Results tagged “beerwineand”

'Tis the season for free champagne tastings. Get started tonight at the Artisan Cellar (located on the first floor of the Merchandise Mart) with a sample of some rare bubblies from 4-6 p.m. Learn all about the history of smothered foods from author Wilbert Jones, the author of Smothered Southern Foods. Jones' lecture, "Smothered - Southern Style" is being held Saturday at the Chicago History Museum, sponsored by the Culinary Historians of Chicago. The lecture...

We were downstairs at our neighbors' a couple weeks back, drinking bloody marys before the Bears-Broncos game while we were making chicken stock for soup. Normally, we make a killer bloody mary. But on this occasion we were missing something. Turned out that our neighbor had the cure-all: a good beer chaser. She had been to Sam's earlier in the week and picked up some selections from Ridgeway Brewing, and the first bottle she opened...

Brewer Larry Bell

Every last Friday of the month, the bartenders and servers at Kuma's Corner donate their night's tips to a worthy cause. Tonight, it's all going to Windy City Roller Tahira "Tequila Mockingbird" Johnson, who's still recovering from her injury over the summer. If you find yourself gorging on the "Hatebeak" or "Goblin Cock" this evening, please tip better than you usually do. Just in time for Hanukkah, local food writer Leah Zeldes will give a...

When the weather turns, we tend to switch up our beer choices. Colder weather typically calls for heartier brews: monster ales, porters, and stouts. Now we love a good stout as much as anyone, but as someone with not a drop of Irish to be found in our genealogy, we like to explore the darkest of beers. Often, the sweet flavor and clingy, slightly sour finish in stouts comes from the addition of lactic acid...

One never needs an excuse to drink a selection from Unibroue. We're on record with our claim that the Quebec brewery is the best in North America, and it's because the quality of their brews is unsurpassed and of the highest standard of all we've sampled. Even their entry brews, like La Fin du Monde, would be considered a reserve line for another brewery. Maudite is one of our favorites. We're sticklers for balance: we...

In what's become an annual feature here at Chicagoist and a personal favorite, we canvassed the staff for some of their best recipes and put together a potluck of amazing proportions to fascinate your taste buds, amaze your family (even the ones entranced by the football games), and bring about peace on earth - or at least in your family - for a few hours through the miracle of tryptophan, simple starches, and sugar...

This week's listings kick off this evening at Merchandise Mart with "Chill: an International Wine & Culinary Event" sponsored by Luxehome and Wine Spectator. Proceeds from the event benefit the Respiratory Health Association of Metropolitan Chicago. The event runs from 5 - 8 p.m. Chicago Professionals for Youth is committed to improving the lives of local underprivileged youth through literacy and mentoring programs, college preparation, job training and career skills assistance. Saturday they're hosting...

A couple weeks back we had the opportunity to sit down for a few beers with Jon Cadoux, founder of Peak Organic Brewing Company in Portland, Maine, at the Streeterville Elephant & Castle. Like many craft breweries, Peak evolved from both Cadoux's home-brewing hobby and commitment to organic and sustainable agriculture. He was in town making the rounds, help his distributor place his beers into some new accounts. He was pretty successful: in addition...

First item on the agenda is a month away, but a classic case of the early bird getting the worm. The Northern Illinois Branch of the International Wine & Food Society is sponsoring a seven-course dinner November 10 at Bonsoirée. Bonsoirée will do the cooking; IWFS is bringing the wines. Cost is $120 per person, and advance reservations (highly recommended) can be made here. This weekend is going to be a cold one to ride...

Ah, Phil Vettel. When the Tribune's restaurant critic isn't busy with finding bargain brunches or busting restaurants on the use of wine doggy bags, he's a stickler for a clean fork. Vettel writes in today's Tribune that in future dining excursions to restaurants "with ambitions higher than, say, hash house" he's insisting on a fresh, clean fork with every dish. His reasoning being that any restaurant that places hospitality over profit margin would not dare...

Issues, shmissues. The real story is that the terrorist madrassa-taught, non-black, freedom-hating Barack Hussein Obama doesn't wear an American-flag lapel pin. We were startled when last night's TV news tag line said, "Why is Obama's patriotism in question? Tonight at 9." Though we have been suckered into watching the news based on these tag lines before, we were again let down when it was all about a pin. Those awe-inspiring pins are a standard among...

Award-winning food and drink writer Fiona Beckett will sign copies of her new book Food, Wine & Friends at the House of Glunz in Old Town this evening. The event runs from 5-7 p.m., and there will be a reception with wine and hors d'ouevres. Cost is $20 for the reception, $40 for the reception and a copy of the book. All you amateur sommeliers should be making a beeline to Sam's Wine & Spirits...

Governor Blagojevich signed into law late Wednesday HB 429, which brings into balance the amount of wine wineries in and out of Illinois can sell directly to consumers, but prevents out-of-state retailers and wine clubs to sell product directly to customers in Illinois. HB 429 goes into effect June 2, 2008. Under the terms of HB 429, smaller wineries with an annual production yield of under 25,000 gallons may sell directly to consumers with the...

Are you going to see Beirut at the Portage Theater tonight? You should be. The former movie house is hosting one of this beloved indie-folk band's few American tour dates, and the combination of 1920s movie palace splendor and whimsical orchestration may be enough to make your heart explode. (Think of that feeling you have when you look at a photo of a puppy and multiply it by 10.) Beirut's newest album, The Flying...

Naming the best bartender in Chicago is like trying to find an identical pair of snowflakes. Everybody has a favorite bartender and ours, a gruff, lovable fellow who told stories of Old Town's grittier days and always had a dram of bourbon at the ready when we walked through the door of our local watering hole, was recently fired from his job for refusing to serve Jaeger bombs to a group of Captain Awesomes who...

Rather than go out to participate in last Sunday's national toast to Michael Jackson, we decided to stay at home and raise a glass in honor of the "Beer Hunter." Earlier that afternoon we finished the remaining bottles of Goose Island Harvest Ale during that debacle of a Bears game and were left with a varied selection in the fridge — a couple brews from Three Floyds, a bottle of Unibroue 16, two cans of...

Or, since this will be an Oktoberfest-intensive installment, "Das Freitagsbüfett." Most of these are around the general vicinity of Lincoln Park, Lake View, and Wrigleyville. Things kick off this evening with St. Alphonsus' Sixth Annual Oktoberfest Chicago. Admission is $5, or free if you RSVP at going.com/oktoberfestchicago. First St. Paul's Evangelical Lutheran Church hosts their Oktoberfest Saturday from 5-10 p.m. Cost is $20 ($15 for seniors, $10 for children under 12). St. Michael in Old...

State Rep. Edward Acevedo (D-Chicago) is no stranger to the long green. As one of the chief sponsors of HB 429, the wine shipping bill that aims to bring Illinois in compliance with the 2005 Supreme Court ruling in Granholm v. Heald by limiting the ways consumers can obtain wines, Acevedo received $7,500 in campaign contributions from the Associated Beer Distributors of Illinois for carrying their water. Turns out that Acevedo is also the litigious...

Last month the craft beer community lost one of its greatest advocates with the passing of Michael Jackson, the "Beer Hunter." Jackson's research and writing on this singular subject laid the foundation for the beer, wine, and spirits writers that followed, raised awareness of the passion and commitment to excellence that the best brewers apply to their craft, and lifted beer to a level where it was considered worthy of mention in the same breath...

Conventional wisdom says that we should not speak ill of the deceased, but that's a tall endeavor if we're to take the pundits' criticisms of William Wirtz as law, although one has surprised us with his restraint. The longtime Blackhawks owner and liquor magnate passed away early this morning at the age of 77 from cancer. It's easy to say that Mr. Wirtz was stuck in a bygone era, treating his beloved hockey franchise as...

Asking for salt and lime with a premium tequila has long been a pet peeve of ours, but since we regularly found ourselves behind a bar, we bit our tongue. Not anymore — we're demanding you shed the "training wheels." It isn't as though we're talking about mixtos here, where nearly half of what's in the bottle is cane sugar. These days every major tequila brand seems to be launching a 100-percent, pure agave line....

Yesterday's Trib had a big article about Barack Obama's ability to appeal to "beer-track voters," and today Media Matters posts a smack down, saying the Trib could just have easily focused on different anecdotes that support the opposite point. Is this a typical conservative paper vs. liberal blog fracas? Well ... maybe. But it's fun anyway! Beer, wine, poker, Obama — sounds like a party. The story sets up the difference between "beer-track" and "wine-track"...

While the fish-taco revolution is swimming across the area, there are plenty of other events happening this week. Before we list them, however, we should let you know that the cockroaches are taking over our downtown restaurants. This week's victim of the ultimate survivor, Bice. Cockroaches were the least of their problems, however. A Health Department inspection also found no hot running water in a kitchen sink and fruit flies in the bar. If you...

Fear not, wine guzzlers. The summer festival season may be over, but there are still (legal) opportunities to drink wine outside while the weather's still nice. We speak of the Winefest Chicago, happening this weekend in Northcenter. A "starter kit" for the event is $25 and includes a tasting glass and initial tasting tickets; for the lushes out there (you know who you are), you can buy additional tasting tickets if needed. Winefest isn't all...

The "vere" part is pronounced like "were." Now that you know how to pronounce "saveur," it is time to pick up a copy of the food and wine magazine by the same name. The October issue of Saveur is dedicated solely to Chicago; not too surprisingly, a piece of pizza is featured on the cover. And here we were pumped about getting a single article in Gourmet. Like Gourmet, Saveur doesn't put all of its...

After a week of following the Green City Market Localvore Challenge, Chicagoist is feeling pretty good. OK, we admit that yesterday’s brunch at Prairie Grass Café made up of local products (chicken from Country Cottage Farm, braised greens from Kinnikinnick Farms, corn, roasted peppers, mashed potatoes, Wisconsin cheese, grilled pears, grapes, raspberry ice cream) definitely ended things on a high note. But even before we got to try co-chefs/owners Sarah Stegner and George Bumbaris’ flavorful...

Protest over national vs. regional chains, the never-ending debate over the place of cars and bicycles in our metropolises, professional sports scandals, remembering a solemn day, and being issued a search warrant - it all happened across our sites this week! Another banner week at Chicagoist started off with daily reports from food writer Lisa Shames on her attempt to eat only locally grown and raised foodstuffs all week as part of a farmers market...

While on vacation in Tennessee this summer, Chicagoist went to multiple get-togethers that started with wine and cheese. One particular cheese caught our eyes (and more importantly our mouths) and didn't let go. This cheese was a semi-soft goat cheese. It resembled gouda in texture only creamier. It was a bit manchego-like in taste but with a clear goat's milk flavor, enhanced by a rosemary crust. It was cut either extraordinarily thin and eaten...

The new beige will be on display when the Chicago Luxury Home Tour opens its doors for a three-week run this weekend. The tour highlights twenty-nine $1 million-plus homes in the Chicagoland area, and features the latest in home construction to home design trends. A wide variety of architectural styles are featured in homes built by multiple builders. With houses located from Lake Bluff to Yorkville, from Barrington Hills to Hinsdale, the homes, all outside...