I’d never expected to return to Alinea. It’s not that repeat visits aren’t worth it, but I don’t get to Chicago often, and even though I had an amazing time there during the 2012 Worldcon, when I do get to that city I only have so many free nights, and there are many other intriguing restaurants which I’ve yet to try—Grace, Elizabeth, Moto, Schwa … the list goes on.

But Ellen Datlow desperately wanted dinner there during this year’s Nebula Awards weekend, and asked me to use my good karma and Internet-fu to get her a table. I’d assumed that once I snagged the reservation, I’d simply turn the table over to her, but after I had us on the books (within seconds of when reservations began to be taken for the month of June), the temptation of eating again at one of the world’s top restaurants was too great.

Which is how I found myself stepping through the unmarked front door of Alinea last Thursday night with Ellen, Barry Goldblatt, Sam Miller, Cat Rambo, and Sheila Williams. (Yes, unmarked door. Unless you know it’s there, you don’t know it’s there.)

And here’s what, for the next four hours or so, we ate. (And you’ll have to forgive me for not going into detail on each course, but rather relying on the text from Alinea’s own menu, handed to each diner at the end of the meal. After having posted five other food reports from the Nebula Awards weekend over the past few days, I’m all out of superlatives. Simply assume that everything was wonderful.)

Surf Clam
sunchoke, cucumber, lilac

(more…)

Last Friday was National Doughnut Day. Last Friday was also a part of SFWA’s Nebula Awards weekend. Surely there had to be some way to celebrate both?

There was!

Since there was no programming that morning I felt like witnessing, I took off—with Wayne Rambo, husband of incoming SFWA president Cat Rambo—in search of some of Chicago’s best donuts to bring back to for several hundred of my closest friends. And to see some of the city at the same time, of course. It was a walk meant to be around 2-1/2 miles, but thanks to the vagaries of National Doughnut Day, by the time we were done, we’d hiked nearly five.

First stop—Firecakes, at which my favorite donut has always been their butterscotch-praline variety.

But, this being National Doughnut Day, they were sold out of them. Still, I bought as many donuts as could fit into one of their boxes, and then it was off to our second stop—the Doughnut Vault.

Which is where the weirdness began. (more…)

The first reservation I made for dinner during the Nebula Awards weekend way back when I started planning my trip to Chicago has a science fictional connection of which you’re probably not aware—because Beverly Kim, co-owner of Parachute with husband Johnny Clark, is the sister-in-law of Wesley Chu, author of The Lives of Tao.

So a John W. Campbell Award-nominated writer is related to a James Beard Award-nominated chef. See, the Venn diagram of food and science fiction overlaps even more than you thought!

So last Friday night, Barry Goldblatt, Kate Milford, Fran Wilde and I headed over to Parachute—a Korean American restaurant named Restaurant of the Year by Eater Chicago in 2014 which recently celebrated its one-year anniversary—to find out what all the fuss was about. That’s Fran Wilde and me (and a little bit of lens flare) above. I wish Wes could have joined us, but he had to head off to the Cayman Islands with his wife so they could celebrate their anniversary. What kind of priorities are those?

And the meal was pretty much perfect, with but a single flaw—due to competition from that night’s mass autographing (the early part of which I skipped in order to be able to make this dinner), our party dropped from six to four at the last minute, which meant we couldn’t eat ALL the food on the menu! I guess that will have to be our goal when the Nebulas return to Chicago again in 2016. (more…)

Because I was certain the food served at the Nebula Awards banquet in Chicago Saturday night would be barely edible at best and not at all edible at worst, I was determined to at least have a decent—nay, superior!—lunch so not all my meals that day would feel wasted. And I found that superior lunch at Big Jones, which I discovered thanks to a post which ran two weeks ago over at Eater.

Chef Paul Fehribach (whose food I was so taken with that I bought a copy of his cookbook as soon as the meal was over and had him autograph it) has long been in love with Southern cooking, and has dedicated his life to tracking down historic recipes and presenting food as it originally was. No molecular gastronomy or deconstructed dishes here! Not that there’s anything wrong with those, as visitors to this blog know, but I love the idea of experiencing the cooking of early last century, and even the centuries before that.

So I took off from the Nebulas with Jaym Gates and Lee Whiteside and headed over to Big Jones, where we were joined by Chicago local Eden Robins, with whom I’ve been trying to share a meal for years. Well, it finally happened (as you can see above) and, as it turned out, in one of her favorite restaurants, too.

It took Big Jones to bring us together. (more…)

I hate, hate, hate eating in hotel restaurants. And given the number of hotels I overnight in while traveling the convention circuit each year, I’m given many opportunities to do so. But I scorn those restaurants with the heat of a dying star.

There’s only one meal a year I’m forced to eat in one of those usually little more than competent dining establishments which tell you nothing about the city in which they’re located but instead represent both everywhere and nowhere. And that’s to breakfast with an elder in the science fiction field (because the conversation is worth it) whom I can never seem to dislodge from the site where the convention is being hosted. But other than that lone annual encounter, I bolt from hotels for all other meals.

Some have said to me, hey, aren’t you missing out on the convention itself that way? But I don’t see it that way.If I wander off for multiple meals with three or four different con attendees each time, I see myself as taking a part of the con with me while experiencing food that represents a city, rather than a chain.

Which is how I ended up Sunday afternoon at the Pilsen Food Truck Social, which was being held about three miles from the Palmer House. I’d found out about it from a squib in Eater, which is a site I always hit before visiting a city to make sure I miss nothing I’d regret. I wasn’t sure who’d end up joining me for that roving lunch, but five of my friends ended up tagging along—Greg and Astrid Bear, Francesca Myman, Arley Sorg, and Jacob Weisman. (more…)

Up until Sunday, I’d been to Next—the restaurant that reinvents itself three times each year—six times for five different menus—Sicily, Kyoto, The Hunt, Vegan (twice!), and Bocuse d’Or. For a variety of reasons, I had to miss out on Next’s 2014 cuisines, but once it was announced that the Nebula Awards would be held in Chicago this year, I knew I’d have a chance to go back, and was thrilled.

It will give you a sense of my priorities that the first thing I’ve decided to share with you (well, after my acceptance speech as Groot) is the weekend’s dinner at Next, for which the cuisine was Tapas.

Once I was seated at our table with my three dining companions—Kate Baker, Eugene Fischer, and Barry Goldblatt—the first thing I noticed was a postcard, supposedly sent from Barcelona, because the chefs had travelled to Spain for inspiration.

Also on the table were three varieties of cocas—a type of flatbread—which we found difficult to resist nibbling on before our server could describe them. (more…)

Last week, the group behind the World’s 50 Best Restaurants list announced runners-up #51-100, of which I’d been to three. Today, they announced the Top 50.

When the Top 50 was announced for 2014, I was able to say that I’d dined at four of them (though that’s not in a single year, but rather over the course of my lifetime). This year, that number has risen to seven, and you can click through below to see what I thought of each of my visits.

1. El Celler de Can Roca, Girona, Spain
2. Osteria Francescana, Modena, Italy
3. Noma, Copenhagen
4. Central, Lima, Peru
5. Eleven Madison Park, New York City
6. Mugaritz, Guipúzcoa, Spain
7. Dinner by Heston Blumenthal, London
8. Narisawa, Tokyo
9. D.O.M., Sao Paolo, Brazil
10. Gaggan, Bangkok
11. Mirazur, Menton, France
12. L’arpege, Paris
13. Asador Etxebarri, Bisquay, Spain
14. Astrid y Gaston, Lima, Peru
15. Steirereck, Austria
16. Pujol, Mexico City
17. Arzak, San Sebastian, Spain
18. Le Bernardin, New York City
19. Azurmendi, Larrabetzu, Spain
20. The Ledbury, London
21. Le Chateaubriand, Paris
22. Nahm, Bangkok
23. White Rabbit, Moscow
24. Ultraviolet, Shanghai, China
25. Faviken, Sweden
26. Alinea, Chicago
27. Piazza Duomo, Alba Italy
28. Test Kitchen, Cape Town South Africa
29. RyuGin, Tokyo
30. Vendrome, Germany
31. Frantzen, Sweden
32. Attica, Australia
33. Aqua, Germany
34. Le Calendre, Italy
35. Quintonil, Mexico
36. L’astrance, France
37. Amber, Hong Kong, China
39. QuiQue Dacosta, Spain
40. Per Se, New York City
41. Mani, Sao Paolo, Brazil
42. Boragó, Santiago, Chile
42. Tickets, Barcelona, Spain
44. Maido, Lima, Peru
45. Relae, Copenhagen, Denmark
46. Restaurant Andre, Singapore
47. Ducasse au Plaza Athenee, Paris, France
48. Schloss Schauenstein, Austria
49. Blue Hill at Stone Barns, Pocatino Hills, New York
50. The French Laundry, Yountville, California, USA

Of all these, I’m happiest for Rodolfo Guzmán and his team at Boragó, who finally cracked the Top 50 by tying for #42. They deserve the recognition.

Will the next twelve months allow me to visit any of the other 43 restaurants on this list? Wait and see!

The World’s 50 Best Restaurants won’t be announced until Monday, but to whet our appetites, the organization behind the list has announced what they consider to be the best restaurants 51-100.

I’ve eaten at three of these, which you can click through to and check out my experiences below. Sadly, I never made it to #92, St. John, but rather the spin-off St. John Bread and Wine, for reasons explained at the link.

There are a few surprises here—The Fat Duck, which had been #33 in 2013 and #47 in 2014, has fallen out of the top 50 and is now #73.

Manresa, which in 2014 was #62, this year dropped to #100, almost falling off the list entirely. Of course, it was closed for many months due to a fire last year after my meal there. (I had nothing to do with it, I swear!)

51. Geranium, Copenhagen
52. Tim Rau, Berlin
53. Hertog Jan, Bruges
54. Hof Van Cleve, Kruishoutem, Belgium
55. The Clove Club, London
56. Saison, San Francisco
57. Septime, Paris
58. Quay, Sydney
59. DiverXO, Madrid
60. Hedone, London
61. Martin Berasategui, San Sebastian
62. 8 1/2 Otto e Mezzo Bombana, Hong Kong
63. L’Atelier de Joël Robuchon, Paris
64. Maaemo, Oslo, Norway
65. Combal Zero, Rivoli, Italy
66. Amass, Copenhagen
67. Nomad, New York
68. Nerua, Bilbao
69. Momofuku Ko, New York
70. Waku Ghin, Singapore
71. De Librije, Zwolle, Netherlands
72. Restaurant at Meadowood, St. Helena
73. The Fat Duck, Bray, UK
74. Jaan, Singapore
75. Coi, San Francisco
76. Fu He Hui, Shanghai
77. Indiana Accent, New Delhi
78. La Maison Troisgros, Roanne, France
79. Ryunique, Seoul
80. Daniel, New York
81. Joe Beef, Montreal
82. Le Louis XV, Monte Carlo, Monaco
83. Tegui, Buenos Aires, Argentina
84. Sepia, Sydney
85. L’Effervescence, Tokyo
86. Hajime, Osaka, Japan
87. Brae, Birregurra, Australia
88. The Tasting Room at Le Quartier Français, Franschhoek, South Africa
89. Zuma, Dubai
90. Estela, New York
91. Belcanto, Lisbon
92. St. John, London
93. Jungsik, Seoul
94. Masa, New York
95. FU1015, Shanghai
96. Mikla, Istanbul
97. Esperanto, Stockholm
98. Vila Joya, Albufeira
99. Lung King Heen, Hong Kong
100. Manresa, Los Gatos, CA

One more thing—I’m hoping the absence of Boragó from the extended list—where it was #91 last year—means it has risen into the Top 50, rather than having fallen out of the Top 100, because Chef David Kinch and staff certainly deserve it.

Last month, I picked up a copy of Bryan Voltaggio’s new cookbook, Home, while he was making an appearance at a Barnes & Noble in Frederick. I’ve been to all of his restaurants often, and was looking forward to preparing some of my favorites at, well, home.

I assumed the first recipe I’d attempt would be his Chicken Pot Pie Fritters, but when a friend invited us to her 60th birthday party, I realized I’d have to start with something else, because fritters don’t travel. So I decided to whip up the Blueberry Cake with Peanut Streusel, which according to the cookbook photo is to supposed to turn out looking like this. (more…)

I’ve already shared a bit about how the stars seemed to align in my favor to make last month’s international birthday celebration not just possible, but extraordinary.

Like how Chef René Redzepi personally reached out so I could have my birthday dinner at his hard-to-get-into Copenhagen restaurant Noma, currently rated #1 in the world.

And how I was able to use my frequent flyer miles to book a trip on exactly the dates I wanted for only $100.60 in taxes and fees, instead of … gulp!

How, after I bemoaned the fact that a trip to Denmark during the time of year when Tivoli, its top attraction, would be closed, and that it would be depressing to peer through its locked gates, the amusement park announced it would opening several weeks early this year—on April 1, the day after my birthday, making a visit possible.

My trip was filled with many incidents of luck working in my favor, but I thought I should share one more, which occurred at the very end, and demonstrates that what are mishaps for most usually turn out to be gifts for me.

Ah, the power of serendipity! (more…)