Restaurant News: Bleeding Heart's New Location, Bristol's Peek Wins National Honors, GWiv the Pitmaster

By Anthony Todd in Food on Jul 26, 2011 6:40PM

- Bleeding Heart Bakery, everyone's favorite punk rock pasty location, is opening a new location in the suburbs. According to their facebook page, they will be opening a new location in Elmhurst by the end of the summer. The new location will be supplied by their new, huge home bakery in the city which will hopefully open in the next few weeks - the opening has been delayed several times already. In any case, suburbanites rejoice, as you won't have to drive all the way into the city to taste their baked goodies.

- Debbi Peek, bartender at The Bristol and one of our favorite mixers, has won top honors at the world cocktail competition in New Orleans. According to Eater, the winning cocktail was called "No Passport Required" and was made with "cherrywood smoked Barcardi Anejo, caramelized perfect pineapple puree, ginger puree, brown sugar syrup and coconut milk." Yum - Send us that recipe, Debbi! We hope that shows up on the menu at The Bristol.

- Time Out previewed the menu at The Owl, a new late-night Logan Square bar set to open in late August. From the owner of Estelle's, The Owl will have a huge beer selection (unusual for a bar open till 4 a.m.) with 20 beers on tap. It will also have a non-digital 100 CD jukebox. 2521 N Milwaukee Ave.

- They must've put something in the sugar, since every pastry chef in Chicago seems to be roaming to a new job. Grubstreet reports that Boka pastry chef Kady Yon is leaving the hugely successful restaurant group for a new post at Ian Schrager's upcoming Public Hotel. You might remember Public for it's inane stunt to rename the Pump Room - at least now we know that it'll have good desserts.

- We weren't very enthused about Barn & Co., the soon-to-open BBQ joint from the Hubbard Inn folks in the former Grand Central space. A large part of the "mehs" is related to the involvement of chef Bob Zrenner, whose track record at restos like graze and Branch 27 seems to indicate a chef trying to latch on to the trend du jour, rather than just produce good food from a kitchen. But bringing LTHForum founder and Low & Slow sensei Gary Wiviott as pitmaster has piqued our interest. The Zrenner/Wiviott duo is offering a limited "smokehouse sampler" at Barn & Co. this weekend before officially opening Aug. 11. (950 W. Wrightwood)