Quick Bites

By Laura Oppenheimer in Food on Jan 3, 2008 3:12PM

• Menupages has a list up of the 100 most looked-at menus of 2007. The top ten most popular? Thai Bowl, Brasserie Ruhlman, Nookies, Ping Pong, Crust, Silver Seafood Restaurant, Medici, Butterfly, The Art of Pizza and Tango Sur. We're at a loss in figuring out why these would be the most popular menus to browse.


• Chicago food bloggers Whipped and Pro Bono Baker are rocking banana bread and banana muffins, respectively, on their blogs. The Trib, too. Is this a trend we aren't aware of, or just some healthy-ish new years baking?


• The Sun-Times' Food Detective Lisa Donovan is kicking off the new year with a month of eating dangerously; she'll be trying some new wacky food every day. So far she's tried truffled salt (looking for umami) and gulab jamun. Incidentally, she also recommends (separate from the wacky food search), drinking warm beer in the winter. Avec (615 W. Randolph) is offering Swiss La Dragonne served steaming hot. "Billed as an after-ski ale, the non-carbonated beer looks and tastes a bit like coffee with hints of citrus but smells more like mulled wine." But at $35 for a 25.4-ounce bottle, it's no Old Style.


• Takashi's eponymous restaurant is now open in the former Scylla space on 1952 N. Damen. We love, love, loved Scylla, and were sad to see it's demise. But we could probably get over our sadness by trying Takashi menu items like Trio of Home Made Tofu; Steamed Peeky-toe Crab Meat with Organic Egg Custard, Shimeji Mushroom, Sea Urchin, Caviar, Truffle-White Soy Glaze; and Sheep’s Milk Panacotta, Yuzu gelee, Green Tea Macaroons.

Image of mouthwatering banana muffins via Pro Bono Baker.