today is a part of American food and popular culture, Delligatti had to convince executives at Hamburger U that the concept of "two all beef patties, special sauce, lettuce, cheese, pickles, onions on...

Thanks largely to the ubiquity of the Food Network, everyone dabbles a bit in gourmet these days. Even bars that one would think should only cater in standard pub grub are going out of their way and dressing up their burgers with buns and sides our grandparents wouldn't dream of when they were our age. We're not knocking it, mind you. We're just saying that sometimes we just want a burger to just be a burger.

Chicagoist has long been a fan of Goose Island beers. Not only have they long been a staple Beer of the Week, but we're pretty sure our names are on a plaque somewhere on the pub walls as "Masters of Beer Appreciation," a feat accomplished in the hazy years before our baby. What we didn't know then was that we could have our kid and our beer, too.

Now that it seems as though the weather is finally catching up with the calendar, we at Chicagoist feel an obligation to offer some “BotW” selections that won’t put you down any further than the impending muggy weather. Rooting through our fridge, we found one that we think might do the trick for you who like both sweeter and lighter beers. We took a good hard look at the Grand Rapids-based Founder’s brewery a few...

If you haven’t been to Sweets & Savories on a Wednesday night for $10 Kobe beef burgers, boy are you missing out on this sweet..er..rich deal. The whopper of a burger, no pun intended, comes in 1/2-pound form (we think it might be more though), seared on the outside and cooked medium rare for the ultimate in juiciness, topped with a strong blue cheese, and sandwiched between two buttery, brioche buns. Slather a little of the blue cheese aioli on the treat and life doesn’t get much better.

This clip from The Simpsons is as good a place to jump off this week, as we're leaving to see the film after we file this, and the beginning setting is at a fair. Which makes a nice segue for us. Last week, we went to the South Side Arts & Music Fest we profiled in last week's installment and were confronted with the sticker shock of seeing a funnel cake sell for nine...

No repartee this week, all business. - We've received e-mails from concerned people and had to check it out for ourselves, and it looks as though Cereality at 110 South Wacker has closed down, only a couple years after Chicagoist (among other media) made a big fuss about its opening. There's even a "For Rent" sign in its front window. This kind of reaffirms our faith in the human race; if people won't pay $4.50...

If it hasn't been drilled into your heads yet, street festival season is kicking into high gear. This week, we'll highlight a couple to check out, as well as feature one of the more humorous press releases to reach our inbox this week. Strap it on! We'll Call Ours the "Triple Bypass": Wendy's is hosting an online contest to see who can design their next burger. Folks who log on to www.thisismyburger.com can choose from...

Vegetarian Hot Dogs?

It’s fast approaching Memorial Day weekend, the official start of grilling season. But if late nights up rocking (and rocking and rocking) your little one have made you too exhausted to head to Paulina and man the grill yourself, pack up the baby and head to Muskie’s instead.

Last summer, we somehow found ourselves perusing the goods at a flea market held on the grounds of the Square Barn in Wheeling. Walking in with the intention of not purchasing anything, we were surprised to walk out with a fabulous art deco cuff, a lucite bangle, a bag of colorful necklaces, a set of vintage medical jars and a cake stand, all for about $35. After that fateful trip, we ended up spending at...

LAist is experimenting with blogging dates from J-Date, but finds the best men are found offline. Some date vicariously online and that is one reason why porn is big -- really freaking big -- so they ask if they should cover XXX since the heart of it lays in the city's San Fernando Valley. A writer grapples with her food porn photography obsession, another gets censored on Flickr, one gets scooped by the LA...

"This place feels like Northside," we remarked to our dining companion as we sat down at the Five Star Bar & Grill on 1424 W. Chicago Ave. Despite the rock-and-roll-inspired decor (which was strangely matched with the weapons-inspired overhead lamps), we felt like we could have been dining on N. Damen — same frat-boy atmosphere, same mediocre selection of standard bar fare, and same feeling as we left of "did we really just spend...

McDonald's recently added a Third Pounder Burger to their menu here in Chicago. The new burger is a third of pound (duh) of Angus beef topped with restaurant-choice toppings such as bacon or mushrooms and, as always, cheese. Southern California was the first test market for the burgers, and Chicago is serving as the second. Should they catch on, expect an increase in arterial clogs throughout the country. McDonald's joins Burger King with the Angus...

Obviously, when anyone thinks of working at McDonald's they think of the excitement of working long hours, flipping thousands of burgers, dealing with irate customers, and other perks. If it was really that bad wouldn’t they just unionize.

Remember "Cheers," with Sam hanging out behind the bar, often leaving his post to do some classic, cheesy sitcom activity with Cliff and Norm? Paddy Mac's offers its own take on Sam with Brian at the bar. Walk in this old-school Chicago corner establishment, and within three beers you'll be treated as if you've been holding the bar down forever. Paddy Mac's has the requisite flat screen HDTVs (usually tuned to sports or the Game...