Restaurant News: XOCO Wicker Park Set To Open Aug. 12, Jianbing Lands In Chicago
By Lisa White in Food on Aug 6, 2014 6:00PM
The Chipotle Chicken Torta from Xoco with Gunthorp chicken, chipotle-roasted tomato sauce, artisan Jack cheese, avocado, black beans and arugula. Photo: Chicagoist
-After numerous setbacks, the Wicker Park XOCO location finally has an opening date. Rick Bayless and team have announced Aug. 12 as the day they will open their doors. The Wicker Park location will be a larger, full-service location, serving up a similar menu with the addition of a few new items along with craft beer and wine. Get ready to wait in line soon. [Eater]
-Lone Wolf has been serving up a bevy of delicious specialty pot pies this summer (along with offerings from the always delicious Pleasant House Bakery) and the most recent one for August has our mouth watering. You can grab a Portuguese Chicken Pot Pie from Fat Rice, which is full of coconut chicken, chorizo and olives and served with chili lemon and Fat Rice’s Diablo hot sauce. Each pie is $10 (or, as Time Out Chicago points out, for $12 you can include a draft of 3 Floyds’ Gumballhead or Zombie Dust). Proceeds from sales of the pies will benefit La Casa Norte, which helps families facing homelessness. [Time Out Chicago]
-Uber trendy and popular candy boutique Dylan’s Candy Bar is set to open their fifth free-standing store and their first Midwest location on Michigan Avenue in 2015. The store will fill the vacant space at 445 N. Michigan Ave, which use to house the McCormick Freedom Museum. The shop will be two floors and feature a cafe and bar. Those with a sweet tooth can get a sneak peak when a pop-up shop arrives in the same space this November. [Tribune]
-A popular street snack from China recently made its debut in Chicago at The Nosh. Jianbing, a thin pancake made of mung bean and millet, spread with eggs and herbs and topped with fried wontons, chili or soy paste and sometimes stuffed with a filling, is now available in our fair city. The treat is popular in cities throughout northern China, but nowhere to be found in Chicago. Ye Yuan and his wife Caitlin Bauler are changing that with their new business, Nali. The duo cook jianbing currently on Fridays at The Nosh at Block 37, but their website suggests more locations are coming soon. [DNAinfo Chicago]
-Michael Gebert has a great interview in the Reader with Big Jones chef Paul Fehribach. In the first of a two-part interview, Fehribach discusses his upcoming cookbooks for the University of Chicago Press (the first will be released next year), and chatted with Gebert about growing up in Indiana, yet with southern food influences around him. It’s a great read if you love southern food, are a Big Jones fan or simply find regional and cultural impact on food interesting. [Chicago Reader]