Indholdsfortegnelse for May 2024 i Chicago magazine

THERE’S A LINE FROM EARLY IN THE SECOND SEASON OF The Bear that has stuck with me. Sydney asks Carmy what it takes for a restaurant to earn a Michelin star. “You’re going to have to care about everything, more than anything,” he says. The same holds true in the magazine world. Striving for greatness involves sweating the details. And while we may not always achieve those heights, it’s cool when we do. And even cooler when we’re acknowledged for it, as Chicago was with 14 nominations for this year’s City and Regional Magazine Association awards. For the second year in a row, we are finalists for excellence in writing, excellence online, and general excellence. David Syrek is up for designer of the year. John Kessler’s restaurant reviews and his online…

Q: What was Chicago’s first murder? Last year, there were 617 homicides in Chicago, more than in any other U.S. city. Killing your neighbor is an old tradition here, going back to 1812, before the city was even incorporated. The perpetrator of Chicago’s first (documented) homicide was not punished, though; in fact, he has a street named after him. The killer was John Kinzie, a prominent fur trader whose surname is familiar to anyone who has ever walked downtown. His victim: Jean La Lime, who owned Jean Baptiste Pointe DuSable’s former home and served as an interpreter at Fort Dearborn. In one telling, La Lime took the side of a man who accused Kinzie of paying a $400 bribe to be appointed the sutler, or supplier of goods, to the…

A FTER A DISMAL 101- loss season and the defection to Detroit of beloved announcer Jason Benetti, the White Sox could use a little positivity these days. And they may have found it in their unabashedly enthused new TV play-by-play man, John Schriffen. It’s the first gig as a full-time MLB announcer for this 39-year-old, who climbed the ranks by calling everything from G League basketball and (from his home) Korean baseball during the pandemic to big-time college football. Q: How did you reach this point, doing play-by-play in one of baseball’s top markets? A: The biggest thing it takes is belief. Because there’s only 30 jobs in Major League Baseball, and there’s so many people telling you it’s not possible. So you need confidence in yourself—and good people in your corner.…

THERE’S AN UNEXPECTEDLY personal aspect to Court Theatre’s staging of a new play about civil rights activist Stokely Carmichael. “Charlie used to be babysat by Stokely when he was a kid,” playwright Nambi E. Kelley says, raising an eyebrow to punctuate the statement of unlikely fact. “Charlie” is Charles Newell, the longtime artistic director of the University of Chicago– affiliated theater in Hyde Park, who’s retiring this summer after three decades at Court’s helm. Newell and the late Stephen Albert, who was Court’s executive director until his death in 2017, approached Kelley with the project years ago. She had just penned an impressive stage adaptation of Richard Wright’s Native Son for Court in 2014. “They came to me,” Kelley recalls, “and said, ‘We would love you to write this.’ ” If…

MAXWELLS TRADING, WHICH opened in late December in West Town, serves “Chicago food, from children of the city,” according to its website. That raises a question I find of particular interest: What is Chicago food? “It’s not just hot dogs and pizza,” chef-owner Erling Wu-Bower says with a laugh. “When you are a second-generation [immigrant] child raised in a big city in America, you have this ethnic food life. As a kid, I was awash in Thai, Vietnamese, and Chinese food. And when you grow up here, you also go to Devon [Avenue], you eat at Le Bouchon, you eat red-sauce Italian.” Listening to Wu-Bower, whose heritage is Chinese and Cajun, I had an aha moment. To love eating in Chicago is less about thrilling to the new flavors of…

YOU NEVER LEAVE THE NABE,” A FELLOW ROGERS Parker once told me. “Why should I?” I responded. “I can buy my groceries here, I can go to the tavern, I can go to church. If I go somewhere else, I’ll have to pay for parking.” Neighborhood life is the essence of the Chicago experience. The city is designed to discourage us from leaving the few blocks around our home. As Mike Royko wrote in Boss, “In every neighborhood could be found all the ingredients of the small town: the local tavern, the funeral parlor, the bakery, the vegetable store, the butcher shop, the drugstore. … With everything right there, why go anywhere else?” Royko was writing about Chicago in the 1950s, but even in the 2020s, plenty of neighborhoods still…

Among travelers whose plans center on food, I’m of a particular subset: I map out trips around baked things. And if we’re talking a hyperregional specialty, all the better. (Ask my husband, whom I’ve dragged on tours of the sfogliatelles of Naples, the bagels of Montreal, and all the clangers in Bedfordshire.) And so while Racine has plenty of draws—tidy, sprawling North Beach; the Frank Lloyd Wright–designed SC Johnson campus, with its space-age forest of columns and Pyrex tubing; the compact Heritage Museum, which probes the city’s Underground Railroad ties—it’s the kringle that calls me. For the uninitiated, a kringle is a shareable ring of delicate, buttery pastry encasing fillings that run the gamut from a staid smudge of almond paste to a fusion of cherry, brandy, and caramel. It…

The Garden Peninsula, which I discovered on a drive around the Great Lakes nearly 20 years ago, is out of the way even for the Upper Peninsula. Hanging off the bottom of the mother peninsula, it is a 22-mile-long knuckle of land reaching from Michigan toward Wisconsin’s Door Peninsula. Near the far end, at the mouth of Big Bay de Noc, I found a ghost town. The gray wooden buildings of Fayette, their last chips of paint scoured away by 150 winters, told the story of the entire U.P. in just a few blocks. The town was built around a deep aquamarine cove shortly after the Civil War. A tall limestone cliff blocked the winds off Lake Michigan, making Fayette a placid haven for schooners. And it was perfect for…

I could tell you that my lifelong besties and I make an annual pilgrimage to southwest Michigan’s Harbor Country for the sunsets, which turn the sky and lake into a painter’s palette of lavender and saffron and indigo and invite us to contemplate the fleeting nature of beauty and time and life itself. And that would mostly be true. But even truer is that we like to drink beer in a church. And whiskey in a former buggy whip factory. And margaritas at the Stray Dog Bar & Grill. And Cabernet along the Lake Michigan Shore Wine Trail. If a pub crawl grew up, settled down, and invested in a nice little lake retreat, it would look a lot like southwest Michigan. Name the spirit, it’s got it. Name the…

I ’ve been obsessed with ships for as long as I can remember. Perhaps it’s because I grew up in Iowa, and the largest body of water I saw as a kid wasn’t big enough for more than a rowboat. Even now, I still geek out over just about anything that floats. But it’s a little hard to be a boat nerd in the middle of the country, even living just miles from a huge lake. So I was delighted to discover Muskegon’s treasure-trove of boating history. When I first visited the USS Silversides Submarine Museum, I expected to join a tour group and be hustled through the eponymous ship—one of the best-preserved World War II– era submarines anywhere (it was stored at Navy Pier for a stretch in the…

If you follow Nick Murway on Instagram (@nickmurway), you probably find yourself craving burgers on the regular. That’s because Murway, in addition to shooting for commercial and editorial clients, keeps a photographic log of all the burgers he eats. “I have an obsession with documentation,” he confesses. The effort shifted into high gear at the beginning of 2020, when he embarked on a yearlong project to photograph one cheeseburger a week. “I have a tiny point-and-shoot camera. I turn the flash on and just snap the photo. I’m not trying to make it pretty. It’s a document: I’m sitting at the bar and here’s what’s in front of me. It’s mostly the differences I see — the size, the way some are super smashed. Some are on interesting plates, and…

◼ The Affordable Care Act saved my life. At my wife’s hectoring, I got it right before I had my heart attack. Every time I criticize Obama, I preface it with, “Besides the fact that the guy saved my life …” What I felt after my heart surgery was that I wasn’t done yet. It made me determined to work harder. There was an acknowledgment that there’s more behind you than ahead of you, so use your time wisely. ◼ I hadn’t had a drink for 33 years, but after I got out of the hospital, I was told that red wine would thin my blood and keep me healthy. So I had a glass or two every day. Then, during the pandemic, my best friend died, and two or…

1 The Illinois General Assembly adjourns May 24. Some of the big issues tackled this session: funding migrant care, requiring lobbyists to report money received from clients, and proposing a tax credit of $300 per child. 2 Pilsen’s Mole de Mayo Festival is still happening Memorial Day weekend on 18th Street, but it’s moving east, to between Morgan and Halsted Streets, after its old neighbors complained about rowdiness and parking hassles. 3 Is Veronica Roth Chicago’s most prolific author—our version of Stephen King? Her latest novel, When Among Crows, is out May 24. It’s the 35-year-old’s 12th book, if you’re counting. 4 Couldn’t get into the Chicago Marathon? Try the Chicagoland Spring Marathon on May 5 in Schaumburg. At $129, the entry fee is half, and with only a few thousand…

◼ Section 130, row 26, seat 13 You’re behind home plate but a bit to the right. That gives you a nice angle to watch each pitch and puts you in an ideal spot for foul balls off right-handed batters, especially ones that carom off the front of the deck above. Row 26 is key: Anything lower will cost you more. ◼ Section 161, row 10 Left field, 10 rows back — this is home run territory. It’s also where you’ll find fans of all kinds, from die-hards to youth baseball league families. Yes, you will bake in the sun during afternoon games, but the old Comiskey Park shower is right behind you, on the concourse. ◼ Section 533, row 7, seat 1 High up and directly behind home, this…

OPEN HOUSE The free exhibition Chicago: Home of House explores the history of house music, kicking off Navy Pier’s extended celebration of the genre’s 40th anniversary. May 1–Oct. 31. navypier.org JURASSIC SPARK Chicago’s improv comedy scene is in no danger of extinction, but visiting supertroupe Dinosaur brings some impressive star power with performers including Paul Scheer, Jason Mantzoukas, and Nicole Byer. May 2–4. thedentheatre.com BRASS AND SASS The boisterous musical ensemble Mucca Pazza blends the form of a marching band with a joyfully punky attitude. Help them celebrate International Tuba Day, and their own 20th birthday, at this Sleeping Village show. May 3. sleeping-village.com CRITICS’ PICKS The Music Box Theatre hosts the Chicago Critics Film Festival. It’s the country’s only fest curated by a major critics’ group. May 3–9. chicagocriticsfilmfestival.com…

PIEROGI KITCHEN 1856 W. North Ave., Bucktown ◼ Perfect order Kielbasa platter ($17), Zywiec beer ($7) ◼ When Eastern European cool hits, Chicago will be at the epicenter. We’ve already seen pioneers in the restaurants Kimski, Tryzub, and Anelya. These are places for fun drinks and plates that tell a story—not just of a rustic Old World cuisine but of traditions and ingredients moving into modern times. Now add Bucktown’s Pierogi Kitchen, where the previous owners of the boozy-brunch fave Lokal, Artur Wnorowski and Gosia Pieniazek, have brought their Polish heritage to the party. The menu leads with its star player: pierogi. You’ll find them with a variety of fillings, including smoked, dry-rubbed brisket ($14 for six). These are tasty enough, and the owners (who are also behind the carryouts Ella’s…

ON THE GRILLING-COMPLEXITY spectrum, making the juicy Balkan sausages called cevapi isn’t much more taxing than patting together a few burgers. But the payoff is huge. “I love cevapi for the distinctive flavor of lamb mixed with beef plus some paprikas,” says Joe Flamm, whose version is a fan favorite at Rose Mary. “Grilling them over charcoal just brings out the best of all of those flavors.” Traditionally, fluffy lepinja bread and lashings of creamy kajmak and the tangy red pepper sauce ajvar round out the dish; for a one-stop source, Flamm recommends the market adjoining Irving Park’s Beograd Café & Restaurant. JOE FLAMM’S CEVAPI Makes 12 sausages Active time 20 minutes Total time 2 hours 20 minutes 1 lb. ground beef1 lb. ground lamb1 Tbsp. kosher salt1½ tsp. hot…

You know how when you’re stressed out, people say, “Think about your happy place”? When I think of mine, I imagine sitting on my yoga mat on a wide wood-planked deck overlooking Lake Michigan, listening to the waves and the birds and taking in the deep blue of the water. Even just typing this has lowered my heart rate. When I first learned about Lake Shore Resort, a third-generation family-owned motel in Saugatuck, in the summer of 2020, I was drawn to the idea of eating breakfast alfresco and relaxing in the beautifully renovated property, which has a midcentury modern aesthetic. It was too late to snag a booking that year, so we stayed in nearby Holland instead, but drove by the resort to take a peek. We fell in…

Indiana Dunes National Park is a Rust Belt kind of wild space: understated but beautiful, a lonely stretch of delicately brown, grassy sand dunes that overlook a lakefront distant from the Chicago skyline visible, in miniature, across the way. But that’s not what pulls me there. Behind those dunes is one of the best spots for birdwatching anywhere in the Midwest: forests and wetlands that play host to hundreds of migratory birds in the spring and fall. I started going to the dunes regularly after I began birding in 2019—and after I learned it was a hub for migrant birds. It’s where I once spotted—at least I’m pretty sure I did—the only orchard oriole I’ve ever seen. Loons, hawks, and warblers of all colors and kinds, to name just a…

Friendships are based on two things: common interests and complaining. My friend Patryk excels at the latter. For years, he complained that I never invited him on my long-distance cycling trips around the Midwest. When I asked him to ride with my bike team, he complained about that, too. So when Patryk purchased a salmon-pink Surly bike, I offered to take him on his first besties-only trek to Milwaukee. Seemed perfect: The route is flat, scenic, and always close to a bar. We start strong, but just past the Great Lakes Naval Station in North Chicago, we enter the worst part of the Robert McClory Bike Path. It’s unshaded and made of crushed stone, forcing a slower pedal. Our optimism fades as the gripes begin: “Why are you riding so…

Sheboygan has long been known as the home of the bratwurst (and more recently as the go- to spot for Vera Pizza Napoletana–certified wood-fired pizzas at one of my favorite restaurants, Il Ritrovo). But what I love most about this small city halfway between Milwaukee and Green Bay is its lesser-known claim to fame as the Malibu of the Midwest. Thanks to a shoreline that juts into Lake Michigan, exposing it to wind from several directions, Sheboygan is a prime spot to surf when the conditions are just right. I’m not brave enough to join in, but fun to have surf culture so close to home.I’ve passed through the area year-round to visit relatives in points north or to pick up kids from summer camp, and have always seen wave…

1. Which tastes better? A. Deep-fried cheese B. Fudge 2. Which do you prefer? A. Sunrises. I like to be woken up at 6 a.m. in the summer. B. Sunsets. It’s more appropriate to drink on the beach at this hour. 3. Which sounds more appealing as an alcohol-driven afternoon? A. A dozen bottles of Miller High Life in a snowmobilers’ tavern B. The Lake Michigan Shore Wine Trail 4. Which would you rather see? A. The world’s largest fiberglass muskie B. The world’s largest fiberglass Hiawatha 5. Do cherries belong in salsa, mustard, and sausage? A. Absolutely not. B. Of course they do. 6. Which epithet would you rather be called? A. Fucking Illinois Bastard B. Fucking Illinois Person 7. Are you willing to drive through Indiana? A. Hell…

◼ For those who think alluring fragrances only come from overseas, there is new evidence to the contrary: the emergence of Clue Perfumery, started in 2022 by childhood friends Laura Oberwetter and Caleb Vanden Boom, who live in Logan Square. Clue’s three scents ($115 for 30 milliliters) are formulated, handcrafted, and bottled in a Chicago lab. “We try to balance unexpected reference points with really enjoyable aromatic profiles,” says Oberwetter. To wit: Morel Map, which employs the compound geosmin, made from soil-dwelling bacteria, smells like moistened earth after a rainfall. And while the name Clue originally referred to the creators’ love of the cult classic film, it’s ultimately, Oberwetter says, “a nod to the fundamental mystery of perfumery.” clueperfumery.com…

AFTER LORI LIGHTFOOT WON HER 2019 MAYORAL ELECTION RUNOFF WITH 73 PER cent of the vote, it was said that her support was a mile wide and an inch deep. Johnson is the flip side: He was carried into office on a much narrower margin but has deep backing among progressives. Still, his stumbles since taking office have even his supporters wondering if he—and the progressive movement—were ready for the moment. Here’s how the mayor has fared so far in seven key areas. Passing his progressive agenda: B– Johnson started on a roll, seeing the City Council vote in his plan to eliminate the subminimum wage for restaurant servers and other tipped workers, a vote he greased by negotiating a five-year phasein with the Illinois Restaurant Association. Then, the council…

I LOVE THE ART OF creating a joke,” says comedian Andrea Levoff, who started doing standup 10 years ago while pursuing a master’s in spiritual psychology. Both passions deepened for the Lincoln Park mom after she and her husband separated in 2020. Levoff began collaborating on a TV sitcom loosely based on her life, and she picked up a Vedic meditation routine. Since then, she has notched two trips to India to deepen her spiritual practice and has been pitching the pilot for The Dope Ass Mom. “Comedy and spirituality are so closely related,” she says. “All of the enlightened masters — well, most of them—are very funny, very joyful people.” MANTRA MAMA “In the morning, before I eat or drink, I meditate for 20 minutes. If I have my kids, I…

The Best of Gangnam Market GROCERY INGREDIENTS Longan This juicy lychee-like fruit, nicknamed dragon’s eyes for its black seeds, tastes like a tropical cocktail of Asian pears, sweet melons, and white grapes. $7.99 a pound Hot pot beef rib-eye slices Throw a DIY hot pot party by grabbing a shabu-shabu meal kit and these diaphanously thin steak rolls. Use the leftovers to level up your Italian beef game. $8.99 a pound Chinese cauliflower Once you cook with this version, which give a mildly sweet, almost nutty taste when stir-fried, you’ll never want the usual. $1.79 a pound FOOD COURT FARE Bulgogi steak burrito This spicy-sweet homage to bibimbap, Korea’s beloved rice bowls, packs bulgogi, kimchi rice, gochujang mayo, and sweet carrots into one of the best cross-cultural burritos in the…

DRIP COLLECTIVE OPENED IN FEBRUARY, BUT IT FEELS LIKE IT’S BEEN part of the West Loop for years. The café has been drawing creative types from the start with its innovative lattes, but that’s only part of the allure: The space also serves as an incubator for Filipino and Black artisans. It’s the second such venture for Francis Almeda, an artist and serial entrepreneur who opened Side Practice Coffee in Lincoln Square in 2020 partly as a way for friends and family to show off their side hustles. Similarly, he tapped interior designer Jacob Polhill for Drip Collective’s stadium-style seating and DJ booth and Justin Rodriguez, an artist and streetwear designer who happens to be Almeda’s cousin, for its vivid prints of fingers making the peace sign. Almeda relishes his…

1 SOUL PRIME What One of Chicago’s hottest eateries of the moment, thanks to a feature on Keith Lee’s popular food TikTok, serves up soul food classics with upscale twists in the heart of Lincoln Park. Why Shonya Williams, a.k.a. Chef Royce, offers up plenty of fun options: collard green dip, fried green tomatoes with lump crab and Cajun ranch aïoli, fried chicken with hot honey sauce, and a Friday and Saturday seafood pot — dishes that transcend the social media buzz. Where 1969 N. Halsted St., Lincoln Park 2 PUNCH HOUSE What The Obélix and Taqueria Chingón teams, who will be opening Mariscos San Pedro at Thalia Hall, are behind this cocktail bar’s menu revamp. Why Would you like a mushroom-raclette torta ahogada alongside a glass of punch? Don’t mind if we…

It’s rare to find a place where you can see the actual Milky Way spilling itself across the firmament and contemplate the cosmos on an elemental level. But one of the best spots to do so in the Upper Midwest is Newport State Park in Ellison Bay, near the tip of Wisconsin’s Door Peninsula. My spouse and I first trekked to this wilderness—an officially designated Dark Sky Park—in September 2020. The pandemic was bringing us down, and we wanted to have our minds blown with the hugeness of the universe and the smallness of our tiny human position within it, to be simultaneously humbled and expanded. We needed Galaxy Brain to be more than a meme. Having studied up on Dark Sky etiquette, we learned that no white light was…

On a glorious late-summer day a couple of years ago, my wife, Rebecca, and I hiked the modest incline in Sleeping Bear Dunes that leads to Pyramid Point, not far from the town of Glen Arbor. We ascended 1.2 miles through the beech and maple forest until we reached a clearing, where suddenly Lake Michigan appeared beneath us, majestically stretching to the horizon, its hue a tantalizing shade of blue that sparkled in the morning sun. We couldn’t help but hum the background music from those “Pure Michigan” ads, a Pavlovian response that would delight the state’s tourism board. All that was missing was narration from Tim Allen. It was a perfect beach day—warm but not too hot, a gentle breeze—and the water beckoned. The problem was that the water…

Port Washington is a place where time stands still — the view from Franklin Street up the hill to St. Mary’s Church always postcard-perfect, the caw of seagulls in the near distance reminding you of vacations gone by. Even the music playing in the boutiques is stuck somewhere in the yacht-rock era; an earful of Steely Dan greets you at the same time a shopkeeper hollers, “Welcome!” Over the years, I’ve made it a point to stroll downtown’s Franklin Street, finding the harborside city a more relaxing alternative to its heavily touristed neighbor to the south, Cedarburg. One recent Sunday, I drove there to visit the new location of my favorite resale shop, Fifth-Main. Its three stories contain everything from Gucci handbags to vintage Formula One tees, but its bargain…

When my husband, Kurt, and I bought a 2004 Chevy Astro conversion van with two bucket seats and a convertible bed, we envisioned a future filled with epic road trips launched from the curb in front of our home. For starters, we decided to take on the Lake Michigan Circle Tour. A 1,100-mile route through Illinois, Wisconsin, the Upper and Lower Peninsulas of Michigan, and northwest Indiana, it sounded perfect for a weeklong camping getaway. Kurt handled the maintenance checklist while I picked out a ’70s-style shag rug for the van interior, then we packed up our gear and hit I-94 headed north. Our first stop was the camping paradise of Milwaukee, where we caught a Courtney Barnett concert before saying goodbye to indoor plumbing for the week. After stocking…