Alinea - Chicago, Illinois

I think every serious foodie thinks about two questions: what will their last meal be, and what would the dinner of their dreams be? Those two answers could either be the same, or completely different. I was given an opportunity to live out the second question on a chilly, quiet evening in north Chicago this past October.

I still remember the better part of that day with vivid memory, where I roamed the streets of the Near South Side, the brisk but steady breeze of the Windy City traversing the empty sidewalks near Manny's Deli. I remember hopping onto the "El" and riding over to Wicker Park, wasting a good four hours in a swell used bookshop, rummaging the aisles for old MFK Fisher books or a weathered copy of A Midsummer Night's Dream. Then I wandered through Ukrainian Village, a mid-century blue-collar borough which was the opposite direction of where I needed to go, until I found a bus that would take me to the rather nondescript street of Halsted. It's on this street that a culinary giant sits.

I'll pause here to say that this place, a dark, staid, almost cold edifice, contains a wonderworld of flavors, sights, aromas, and colors. I'd been reading about Grant Achatz' hallmark restaurant since Reichl & Co. declared it the top restaurant in the country in Gourmet Magazine just a few years ago. I picked up a copy of the restaurant's cookbook the minute it was released for public consumption. It still sits on my bookcase, jutting out and reminding me of its stately presence every time I look longingly at the scores of food books on the shelf.

Sadly, I failed the philosopher Epicurus when he said that we should look for someone to dine with before we look for something to eat. It might be true that no banquet feels like one until the revelers pull up to its table. I stood alone in front of this former two-story home with its deep entrance and its mysterious entryway lit by staggered walls and mellow white light.

For some reason this moment felt as cold as the Chicago wind, as sobering as the chill that hits your bones through inadequately padded jackets on those days when it blows hard. Though my journey through the world of food began so many years ago, this moment was seminal. It had to be or else my entire endeavors into that world would be a sham, a failure.

I didn't just come with expectations, I came with the hope that Alinea would somehow mark a new chapter in a story and shift my paradigm of how I view the world of food.

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If you're scrolling down with this review looking for photos or wild descriptions of food, I'm afraid you will be a little bit disappointed. I came ill-equipped with a cell phone as my only photographic device. Honestly, there was such a myriad of flavors that my memory is not quite a montage, but a blur, a Pollack-ian smudge of whimsy and caprice.

I sat down at a chalkboard-sized landscape, a smooth black surface that held a solitary, fragrant stem of rosemary, the signature centerpiece. It was to be used at a later part of my meal.

Only two questions are asked: what will I be drinking? and do you have any food allergies? I answer: Chicago tap, and none.

The silhouettes grace the dining room, stately men in full-suited chic regalia, swerving and swinging plates with aplomb and elegance.

First, I get osetra cavier, a briny amuse to enliven and awaken the palate with its cool texture and natural burst of its oceanic flavor. Then a construction of pork belly, layered with crisp iceberg lettuce, garnished with gentle sriracha-like spices. Next is a pretzel-like stick of yuba, crispy dried soybeans laced with orange zest, miso mayonnaise, and threaded with strips of shrimp.

The courses arrive and depart with ease, with no longer than a few minutes in between each.

I absolutely love the interplay of smaller and larger dishes, the flavors spreading every bit of the palate. There's a common theme of tickling every desire of taste, whether it be salty, tangy, crunchy, or comforting, or exulting, or almost disconcerting. A melange of duck breast, chestnuts, and orange emulsions comes after an explosion of black truffle, that ever-complex mystery of sensations. I can't forget the throwback to Larousse Gastronomique, a spread of trout and its caviar upon a regal plate and paired with the perfect Alsatian pinot gris in period stemware. I feel much like a Louis served a dish by Escoffier himself, but with nouvelle-sized portions.

There's a brief rest stop, or rather, a palate-spritzer of candied kumquat made to resemble a Sazerac cocktail. It's imbued with rye, lemon and demerara. The middle courses continue twisting and tantalizing the palate, with flavors of Bacon, butterscotch, thyme, peanut butter, spice, banana, beer, pecans, mustard, mint, dill, octopus. At this point, it's full-on gastro-mania, the kind that we all dream for in a meal of this proportion. Matsutake mushrooms come side-by-side with luscious otoro while pheasant comes hanging on long metal rods, much like that bacon strip with butterscotch.

Then Achatz' equivalent to Keller's salmon coronet - hot potato, cold potato. A perfect sphere of yukon gold potato hovers timidly over a soup of black truffle and butter, where the pin holding the sphere is pulled and dropped quickly into the liquid. It's inhaled in one ecstatic bite.

Then the final stretch of savory, a lineup of lamb cubes on a sizzling stone, the aromas aided by that rosemary strip. The herb's oils fill my olfactory like temptation while I enjoy each piece of meat.

To me, desserts were really three notable dishes - a slurp from a test tube containing bubble gum tapioca, hibiscus, and creme fraiche; a Abstract Expressionist's dream of a dessert, served tableside (more on that later), and a lump of cold pound cake that could've fooled me for butter.

Regarding that tableside preparation, a chef comes out (chef de cuisine Dave Beran, not Achatz who was unfortunately in Spain on that evening) and uses various ingredients, namely crabapple sauces, bacon, and others, and draws up a canvas of lumps, streaks, and dots. It's all laid out on the table itself, not a plate. For the sake of cleanliness, there's a rubber mat placed upon the table; still, you can't help but wonder the madness that could've possessed Achatz to serve me something straight onto the expansive table. Massive chunks of nitrogen-frozen chocolate mousse provide the ice cream-like main character of this "dish". I start to think I'm eating melting moonrocks, but of the scrumptious type.

The last course is not an endless parade of petits fours and mignardises. It's a simple buttery chunk of strawberry pound cake, tempered by hints of lemon and stabbed by a shortened vanilla bean pod.

With a coda like that, I can't help but wonder if this meal is really just 24 courses, or part of a lifetime of culinary symphonic movements meant to be enjoyed again and again. I certainly hope so, and next time, with people I cherish.


Alinea
1723 North Halsted
Chicago, Illinois 60614
312-867-0110