We had a great weekend of food, fun, friends and celebration the weekend of May 16th in Chicago. Linda’s hometown is our favorite place to visit – we do often when we can – it is usually a 3 hour drive to downtown. Unfortunately, Friday the 15th was not to be a simple drive – we had rain and hit the wall around O’Hare. Let’s say it was not a wonderful 5 hour excursion but one that was so painfully slow we started to count out of state plates and ended up with 24 states and 2 Canadian provinces by the end of the weekend. But once we made it to our hotel the beautiful downtown Marriott (ugh) we checked-in, had an overpriced cocktail and then made our way to dinner. Did I mention it was raining, yes this is mid May, Chicago, NRA and that spells weird weather – 50’s and wet, not just wet but stormy! I digress, dinner time we had an eight o’clock reservation at C-House, Marcus Samuelsson’s new Chicago seafood and chop house concept in the Affinia Hotel, we arrived on time. I am usually happy and cheerful but when you try to seat us at the worst table in a half full dining room I get a little cranky, the five hours in the car helped I am sure. So we opted to “wait” at the bar – it was like 3 minutes and they sat us at the premier table in the dining room, what a spot. Ok the recovery was swift but then it gets better who pops by the table to greet us and suggest a menu items or two – Marcus himself in town is working the dining room. What impressed me most was that he was authentic, reserved and himself, just a warm and hospitable host! He suggested that we not miss the tuna tacos (mini) and the heirloom tomato salad, cool we made sure to order both and they were spectacular. The service the rest of the meal was wonderful, prompt, informed and oh yes the GM of C-House stopped by as well on two occasions. What started out as a dark and stormy night was turning into an awesome start to our weekend. The menu at C-House is very reasonably priced and has lots of variety with nods to Marcus’s background and Scandinavian style of cooking here is what we ate!
The – C-Bar – menu section that is a sampling section were you select either individual pieces or 3,5, or 7 piece samplers – we went for the 5 piece
Tuna with pine nut and toasted rice vinaigrette – was delicious almost tarter or ceviche in style it was wonderfully rich with meat notes
Octopus with smoked romesco and fennel – sorry to say one of the misses – too over fishy due to the preparation of being cooked confit, oily and unpleasing
Yellow Tail – mini fish tacos served on a bed of dehydrated sweet corn – what an awesome little bite yum!
Cobia – with Kumquat relish, rye toast and juniper – the acid of the relish really balanced the richness of the fish it was wonderful item
Waygu Tartare - chopped with roasted beets, quail egg and pineapple – it was an utter delight and we enjoyed it with gusto
Oysters – with honeydew granite, mignonette and house made cocktail sauce
We had a variety we have never before seen Stingray – it was briny and sweet with a nice plump bite, also we enjoyed a few Sunset Beach oysters, another favorite of ours
We bypassed the entrée selections and shared 3 different appetizers instead because they had greater appeal to us that evening. Here is what we shared
Heirloom Tomato Salad - at Marcus’s recommendation we enjoyed this dish completely – the tomatoes were lush and rip large chunks of brandy wine and ox heart served with a wonderful group of little accompaniments they tasted yummy. The black olive sponge cake was a wonderful surprise
Porchetta – what an amazing dish – a very different approach that was so wonderfully rich that it was complimented by the pickled green beans, pecans and candied fennel that was better with every bite we will have this dish again!
Salmon Pastrami – well this one sounded better than it was with beet, pickled radish and bitter sweet chocolate the dish just did not live up to the rest of the meal
Marcus sent out two sides as complimentary dishes to try – the Pea Tendrils with lemon and sesame fell flat but the Chorizo Mac & Cheese was a wonderful delight we enjoyed it – even Linda liked it and she is not a huge fan of mac & cheese
For Dessert we took the same sampling approach from what they call the Candy Bar our favorite item the sour candied citrus was simply the best way to finish the meal. We also tried the rocky road clusters, pistachio brittle, salted fudge brownie, and a boring vanilla bean cupcake. I would make the sour candied citrus and eat it every day – that is how good it is!
But wait the evening is not over…….we head up to the C-Vue lounge on the 29th floor for an after dinner drink – a small high end lounge with outdoor terrace that has the most wonderful views – tonight a lighting show from the storms moving in off the lake. Service was very good again but what a great space to drink and have a wonderful conversation and we did.
From here we headed out into the night to a private party at Buddy’s Guys to hear emerging legend Ronnie Baker Brooks rock the house with awesome Chicago blues. We played into the wee hours and had a wonderful Friday night in our favorite town, Chicago!
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