The Chicagoist will be launching later but in the meantime please enjoy our archives.

Quick Byte To Eat

By Rachelle Bowden in Food on Dec 8, 2004 3:28AM

Those who do any holiday gift shopping before December 23 make the rest of us look like heathens because we haven’t yet placed a lick of thought into what we’re buying for those on our holiday shopping lists. Certainly not enough consideration to merit battling with the gobs of weekend shoppers on Michigan Avenue who easily rationalize their presence with self-satisfied statements like, “I can relax for the rest of the season!”

Don’t fool yourselves; these sorts of people never relax.

Jay Harlow Chicagoist can’t muster up the give-a-shit to haul its cookies out of bed on a weekend morning to shop; it’s way too cold outside. It’s for this reason that friends and loved ones, all of whom seemed to have caught The Foodie Bug this year, will find themselves the proud recipients of Cooking School gift certificates, all solicitously purchased online.

They make great, chic gifts and you don’t need to wear sensible shoes while buying them.

For your west suburban loved ones, Best Chefs offers extensive cooking classes at its Bloomingdale location, with chefs from Chicago and the suburbs alike. You can even have your gift certificate sent in advance.

Maker of The Holy Grail of cookingware, Calphalon Culinary Center offers demonstration classes, hands-on classes and a nifty wine class as well at its Washington Boulevard location in downtown Chicago.

The first and last word in Chicago cooking classes for the yuppie in all of us, The Chopping Block is a gourmet orgy. With locations in Lincoln Park and Lincoln Square, you can opt to purchase gift certificates in your price range or go crazy and buy your roommate a gift certificate for an entire class.

Know someone whose idea of cooking is to call a caterer while she sips chardonnay? Send her to the Chicago Wine School and assure that the wine she drinks is only the very best. With single sessions on the basics of wine to five-week courses at its Chicago, Halsted street location, that next dinner party of hers you attend will have pairing stations.
 
Just letting the words “Sur La Table” drip from your tongue can make you feel all culinary and fuzzy. With locations in downtown Chicago and Naperville, Sur La Table offers a host of hands-on cooking classes at reasonable prices.

Thanks, Erin