Restaurant Review Archives

Dawn Lewis of D's Roti & Trini Cuisine with delicious dishes of “buss up shut,” Chinese chicken, doubles, and dhalpuri

Dawn Lewis of D’s Roti & Trini Cuisine has a sweet hand

by Mike Sula May 11, 2022May 12, 2022

Nobody just wakes up and says, “I’m gonna make roti today.” Not for the first time, anyway, and not without preparation. So says Dawn Lewis, who over the last four years earned the title of “the Roti Lady” among Trinidadian expats exiting frenetic soca fetes at the South Loop club Bassline, who grew dependent on […]

Dishes from the reimagined Pippin's Tavern

Restaurant Review

A Viagra Triangle dive rises under chef Amanda Barnes

by Mike Sula March 16, 2022March 30, 2022

Used to be, if you worked up a hunger bending your elbow at Pippin’s Tavern, you could vanquish it with a dog, a polish, a beef, or a burger from Downtown Dogs next door. Over the 48-year history of this Rush Street Irish dive, its charms never included food prepared with deeper thought, effort, or […]

Restaurant Review

Avenida Peru takes it to the street

by Mike Sula February 16, 2022February 17, 2022

Karlo Caceres and his mother, Cecilia Descalzi, threw out the couch in the living room of their tiny two-bedroom Jefferson Park apartment. They replaced it with foldable tables stacked with aluminum trays and plastic carryout containers and bags. This is where they staged the pickup and delivery meals Caceres advertised each week on Facebook under […]

Restaurant Review

Roel Estanilla makes a very presentable pig

by Mike Sula January 19, 2022January 19, 2022

A lion’s purr revving to a roar. The sound of a crack racing across the bald face of a mountain. Thunder ripping across the sky. All arresting sounds for sure, but the phenomenon of Roel Estanilla breaking into the crispy, copper skin of a roasted cochinillo lechón could drown them all out. That sound is […]

Moonwalker Cafe Breakfast Sandwich pic by J. Kirby Torres

Food & Drink

Moonwalker Cafe is the scratch kitchen every neighborhood deserves

by Mike Sula January 4, 2022January 4, 2022

When Arlene Luna moved back to Chicago in December 2020 she discovered that all of her old classmates from the now-defunct Cooking and Hospitality Institute of Chicago had left the life. “Everyone that I knew from back then is no longer in the business,” she says. “I came back and started looking up a few […]

Restaurant Review

The Malaysian family recipes at HD Cuisine are worth a journey

by Mike Sula November 10, 2021November 17, 2021

There’s one table and one small booth inside HD Cuisine, a tiny Malaysian restaurant in a suburban Wheeling strip mall. Altogether there’s enough space to seat 11 people. If the weather’s nice and your timing is right, you can enjoy your nasi lemak, beef rendang, or Penang Hokkien mee at one of two tables set […]