16 courses of gastronomic wizardry - all in black. more ›

Cantu hit the road to talk about the miracle berry and its potential to fight hunger and diabetes. Watch his TED talk and CNN segments to learn more. more ›

Take a "trip" with iNG and the miracle berry. more ›

Celebrated Chef Ferran Adrià will visit the Harold Washington Library Center on Wednesday, September 28, the library announced in an email newsletter sent yesterday. He'll be in town to discuss and sign copies of his forthcoming cookbook, The Family Meal: Home Cooking with Ferran Adrià. The event begins at 6 p.m., with general seating beginning at 5. One month and one day ago, Adrià's world-famous, three-Michelin-star-rated restaurant in rural Catalonia, elBulli, closed its doors forever to make way for the chef's next endeavor, a nonprofit culinary think tank and foundation slated to open in 2014. more ›

Earlier this week, we mentioned Grant Achatz's new super hard-to-get-into bar, underneath the Aviary. With only 14 seats, and entry by invitation or reservation only, we opined that we'd probably never get in. Our commenters mostly said "Good riddance." Time Out Chicago now has the entire menu, and while we still think we'll never get in, now we're a little bit sad about it. more ›

When I walked in the door of Homaro Cantu's ING, I honestly had no idea what to expect. I'd been to Moto many times, and to Otom (the previous tenant of the space) once before, but aside from some buzz about miracle berries and a lot of tweets ending in "-ing," I was pretty much in the dark. What I experienced was a potential revolution in restaurant logistics. For all the highfalutin talk about feeding the poor, levitating food and "molecular gastronomy," the real stories of the night were the fun, interesting food cooked by executive chef Thomas Bowman and the incredible machine Cantu has created to run such an immensely complicated restaurant. Food aside, we may be seeing the future of restaurant management at ING. more ›

Homaro Cantu, the mad scientist behind Moto, Otom and ING, is well known for making large-scale claims about the importance of his culinary inventions. He has worked with NASA, extolled the virtues of edible paper, and holds many patents for his culinary inventions. Heck, the chef has a display in the Museum of Science and Industry! His work is exciting, and his ideas push the envelope of food innovation. But an article in today's New York Times has us a little skeptical, not only about Chef Cantu's ambitions for the global food landscape but also for the offerings at his new restaurant, ING, which opens on Monday to Valentine's Day patrons. From everything available in the press, many of the restaurant's tricks center around the "miracle berry," which Cantu believes could be "an answer to global hunger." more ›

Last month, we confirmed that Homaro Cantu, the mad scientist behind Moto, was opening another restaurant. It was to be called "ING" and promised to be our favorite restaurant named after a suffix, but no other information was available. Bits and pieces have come out - due to a quirk of postage, Time Out Chicago got the invitation to the media preview first and posted some potential menu items. Cantu sent Kevin Pang at the Tribune an unmarked pill (Pang made another staffer try it) and we got an email over the weekend telling us that all Otom Groupons would be refunded - the final confirmation that Otom was out and ING was in. Now Cantu has started tweeting out videos of the new space. more ›

Back in December, Grubstreet told the world that Homaro Cantu, the culinary mad scientist (and we mean that in the nicest way) behind Moto and Otom was opening a new project. It will be called "ING," and no more information was available. more ›

Friend of Chicagoist Mark Bazer, of "The Interview Show" fame, recently had moto chefs/Future Food hosts Homaro Cantu and Ben Roche on his show, where they talked about dining at moto, Future Food and other things. We've embedded part 1 of the interview in the post. Check out part 2 here. more ›

Chef Cantu decided to show me a little microwave trick. I should mention ...that white stuff he set on fire and put in the microwave? I had just eaten some of that. more ›

We recently spent a Saturday afternoon in the kitchen at moto. Chef Homaro Cantu set things on fire for us (video this afternoon!) while Chef Ben Roche created and destroyed a dessert for our benefit (pictures of that this week). We also captured images of a new bagel and lox menu item and how the salmon gets smoked right at your table (keep watching for those, too). For now, enjoy some images of moto's cuisine and be sure to return for behind the scene pictures. more ›

In a little over a week a year of anticipation will give way to impatient waiting by the mailbox as the Alinea cookbook arrives for those who pre-ordered it this time last year (including your humble food and drink editor). Some bookstores may already be selling the five-plus-pound omnibus — Anthony said he spent a half hour at Book Cellar over the weekend just thumbing through it — but the preorders come with signatures from Grant Achatz and the Alinea team. more ›