Last weekend, we celebrated Ben’s graduation ceremony.
This is a video of Ben walking across the stage and receiving his diploma.
Finally, an assortment of photos of the ceremony and after party at Publican.
How much I missed delicious Chicago food!
It’s done! YAY!!!!!
A new window sill. It doesn’t look like much, but I am so glad it is done.
Before:
After:
Today, Waverly is being moved from Chicago to La Crosse.
Bye bye Waverly! -Chicago
My lamb shank recipe is based on this recipe. First, I season the lamb shanks with a little salt and pepper. Then, I brown the lamb shanks on all sides for about 5 minutes and remove from pan. I then heat up 1 Tbsp of olive oil or butter in the pan saute one onion (diced) with 5 cloves of garlic (minced) and then I add 1 cup of chopped carrots (2-3 carrots cut into 0.5 inch cubes) and chopped celery (2 stalks cut into 0.5 inch cubes). I saute these aromatic vegetables over medium high heat for 6-8 minutes until the veggies are softened. Then I add 2 cups of red wine and simmer for 10 minutes on medium, until the wine is bubbling. Finally, I add 1 bay leaf, 10 black peppercorns, some sprigs of thyme or rosemary (optional) and 4 cups of chicken or vegetable stock and the browned shanks. I boil all this goodness for 1.5 hours on low heat. Then I remove the lid and the shanks and allow the broth to condense on high heat for 20-30 more minutes. I pour the hot broth/sauce over the shanks and serve.
Although we have both lived in Chicago since 2004, there are still restaurants, ice cream and pie shops, and farmer’s markets that we have only recently found and tried. Here are my reviews:
Hoosier Mama Pie Company
Ben and I finally got an opportunity to sample their pies. On Fridays, they have a $7 special where you can try a flight (ie. 3 slices) of pies. These are the pies we sampled:
lemon chess
cherry
dutch apple sour cream
All three pies had extraordinary crusts. The fillings for the dutch apple and lemon chess were sweet and nicely textured. The cherry pie filling was quite sour but tasted fresh and seasonal. All in all, it was a worthwhile visit. We also took a bacon/cheddar quiche home for “dessert.” It was fantastic and would make a great breakfast (or anytime) food. Here is a podcast we watched which inspired our trip: http://www.vimeo.com/8096266
Black Dog Gelato
A new gelato place in the Ukranian neighborhood near the intersection of Ashland and Chicago. They make their gelato inside the store fresh everyday. You can taste the difference. They have 8-10 flavors every day but if you go late at night, many of them have run out. We got 1 pint containing mint oreo and hazelnut and a 2nd pint containing fig chocolate chip and orange cream. We have also tried strawberry and coconut. All flavors were amazing!
Piccolo Sogno (beware the obnoxious music if you click on this link)
We had lunch at this local restaurant today. The terrace seating was elegant and the weather was perfect (warm and sunny but not humid or hot). Ben ate the special mushroom risotto. We split a beet salad antipasto, which was not very well flavored but contained an interesting buffalo ricotta cheese. I had a grilled “misto” seafood combination of shrimp, octopus and squid within a salad of arugula, olives, cherry tomatoes. For dessert, we shared an eggless panna cotta. The food was good quality, but not super-creative. The service was first class and the ambience was snobby and wealthy. I would consider this restaurant the upscale, pricier, prettier version of Trattoria Isabella (on Jefferson Street). Not really worth the high prices (especially not for dinner) but good for impressing family and friends if you have the $$.
UIC farmer’s market (at the corner of Halsted and Polk, across the street from the Jane Addams Hull House) on Tuesdays
While small and new, I think this FM has potential. With only 4-5 vendors, this market seems a little sad, but I think it will grow and UIC students will learn to eat their fruits and veggies.
Fish/pork: Ben has tried the lake trout, whitefish and salmon (from the great lakes). I thought the lake trout and salmon were both delicious.
Nice cream: Always a local favorite–we had the michigan peaches in vanilla ice cream. They use local, organic cream/milk products. Made in someone’s apartment in Chicago.
Veggies: We got zucchini from one guy and potatoes from a different vendor. They also sell eggplants, tomatoes and other summer nightshades.
Cheese: The cheese vendor recognizes Ben because he always buys 2 jars of spreadable raw milk cheddar cheese 
We also tried their hard cheeses, which weren’t bad, but not raw milk, I think.
In the tradition of High Fidelity (a movie set in Chicago), I would like to make a list memorializing the six years of delicious food I have enjoyed in the windy city. A description of each meal, restaurant and it’s sentimental significance will be added in the upcoming months. The current order is subject to change and may be somewhat arbitrary.
1. Avec
2. Publican
3. Mado
4. Big Star
5. Paramount Room
6. Green Zebra
7. Poochie’s (Skokie)
8. Tre Kronor
9. Edzo’s (Evanston)
10. Renga Tei (Skokie)
Ben, please give input. Here are restaurants that didn’t make my cut but may still be contenders
Xoco, Nightwood, Superdawg, Hopleaf, Mercat ala Planxa, Tuscany, JP Graziano’s, Volo, Province, Salpicon, Campagnola (Evanston), Art of Pizza, Coalfire pizza, Spoon, TACquick, Union pizzeria (Evanston), Lula cafe, Irazu, dolsat bimbimbap at H-Mart in Niles, IL
After graduation ceremony, the Stokes family played a round of mini-golf. Jodi Stokes won the tournament with a perfect on-par finish and won a free game.
Photos from our mini-golf adventure (huge thunderstorms began as soon as we finished our game):
Ben cooked lamb hearts from Mint Creek Farm this morning. “They were pretty tasty. Interesting fattiness. I even deglazed with red wine.”
Here are photos he emailed to me.
