Indholdsfortegnelse for February 2023 i Chicago magazine

AS JOANNA MARSZAŁEK INTERVIEWED five Ukrainians who fled to Chicago—their tales, “The World Must Hear Our Voices,” start on page 78 — she knew it was important to gain their trust. It didn’t hurt that the journalist is a Slavic immigrant, having come here from Poland in 2000. She strategically decided against using an interpreter. “We sometimes had to fill in a word in Russian or Polish when they were struggling to tell me their story in English,” she says, “but I could just tell they connected better to me without any third party there.” She connected with them as well, observing their pain not just in their words but in their shaky voices and teary eyes. “I was thinking, Wow, this could really happen in Poland, too, where my family…

1 In the past century, only two Chicago mayors have failed to win reelection after serving a full term: William Dever in 1927 and Jane Byrne in 1983. Lori Lightfoot will try to avoid becoming the third when voters hit the booths Feb. 28. 2 Also on the ballot: new three-member police district councils, liaisons between public and police. Candidates are divided between “back the blue” supporters and those who believe an abusive department needs oversight. 3 Valentine’s Day means one thing in Chicago: a 1929 massacre. To bring joy to a violent day in the city’s history, the Art Institute will offer free admission to Illinois residents. 4 Rebecca Makkai’s follow-up to her acclaimed novel The Great Believers drops Feb. 21. I Have Some Questions for You, about a murder…

WHETHER PILOTING new paths for Chicago’s cultural institutions or exploring the Arctic by kayak, Lynn Osmond embraces adventure. Born and raised in Ontario, she plunged into aquatic activities in her youth, including speed swimming, synchronized swimming, water polo, and rowing. She came to the Windy City when the Chicago Architecture Center recruited her to helm the org in 1996. This past May, she stepped down to become the first woman to lead Choose Chicago, the city’s official tourism advocate. Despite long hours on the job, the hydrophilic exec finds plenty of ways to stay active, including Sunday classes at Row House and swimming on the roof of Soho House. She makes a splash in Lake Michigan, too, typically while playing with Lester, her husky-terrier mix, at the Montrose Dog Beach. WHAT’S…

THE BAJA OYSTERS AT Sueños x Soho, a pop-up from chef Stephen Sandoval at Soho House, come with your choice of a spicy red cocktail sauce of pico de gallo and cucumber or a vibrant green version with serrano, basil, Asian pear, and white soy. They eat unlike any other bivalves in town. That’s because Sandoval incorporates Spanish cooking techniques by adding an oil made from shrimp heads into the red and Asian ingredients into the green. “That Asian influence is something you see in Tijuana,” he explains. This is not your abuela’s marisquería, or seafood restaurant (mariscos means “seafood” in Spanish). While Chicago has no shortage of them, from Mariscos La Costa Central in Belmont Cragin to La Palapa in McKinley Park, Sueños x Soho gives the cuisine a contemporary…

The Believer Natalya Zavizistup, 45, Near West Side “Each morning I hope to realize that this is just a bad dream.” “In February, my horoscope showed a big danger in my city of Kharkiv. I decided to come to Chicago and spend my birthday with my son, who studies at UIC. Now I believe that protected me from war. and going back and caring for him. Every day While I stay here under temporary protected status, my 84-year-old father refuses to join me. He is trying to survive winter while he teaches online classes at Kharkiv National University of Radio Electronics. He lives alone, has health problems, and his apartment doesn’t have enough heat. It’s so hard to choose between protecting my life I call him and wonder if this…

◼ A lot of times I don’t even want to start a writing project unless I’ve become so obsessed that I can’t stop thinking about it over the course of multiple weeks. That’s about the level of enthusiasm that is required to sustain me in actually finishing the thing. So if I think of a great idea and then it doesn’t come back the next day and the next day and the next day to kinda poke me in the ribs, then I’m not even gonna try to write it. ◼ I’ve struggled with anxiety at different points in my life, and in the last couple of years, I started having physical symptoms. I was having to take Benadryl in order to finish a presentation or show up on time,…

125 ESTIMATED DRINKS CONSUMED 10 Most ordered in one day 1 NUMBER OF TIMES SAYING “I’LL TAKE ANOTHER” (“I NEVER REPEAT A DRINK!”) $51 PRICE OF THE MOST EXPENSIVE COCKTAIL 1 Chicago magazine contributors encountered 3 BARS VISITED WHERE YOU CAN ALSO SHOP FOR GROCERIES 1 Bars that would have made the list but closed (The Gin Commission) 3 NUMBER OF HANGOVERS…

WHEN EVANSTONIANS GO TO THE POLLS IN 2025 TO CHOOSE A MAYOR AND CITY Council members, they won’t be voting the traditional way: picking a single candidate in each race. Instead, they will rank candidates in order of preference. That’s because last November, Evanston became the first community in Illinois to adopt a relatively new electoral system called ranked-choice voting, joining more than 20 U.S. cities — including New York, San Francisco, and Minneapolis — and three states in using a method that proponents say is more inclusive of all voters. “It decreases the likelihood people will say ‘My vote doesn’t matter’ or that they’re ‘voting for the lesser of two evils,’” Evanston mayor Daniel Biss says. “Ranked-choice voting is a better way to ensure everyone’s voice gets heard, and it…

URL hardprairie.com ◼ What it is A blog dedicated to Illinois trail running and ultra-running (races longer than marathons) ◼ Who’s behind it Chad Sullivan, 41, an Elburn ultrarunner ◼ Why he started it Illinois is overlooked for ultrarunning compared with mountainous states such as Colorado and Idaho. “It’s an opportunity for runners here to share their stories, their wild experiences,” says Sullivan, who began the site last August. ◼ Success story An interview with James Solomon, who ran a 100-mile trail race near Peoria in under 24 hours, record time. “It brings to light the athleticism prevalent here,” Sullivan says. ◼ Not-so-successful stories “We share DNF—did not finish—stories. We use them as learning experiences. This community celebrates failure, because what we do is incredibly hard.”…

WHEN WILL LIVERMAN AND DJ King Rico started writing The Factotum, a loose retelling of Rossini’s The Barber of Seville centered on—what else? — a modern-day barbershop, they planned to set it in 1990s Virginia Beach. That’s where they both grew up; the pair met as teenagers at the Governor’s School for the Arts in Norfolk, Virginia. But as the story evolved, Liverman and Rico realized the right place for their new opera was Chicago — the source, as Liverman puts it, of so much “Black greatness.” Premiering February 3 to 12 in a Lyric Opera production, The Factotum focuses not on fame but rather on Chicago’s Black quotidian. As director and cowriter Rajendra Ramoon Maharaj puts it, “We want to celebrate the average human, who is Black, who’s living in…

AS THEY PLANNED THEIR LOUISIANA-INSPIRED JUNEBUG CAFÉ (WHICH NOW has locations in Portage Park, Near North Side, and West Town), Jacqueline and Chris Murphy had no shortage of source material: Jacqueline was well versed in the region’s flavors through her French Creole grandmother, June, while Chris’s parents own Oak Park’s Cajun-influenced Poor Phil’s Bar and Grill. But the couple’s culinary background is a starting point, not a rule. Take their gumbo, which nods to their families’ recipes but forgoes the customary okra and dials up the heat. Perhaps the most notable addition is simplicity: This version swaps slow-cooked flour and oil for a high-quality premade roux, shaving off time without sacrificing the dish’s signature deep, dark savoriness. It makes a big batch, so it’s perfect for your Mardi Gras fete (and…

◼ Inspired by the hidden-gem gift shops in European boutique hotels, Victoria Fantauzzi has mirrored that vibe with her small but spot-on new store of imported crafts and apothecary goods. Each item has an origin story. Think: colorful beeswax candles made by a co-op of Indigenous women in Oaxaca, Mexico, or cleansing bars created in the South of France with local botanical ingredients. Fantauzzi was a founding partner of La Bella Figura, a maker of artisanal perfumes and skin care products. With this latest endeavor, she’s introduced her own face oil, made with prickly pear and kakadu plum oils. 4541 N. Western Ave., Lincoln Square…

POLITICIANS TEND to have extreme opinions. That’s how they win partisan primaries. Polling, though, shows that most voters have more moderate views, especially on hot-button issues such as gun control, abortion, and policing. “Our primary system and gerrymandering create this dynamic where you’re actually not getting the will of the people,” says Will Johnson, who since 2017 has been CEO of the Harris Poll, a Chicago-based survey company. Harris’s polling finds that voters these days put a premium on pragmatism, competence, and moderation. That’s true of what Chicagoans want in their next mayor, too, Johnson says. He talked to Chicago about lessons from the midterm elections and what to look for in the race for the city’s top seat this month. Q: What’s your assessment of the polling in the midterms—specifically,…

IF YOU WANT TO KNOW WHERE SUJAN SARKAR’S CAREER AS A CHEF has taken him, crack open the leather-bound cocktail list at Indienne, where each drink is named for a stop on his culinary journey. The beverages on the left (Kolkata, Mumbai, Goa) show he has cooked around his native land, while those on the right (New York, San Francisco, Dubai) point to his international postings. He tells his story, and does it well. His menu includes call-outs to regional Indian specialties and also offers a cosmopolitan sense of fine dining. But I’m surprised there’s no cocktail called London, where Sarkar spent 11 years, because that’s what I get most from this new restaurant in the former Graham Elliot space in River North. It feels like a posh meal in the…