Need a three layer cake in the shape of a tea kettle (complete with cotton candy steam) for your grandmother’s 80th birthday and your baking skills began and ended with the penis shaped cake you made for your college roommate’s bachelorette party? Never fear; Chicago bakeries have you covered for your non-penis shaped, special event cake needs. Contact any of these great bakeries well ahead of your next event to describe your cake needs and......

There was an old man named Seuss, Who loved to eat chocolate mousse. He always took more, (for he was a food whore) And to hell with his growing caboose! Get your green eggs and ham this weekend at Marche’s Annual Dr. Seuss Celebration this Sunday, March 2. The Randolph Street restaurant is throwing Theodor Seuss Geisel a 104th birthday to remember with costumed characters and a special Dr. Seuss menu with food for both......

The Chicago Auto Show opens to the public tomorrow ($10 admission), and while the extent of our car knowledge--well, my car knowledge--comes from accidentally listening to a few minutes of Car Talk here and there, there is one vehicle that's currently blowing our minds: Ford's Alton F-650 XUV. That mofo has six wheels. Images via Autoblog's gallery, which is truly staggering. Christ, that car is ugly. But which Alton is more badass, that "XUV"? Or......

The Dill Pickle Co-Op's benefit concert goes down tomorrow night at the Av-Aerie, 2000 W. Fulton. Bands scheduled to perform include Reds and Blue, Pit er Pat, and Detholz. Things kick off at 8 p.m. and the cost is a suggested $15 donation. Professor Bruce Kraig of the Culinary Historians of Chicago will be at Kendall College Saturday morning hosting a seminar on "Changes in Food Consumption Patterns After the Civil War." The seminar......

This is the time of year where we sit back and reflect on what's happened the past twelve months. If you're like us, you do so with a nice spread of food and a good stiff drink laid out in front of you. Chicagoans take few things as seriously as we do our eating and drinking. Some of us take it more seriously than others. As food and drink writers we take a particular pride......

We were downtown at work yesterday when a co-worker said "What's with the protest outside? There's someone chanting for justice or something." Knowing from the "Saturday Plans" post that The Lady herself, Paula Deen was appearing, this was a head-scratcher. Who could be so upset at a TV chef? Besides the obvious, of course. Well, fans of Food Network's favorite Southern mother probably showed up at the Chicago Theater Saturday expecting the use of a......

If there's one thing we brought back to Chicago with us after our six years down south, it's certainly our love for smoked meats. We'd always loved ribs as far back as we can remember, but exposure to true Southern BBQ raised our expectations to a whole new level. We learned that meat is meant to be lovingly smoked for hours in order to achieve the perfect symphony of tastes and textures. When first we......

The cover story to today's Sun-Times food section deals with inexpensive substitutes for fancy kitchen tools that you can find at the hardware store, which is something we've been down with since we started using the kitchen for more than beer-pong and a mechanic's station for bike repair. We typically use paint brushes to marinade roasts and meats, to butter pastries and to clean out the coffee grinder. We also have a mini-propane torch for......

This week Chicagoist bought pork tenderloin with the plan of writing about making it into a dish for the site. The only slight set-back we faced was that we had no idea what we were actually going to cook. We'd already done tenderloin this, rather classic, way and felt, at least at first, over-inspired. When cooking, we often start ourselves off with a main ingredient (often enough meat) then research all the ways others......

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......

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......

This week we'd like to congratulate the -ist network's Mother Hen, Gothamist's Jen Chung, who found herself a recipient of Wired Magazine's Wired Rave Award. If that doesn't sound terribly exciting, keep in mind another recipient was J.K. Rowling. Yep, that's right, the -ist network and Harry Potter now have something in common. Go us. Austinist has a chat with the ever-fashionable Golden Girl Rue McClanahan, and managed to catch some local fashionistas making......

The International Association of Culinary Professionals (IACP) is holding its annual Cookbook Expo this weekend in Chicago. And, for the first time, they're opening it up to the public. This is your chance to hobnob with some of your favorite cookbook authors and chefs, who will be on hand to sell and sign their latest books. The event runs from 5-6 p.m. tomorrow at the Hilton Chicago. Even though it's free, reservations are required; e-mail......

Quick, name the top five chefs in Chicago. Now name the five most famous chefs in the country. While the cuisines may vary from Grant Achatz's "molecular gastronomy" to Mario Batali's classic Italian, the one thing that most — or all — of these chefs have in common is the pale, pale, color of their skin. As Maureen Jenkins writes in today's Sun-Times, "the shortage of chefs of African descent is noteworthy if only by......

Today is National Get Over It Day. Chicagoist is going to get over Del Toro closing, a crush on Molto Mario, our dream of moving to France to drink wine all day, the death of wine maker Ernest Gallo and ... we don't have anything to get over regarding the new Grand Mart grocery. We do think it is nice, however, that Guaranty Bank isn't lonely anymore. Wicker Park tapas hotspot Del Toro is closing......

If watching Homaro Cantu make maki made you want to eat a Big Mac on Sunday night, you aren't alone. The Food Network's "Iron Chef America" and Oakbrook-based McDonald's are catching some heat after a McDonald's logo and the phrase "I'm Lovin' It" appeared for a split second during the show. What's the story? Is The Food Network going all "Saved By the Bell" on viewers? Not so fast, says Food Network spokesman Mark O'Connor,......

With the Bears heading to Miami, some serious planning needs to commence starting, oh, right about now. Chicagoist is already getting stressed out. Where should we watch the game? Which friends should we invite over? And what should we eat? Normally when we watch football, we go for the standards; ice cold beer, chips and salsa (no Dips, please) and the occasional pizza ordered in from down the street. This game is bigger, better and......

Chicagoist isn't one for food shows. This is mainly because we don't have cable thus have no access to the world of the Food Network. But a few weeks back we found ourselves in a cable using household and we got sucked into an episode of The Barefoot Contessa. This episode was about the chicken hash Truman Capote made for his black and white ball. The contessa went on and on about Capote and......

Greg Christian used to be a rock-star chef. Think Anthony Bourdain before he stopped doing the partying and started writing books and appearing on the Food Network. Christian cooked hard, partied hard and essentially lived every chef's dream; working at the now-closed Gordon’s restaurant under executive chef John Terczak and then ultimately starting his own catering company. Hungry Mag has a great profile of Christian up, in which his story of discovering the organic food......

"We're very choosy about who we get into bed with, to put it bluntly" was how Charlie Trotter explained the news, reported yesterday by both NBC 5 and the Tribune, that he is the "iconic chef" developing the restaurant for the under-construction Elysian Hotel on East Walton. Unfortunately for the gourmands among our readership, you'll be waiting until this time in 2K8 to enjoy Trotter's new digs, as that's when the Elysian is expected......

Alain Roby, pastry chef at the Hyatt Regency Chicago, set the world record for tallest chocolate structure last week in New York when he created a 20-foot, 8-inch tall replica of the Rockefeller Center, the Empire State Building and the Chrysler Building. Roby was in NY as part of the "Food Network Challenge," which also saw challenges for best pizza dough tossing and popcorn sculpting. Chicagoist didn’t know there were that many people who......

Fans of Food Network's "Iron Chef America" can expect to taste a decidedly Chicagoan flavor when the new season premieres next month. Two episodes to tivo or tape: Tru impressarios Rick Tramonto and Gale Gand (with executive sous chef Stuart Davis) against Mario Batali; and Homaru Cantu's "Team moto" faces of against Chef Morimoto. It's unknown what the secret ingredient was for each team or when the episodes will air. For those of you who......

This Friday, December 9, Sara Moulton is going to be at Pastoral and you're invited to stop by and meet her. If her name sounds familiar, there's a good reason. Sara is the Executive Chef of Gourmet Magazine; hosts a popular show on the Food Network, Sara's Secrets; has written several books; and has a pretty cool blog. From 5pm - 7pm stop by to grab a copy of her new book Sara's Secrets for......

Add Dan Smith and Steve McDonagh to the top of the list of "People Chicagoist Would Hate If They Weren't So Nice." Not only have the Boystown caterers opened a successful new restaurant, HB: A Hearty Boys Spot, their new Food Network show, Party Line with Dan and Steve, premiered this week. And, the couple recently adopted a 2-month-old baby, Nate. All in unison now, "Awwwwwww." You may remember earlier this summer when Dan......

Oh my God, Chicagoist HATES cutting peaches after peeling them. Seriously, what looked like an easy recipe turned into a grotesque autopsy of a fruit cutting Fear Factor episode, and thank God we saved some of the wine to drink, not just marinate these mean-spirited peaches. Luckily, the result is unbelievably delicious, if not a little messy looking. During vacation, Chicagoist saw a great recipe on the Food Network that seemed like the perfect summer......

Two Chicago Boystown caterers, Hearty Boys' Dan Smith and Steve McDonagh, won their own show on the Food Network. Dancing and merriment was seen on Halsted after the annoucement, although it's unclear as to whether celebrations were due to the response to the Food Network annoucement or spillover from the earlier Pride Parade. Dan and Steve beat out seven other contestants in a month-long competition. The couple's new show starts this fall.......

Boystown restaurant moguls Dan Smith and Steve McDonagh -- aka the "Hearty Boys" -- have a full plate these days. Not only have they transformed their casual cafe into a full-service upscale restaurant, this Sunday they will compete to become "The Next Food Network Star." Their revamped restaurant, open for a week, has already won rave reviews. After having the "flamboyantly front and center" double-cut pork chop [only in Boystown can pork be flamboyant], Metromix......