A Peek at Brendan Sodikoff's Chicago Establishments

After a long hiatus, the Amateur’s Palate is back! There has been a lot going on in the amateur world, and I’m excited to share some of my learning’s with you. What’s the first announcement since my last post? The Amateur’s Palate is now headquartered in the great culinary city of Chicago.

For those who haven’t had the chance to have a proper taste of Chicago, this city is an appropriate rival to New York in the culinary scene. While smaller than the Big Apple, Chicago has a cluster of Michelin Star chefs, Top Chef alums, and up and coming restaurateurs.

One restaurateur I’ve been watching in particular is Brendan Sodikoff, owner of some of the most exciting restaurants in Chicago. So far, he’s opened four restaurants and a donut shop, and a pizzeria is on its way. The dishes in his restaurants don’t try to over complicate things. They’re simple, hearty, and packed with flavor—exactly the kind of food you want to eat over and over again. It’s easy to become a regular at his restaurants. 

Here is a quick summary and a few thoughts on his establishments.

Gilt Bar

A favorite of mine, Gilt Bar has a small though strong and consistently good menu. I recommend getting the chicken, octopus and chorizo and any of the toasts.

Courtesy of Giltbarchicago.com

Image courtesy of Mega Bites Chicago

Au Cheval

Au Cheval is a dark diner with a DJ playing good music. Their burgers are so deliciously juicy, you’ll forget about all of the other diners in your neighborhood.

Image courtesy of Aucheval.tumblr.com

Image courtesy of Aucheval.tumblr.com

Bavette’s  Bar & Boeuf

Bavette’s Bar & Boeuf is a sharp restaurant that primarily serves steak. However, I’ve also had the chicken here and the special, which was a bratwurst that was half beef and half pork. Both were simply prepared but wonderfully cooked. Also, try the side of corn, which is prepared Elote style with Parmesan, chili and lime.

Image courtesy of Bavette's Bar & Boeuf

Maude’s Liquor Bar

Maude’s Liquor Bar is an elegant French bistro restaurant. The food is good, as expected, but I like to go here for the cocktails. 

Image courtesy of Maude's Liquor Bar

Image courtesy of Maude's Liquor Bar

The Doughnut Vault

The Doughnut Vault opens early in the morning and stays open until they run out of doughnuts—and that happens quickly. Lines to purchase these doughnuts circle the block during the weekends, and it doesn’t matter if it’s sunny, raining or snowing.

Image courtesy of The Doughnut Vault

Image courtesy of The Doughnut Vault

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2011 NYC Wine and Food Festival

In case you've been ignoring all things food around the city, the NYC Wine & Food Festival is coming up. I'm so excited, I'm am scouring the list over and over again like mad man. I can't seem to decide which event to attend! Also, does anyone have an extra Benjamin to spare? I'd appreciate it. Thanks.

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Chicken Piccata

Chicken Piccata is a wonderful, classic Italian dish. I've always enjoyed eating this dish because it has a nice, fresh tang which comes from the lemon-based sauce.

While I have ordered it several times at restaurants, I have never attempted to cook it. It wasn't until my good friend Lucille (who happens to be a fiery Sicilian) had me help her prepare it for a typical Italian family dinner. It was easy enough to cook the dish with her, so last night I decided to cook it for myself.

Here's what I did (and apologies in advance that I don't have exact measurements. I did, after all, steal this recipe from a family):

Ingredients

chicken breasts

flour

butter

garlic

white wine

mushrooms

lemon juice

parsley

capers

If the chicken breasts aren't thin enough, use a tenderizer to pound them until they are thin. Afterwards, lightly coat each side with flour. In a pan coated with butter, cook the chicken breasts thoroughly and set aside.

Throw more butter in the pan and sautee the garlic and mushrooms. Afterwards, pour in the lemon juice and white wine, letting it simmer until the ingredients thoroughly mix with each other. Both Lucille and I--on separate occasions--added too much lemon juice, and we needed to balance out the taste by pouring in more white wine. So, be sure to constantly taste the sauce!

Add more flour to thicken the sauce. Lastly, throw in some Italian parsley and capers, and let it simmer for a few more minutes. Once the sauce is done, pour it over the chicken, and serve the dish with pasta (I prefer to have Piccata with linguini).

Tip: Make enough sauce to pour over your pasta. Also, don't forget, be easy on the lemon juice.

Buon appetito!

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animal

You're "foie'd up!" exclaimed our waiter. We were at the trendy downtown Los Angeles restaurant, animal. Our waiter, who resembled a young Paul Giamatti, was commenting on the abundance of foie gras in half of the dishes we chose to try that evening.

We didn't plan to have so much foie gras for dinner, but Chefs Jon Shook and Vinny Dotolo created a menu that used the ingredient in so many creative ways, we couldn't order just one. Better yet, the chefs' use of different parts of the animal is astonishingly unique that I wonder what inspired their dishes. They pair unlikely ingredients with proteins: think lamb neck served with fava beans and daikon, or consider veal brains with apple sauce.

Because of all of this, we couldn't cling to a salad for safety. In celebrating animal, we decided to order exactly what they wanted us to order...the wild.

Take a look:

poutine with oxtail gravy and cheddar cheese

bone marrow topped with chimichurri and caramelized onions

foie gras loco moco, with quail egg, spam and hamburger meat

foie gras, biscuit and maple sausage gravy

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Try These Restaurants In San Francisco

I was recently in San Francisco for a business trip. While most of my time there was spent in a convention center and in hotels, I was able to sneak out and try some of San Francisco's best restaurants. Here are a few of my favorites:

Flour + Water

Area: Mission District

Rumor has it that this popular hipster spot made Steve Jobs wait for a table. And I don't blame him for getting in line. Their dishes are simple, rustic and made with the freshest ingredients. Their menu is seasonal, but you can't go wrong with any of the pasta dishes. I also recommend trying the radiatore with smoked hen, pancetta, wild arugula and chili. And if they let you, substitute the hen with rabbit. Delish!

Nettie's Crab Shack

Area: Union Street

There's something so comforting about this restaurant that if I lived in San Francisco, I'd be a regular at this place. Maybe it's the restaurant's 'no frills' approach to its dining room, maybe it's the dedicated and hospitable wait staff...or maybe it's the gigantic crab roll they give you. Large globs of fresh dungeness crab are served in a heavily buttered roll. Yum.

Anchor & Hope

Area: SoMa

Anchor & Hope is a great escape from the surrounding convention center and hotel conference rooms, and it's the perfect place to pop in for a nice lunch. Fresh seafood is served daily. Try their clam chowder or one of the many seafood sandwiches they have to offer. I had a fried clam sandwich and thought it was lovely. Don't forget to order the rosemary and thyme french fries with your sandwich. They're to die for.

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Don’t Be A Shrimp. Socialize!

by Jessica Young, Amateur Guest Blogger from New York, NY

Wok + Wine. NYC loves a good pop-up. The pop-up shop, the pop-up food truck, the pop-up rainstorm….not really but the verbiage is used in local weather reports. So, it should come as no surprise (slight irony) that the pop-up party would indeed, pop up. Leave it to two media and marketing veterans to tap into the zeitgeist and package a social event that exploits both the ephemeral and the exclusive – two precarious ingredients when combined creates a combustible cocktail…and then, the party never dies.

Thus, inherent is the interest in word-of-mouth whispers heralding the innovators, the early adopters, urban professional movers & shakers, the creatives, and those who moonlight as socializers. When all these desirables convene under the pretense of a fleeting experience encapsulating “the sign of our times” what do you do with them? What magical entertaining dynamics shall tantalize?

Let’s check out the stellar stats for Wok + Wine: invitation by application or personal recommendation – check, obscure locale – check, maximum admittance of an intimate forty – check, forty enthused strangers – check, forty bottles of wine to lubricate small talk – check, forty pounds of whole jumbo shrimp – check? Checking out? Nope. Heads, legs, and tails all drenched in GARLICKY, greasy, orangey-red staining al ajillo sauce. Their little beady eyes just minor dots in a sea of slipping and sliding mountainous piles on a center collapsible (for pop-up purposes) communal table. The crowd circles round. Some dive elbows deep in the critters. Some cling to their wine glasses for self preservation – heads are gross! Some concentrate on conversation due to shellfish allergies because hey, it’s hard to pass up a pop-up. At varying levels of embrace for the full-bodied food, the guests perk up and the party livens. Perhaps it’s the alcohol hitting the blood stream. Or, perhaps it’s the novelty of novice beheading and de-legging shrimp that has Mr. Lawyer and Ms. Jewelry Designer chatting it up in the mutual awkwardness of achieving one laborious yet satiating bite. Logical reasoning would infer that serving guests shrimp al ajillo with nothing other than whole (unsliced) loaves of bread as the sole sidekick would be soiree suicide. The smell! Garlic certainly clings to breath and clothes alike. The mess! Throw conventional propriety out the window when shelling shellfish. There’s no pretty method to the madness. The sauce! Bright orange-red splatters incriminate shirts involved in the crustacean carnage. Yet, the party continues. Eventually even the most finicky abandon their wine glasses to get down and dirty.

There’s something about unusual experiences that when shared by a group automatically forms a bond, a commonality. A quintessential “we’re all in this together” situation. Beyond the event naturally garnering an outgoing segment of the population, the forced participation in an activity, especially an activity that pushes the boundaries of comfort for some, creates immediate camaraderie. The ultimate of ice-breakers, inhibitions crumble and connections arise when shrimp shrapnel flies. Make people do something weird together and, guess what, nothing weirder can happen. It takes the focus off of the tendency to be “on point”. Of course, after several glasses of free-flowing wine it’s a slippery slope into the succulent swamp, regardless. A welcome round of limoncello shots and refreshing pineapple slices later, the crowd is rollicking in conversation.

Of course, no ordinary experience would suffice. Although a pop-up draws demand from its time sensitive nature – poof it’s here, poof it’s gone - that in itself would not be enough to placate NYC’s notorious appetite for novelty. Mix in a bit of the unexpected with the ephemeral and the exclusive then ta da memories are made! Guaranteed Mr. Digital Start-Up can put a face to the name of Ms. I’m Wearing A White Shirt he inadvertently sprayed with sauce. Way to spice up the networking/dating/drinking/social scene! Oh, and the shrimp is damn delicious.

More on Wok + Wine.

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My Father's Daughter

Yes, I did it. I bought Gwyneth Paltrow's new cookbook My Father's Daughter.

But before you role your eyes and name the many reasons why cookbooks should be written by real chefs instead of over-ambitious actors, take the time to watch a few episodes of Spain...On the Road Again. You'll soon realize that this girl knows her food.

I'm dying to try her 10-hour chicken recipe. I just need to find the 10 hours to actually do it...

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