CHI - Chicago Pizza and Grinder Oven Co

I'm very easily influenced by food clips on social media and thankfully I now have Christel who will come with me to try snacks and food no matter what it is because our tastes are similar enough and somehow amid crazy schedules and mountains of school work we find time to be free (or maybe lazy?) to pursue new food ventures. 

LOCATION: 2121 N CLARK ST., CHICAGO, IL 60614

Just in case you're unaware, this video has been circulating not too long ago of an upside down pizza pot pie sort of dish. Chicago Pizza and Grinder Oven Co. has a pizza basically that they bake in a dish and flip out onto a plate table side. I get pretty excited about this kinda stuff and believe me, it's been on my list of places to eat since I moved to Chicago so I was pretty excited to go. One of my grad classmates has even mentioned this place before saying it's his wife's favorite spot for 'pizza' (if that's what people in Chicago wanna call it, I'm not totally convinced.) but it seemed like enough of a confirmation that this was a must visit. 

So off we go up north to this place and of course theres still a lot of hype so theres a line out the door even though its freezing and we manage to squeeze inside in order to put our name down. The estimated wait time is 4 hours long but I'm starving now so thankfully theres a diner across the street and we duck in for some french fries to tie me over. Originally we planned to walk to the Lincoln Park Zoo to see the holiday Zoo Lights but its still freezing and we cross the street and go sit in Chicago Pizza and Grinder Oven Co again. We thought we would just check to see if we might get seated early but somehow the place got fuller and we still had a few hours to go until it was our turn. 

Seeing as we're chickens in the cold and found a nice little spot to sit in the waiting area where it was warm we just set up camp. Christel brainstormed for finals and I crocheted while we people watched and commiserated with all the other people in line. We knew there would be a way but boy did we not expect this. It was still somehow fun to talk with strangers in the waiting area and compare when everyone arrived and how long they waited. Some people were regulars, visiting this place on special occasions for years while others were more tourists drawn in by social media. 

Five hours later, we were seated and let me tell you, we ordered like the wind; super excited for food. So during our wait we could see waiters rushing around and had a pretty clear view of a table and we kept seeing people order a Mediterranean Bread which is a super flat cheesy herb-y wonderful super thin bread, so we had to order it. We also shared a small country french salad (our waiter knew us so well from the start he suggested we share a small), and we each got our own half-pounder pizza pot pie (instead of sharing one one-pounder between us - another suggestion from our waiter that we decided to follow).

All in all, everything was great. The salad was a great choice seeing as we needed something a little light and fresh with all the bread and cheese and dough. I think we both agreed that the Mediterranean bread was our favorite part of the meal and over shined the pizza pot pie. A little overly hyped, and while the presentation was cool to see them flipped onto a plate in front of us it was a little underwhelming. Christel and I had such Non-American tastes sometimes too that the amount of cheese on them was a little much and we ended scraping some off it off. I'm sure other people would disagree with us and call us crazy but that's just how it goes!        

In terms of waiting, I'm not sure it was worth 5 hours but it's always fun to be able to say that we went and now we'll have a sort of 'dedicated to food we waited 5 hours in line to eat' kind of story. It's also fun to be able to talk to people in line and hear their stories and experiences with this place as well. 

Somehow, we miraculously found room in our stomachs to order dessert as well. We had left over salad and bread to take home but there's always room for ice cream so we decided to order a tortoni to share. Tortoni is their only listed dessert and is an Italian frozen cream desert that's flavored with rum and macaroons and topped with graham cracker crumbs. As far as ice cream goes I've never had one that tastes like this and I loved it. As full as I felt, it was so cool and melty to eat and tasted great and I'm so happy we got it to share.  

I think I would go back but maybe only if the wait was shorter than five hours and I planned it into my schedule a little more but that mediterranean bread made it kind of worth it.

Spam Masubi and Tamago

Holiday time is here, which means ugly sweater parties and potlucks galore. Of course as a studio we planned a holiday party to take place as a reward for making it through fall semester. I pressured everyone into making it an ugly sweater party and because we're all broke graduate students this is a perfect time to bring food together and share. 

I personally made some Vietnamese pork eggrolls  and it turns out I like making spring rolls because the thiner wrapper is much easier to fry but these are just learning curves I find by trying to make traditional foods away from home and just far enough away from asian grocery stores to find the exact ingredients I recognize. 

I also used this opportunity to use Christel's kitchen because her apartment is much more accessible from school after work, class, and climbing and just more conveniently placed to go to the party. This meant, however, that I was designated helper to make her dishes - spam masubi and tomago!!!

I've never made either before but I'm pretty handy in the kitchen and learn fast so our process went smoothly. Christel already made the egg part of the tomago before I arrived and had the rice ready to be balled up. While I fried/baked my eggrolls she cooked her spam, made her sauce, and we were ready to roll.

We went assembly line style which is pretty typical for us with Christel portioning off rice and me rolling. We made quite a bunch of stuff and were a big hit at the potluck and I'm pretty proud of us and I've never had spam masubi or homemade tomago before but I'm ready to eat this again.   

CHI - Jollibee

This adventure was pretty unknown to me and honestly I just went along for the ride but boy am I glad I did! Tongxin has been begging Christel to go and get Jollibee for some time now apparently but seeing as it's a little far from campus it hasn't been an easy trip to make. The two of them finally decided to go and invited me along as well and now I'm obsessed. 

LOCATION: 5033 N ELSTON AVE, CHICAGO, IL 60630

Jollibee is a Filipino fast food chain that's known for their fried chicken (i.e. Filipino KFC) with the cutest Jolly Bee as their mascot and really good food. Christel is from the Philippines so she knew exactly what to get and just ordered the three of us a sample of everything so we could take in the Jollibee experience. Christel ordered us a Bucket Treat B which comes with a 6 pieces Chickenjoy Bucket (with gravy because this chicken MUST be eaten with gravy to be authentic), one family sized jolly spaghetti, and three mango peach pies. We ordered a soda to share and also an order of Palabok fiesta which is a Filipino noodle dish to round out the meal.

I had zero expectation of what this would be like but Tongxin was pretty excited she finally got to try some Jollibee and neither of us was disappointed. This chicken definitely gives KFC a run for their money; its soft, moist, and had a great crisp skin with great flavor. I'm too American and can't get used to eating it with gravy but that's not to say the gravy was bad at all. Jolly Spaghetti is pretty good but it's one of those sweeter spaghetti's with little hot dog pieces in it. Very American if you ask me but Christel and Tongxin are all about it. I'm a bigger fan of the palabok but that's not a surprise seeing as I like rice noodles with citrus drizzled on it. The palabook has a lighter sauce and comes with egg, shrimp, and crunchy pork skins on top for texture and flavor. I'm hooked and will dream about this noodle for a long time and I'm already sad it's gone. I'm already planning my next visit with my mom because she loves KFC and this is something she'll actually enjoy without a doubt. 

Of course it doesn't stop there, we made sure to stop in time to save room for dessert and Christel ordered us one halo halo to share which is more than enough after our chicken feast. Halo halo is a filipino dessert (similar to Chè for all my Viet homies out there) thats made up of shaved ice and evaporated milk. Jollibee halo halo includes this beautiful jam smeared on the inside of the cup and all the magical beans and jello hiding on the bottom including white beans, red beans, chickpeas, young coconut and has two scoops of ice cream (ube and cheese flavored) and flan on top. Christel said there was supposed to be pieces of jackfruit mixed in but we totally got ripped off and didn't have any and this thing was still magical. Halo halo and Chè are just those fun desserts that I love that no one else understands in America because it just doesn't exist but when you have it, it's just super special. 

CHI - Goddess and the Baker

Here I am again, back in Chicago against my will (kinda), but at least I always have somewhere new to eat. 

LOCATION: 33 S WABASH AVE, Chicago, IL 60603

Goddess and the Baker is marketed as this veggie friendly, healthy cafe and bakery which just happens to be by a few other veggie friendly, healthy eateries. Tons of competition but that doesn't keep it from being super packed with a line to the door. Still it moves pretty quickly so that's a plus and if there are this many people it must be good right? Well that's the logic I like to go with anyways. 

I came with a friend who wanted to check this place out and by the time we got to the front of the line decided that take out was the way to go since there were very few seats left open. I ordered the Garden Goddess Wrap which comes with hummus, avocado, beets, cucumber, carrot, tomato, arugula, and the 'goddess dressing' and also a side of fruit (or chips). It took a little bit of time until my order was ready and that time consisted of me trying to move around so that I was close enough to the take away counter yet not in someone's way. Spoilers if you've never been, there's no where that puts you out of the way. Still after 5-10 minutes my name was called (even though they never asked for it?) and we were on our way to look for a place to eat. A few tables had opened up but apparently we were up for an adventure so we walked around. 

A couple blocks later we ended up on a bench in the Maggie Daley Park (right next to Millennium) digging in. I was a little nervous because my wrap looked a little messy to eat on a bench but that's never stopped me before.

As beautifully colored as this wrap is, I can say I was a little disappointed. I love beets and just because of the way they're shaved you can barely taste them. Everything sort of melded into the bland blob of veggies. I took one bite and immediately thought 'it needs more flavor' a little bit of salt or citrus juice honestly would've done wonders for this wrap and I was so excited that I bought a lemonade to try and wash some of the blandness around to resemble flavor. The hummus itself stood out seeing as it was the only thing that had a unique flavor to it at the ends of the wrap and as much as I love veggies, I couldn't even finish this little $10 wrap because it was so boring. 

The food here looks pretty good but in comparing quantity to price I was for sure hesitant to pay $10+ for smaller sandwiches with fewer ingredients and I'm completely deterred now that I know the flavor is completely lacking. I'm sure I could find an equally sized $10 sandwich with at least a little more kick to it. I was also disappointed in my little 5oz size of fruit but I guess that's to be expected. 'Fresh fruit' cups are always a hit or miss (mostly a miss in my opinion.)

In the end, would not go back. As incredible as the esthetic is and as nice and the food sounds, it was a total flavor disappointment. 

It's about time....

I'm not sure if this is surprising or not but I've honestly never eaten at Chili's. As much as I love eating out I have fun at the smaller places that Rochester has to offer with the quirks and charm that you can't get anywhere else. Nevertheless, it's still convenient to go to chains because they're all over the place and with my picky cousin Vi, this was a safe choice. So off we were to Chili's! 

LOCATION: 655 JEFFERSON RD., ROCHESTER, NY 14623

Now when I say I've never been to Chili's I mean I've never eaten there because I've definitely been here for Margarita's with the Italy adventure buddies. Still, I've never looked at a menu for food so this was a new experience. 

Vi used to go to Chili's relatively often in Arizona so I just trusted her and went with what she likes. I'm not as picky and would try anything especially since I was so hungry. We started right off the bat with skillet queso & chips which is Vi's usual starter. This queso has seasoned beef in it giving it a darker color than what I was expecting and made the salt levels higher. Put that on top of salty corn chips and cut to me drinking a whole glass of strawberry lemonade before we get our main dishes. Now if you know me, it's generally lucky if I finish one of these glasses of lemonade by the end of a meal so I'm serious when I say that salty is the word of the day for Chili's food at this location.

As a main dish I was considering a fresh mex bowl because I love rice bowls but Vi was saying how her brother likes getting the fajita's and the idea of a grilled steak over prime rib sounded like a better plan to me. I got Mix & Match Fajita's and I of course picked grilled steak and shrimp. It also came with caramelized onions and peppers, three cheese, guac, salsa, rice, black beans, and a few flour tortilla's. Vi ordered a steak (well done) with two sides of corn, not exactly my choice of a great meal but to each his own.

Already I wasn't asked how i wanted my steak cooked which concerned me but I've never been here before so I'm not sure if this is the normal structure or if I just got ripped off in this because my grilled steak came out very well done and I'm a medium rare kinda girl so I was slightly disappointed. The shrimp however was cooked nicely and everything came together to make some nice tacos. Of course, if you remember, the word of the meal is salty which is exactly what everything was. all of the protein was overly salty and i was pretty glad for the tortillas and my lemonade because I would've dried up from the sodium intake in this one meal. I had half left over which will be great for lunch tomorrow but chewy overcooked steak can only go down from here and I'd rather order a rice bowl at chipotle for $10 than come back for the over saltedness that is my Chili's experience.