#the two year old birthday girl got her favorite salmon meaties as a treat

[bunabi]

according to her adoption papers today is a VERY special day 😭🫶🏿

[abiteofnat]

72 HOURS OF “RESTAURANT WEEK CHICAGO” LATER I’M A NEW WOMAN...

Because when you have very little funds after traveling for five days and have food poisoning that just won’t even let you eat crackers, you should go out for 3 really nice multi-course meals. Logically. It all makes sense. 

Restaurant Week in Chicago is like a frenzied Olympics of the mind, stomach, and Instagram (especially when you’re a food blogger) because the goal is to eat at as many places as possible, and you want all those places to be new and exciting so you can write fresh takes on fresh foods for the followers. And to show other bloggers, “I am relevant and cool.” So I did JUST THAT and even though one of the three places I tried a Restaurant Week menu is a long-time favorite, I strayed from my usual choices to expand my taste bud horizon. If you know me, this is rare, because once I find my favorite menu item at a repeat location it’s probably never going to change unless I experience a horrific interaction with it (aka &Pizza in D.C. a couple weeks ago, RIP to the mushroom-truffle pizza sauce that was my #1 Saturday night and then caused me to sleep in the bathtub so I could vomit freely Sunday night. Why do I tell you this? Because years from now I’d love to read this and laugh, even though now I still just gag at the remembrance of it. Oh, &Pizza... the shortest love affair ever had). 

ANYWAY, since I am one to not back down from a challenge of the food variety, the first Friday of Restaurant Week I was lucky enough to be taken out for dinner at Fleming’s Steakhouse in River North, and then had a lovely early dinner Saturday night at Ema, also in River North, and ended the weekend at Siena Tavern... in River North. There’s a theme here- it’s almost like there’s a section of the city that houses some realllyyyyyy good restaurants... hmmm. I’m going to walk you guys through the menus and what was had by all, and hopefully since Feb. 8 was the last date to try out the pre-fixe menus you can store these places in your brain until next year! It’s always fun to treat this week like a reason to go out and get a little bourgeois, because most of the places on the Restaurant Week Chicago list are a killer steal for the $44 set price. 

Here we GO:  

1. FLEMING’S STEAKHOUSE 

Fleming’s was a choice that shook a lot of people because they follow up, “Wow that sounds so nice!” with “But what does a vegetarian eat at a steakhouse?”

Well, I’m a girl who tends to eat my weight in sushi multiple times a week, and I will never turn away from a big plank of salmon dripping in sauce, which is exactly what came my way course #2... and oh my god, that salmon was so good that I almost didn’t feel guilty it wasn’t still swimming in a creek somewhere. (Whatever, a bear probably would have gotten it before me anyway). 

Fleming’s is a somewhat modernized steakhouse off Ohio Street that has an incredible wine bar on the first floor, worth sitting in for a pre-dinner drink for SURE, and their upstairs is a plush, warm environment that gives you steakhouse vibes while still being slightly intimate and even “cozy”. It might have been the entire bottle of red wine we drank but I recall the room being all orange, red, and gold colors so you’re for sure not sitting in some dark cave ripping into a steak (which is how some of the suburban ones can feel- Morton’s in Northbrook is literally a dimly lit daddy cavern). Our waiter couldn’t have been nicer, even when we quizzed him on his age because he looked like a rather tall fifteen year old to be handling wine (he was 25 and engaged- wow), and he made sure our meal was entirely to our liking. The meal was as follows:

Course One: Bread + various butters, all delicious. Then, a lobster bisque that was super creamy, rich in color, garnished with herbs and crème fraîche, and worth every single calorie since it was clearly made with an entire cow’s worth of cream. Not to mention a whoooole lot of butter, however when you’re committing to a bisque, you want it to be so heavy that United makes it pay for it’s luggage, and this bisque did not disappoint. 

Course Two: A whole salmon smoked + grilled perfectly, giving it a robust woody flavor but then slathered in a BBQ sauce that had just the right amount of molasses in it to make it sweet, savory, and even a tad salty. This slab of salmon was the first real plate of food I’d had in what felt like years, and WOW did my body need that iron. I asked for it well-done to give it that meaty texture and they made it the most perfect, succulent salmon ever, however most steakhouses blow my mind with how they can make a wiggly fish into a 5-star meal. My now-boyfriend (Fleming’s was a pivotal turning point for us) got the steak and entered a new dimension upon eating it, so for all you carnivores try the steak because it looked + smelled beyond awesome. Can’t give you more details on the taste tho! 

Course Three: A couple of sides that can’t really be counted as a separate course, but given how long it took me to enjoy the mashed potatoes it turned into a 20-minute flavor endeavor. We got the Fleming’s potatoes that have jalapeños stirred in- delicious - and then the good ole mashed potatoes that I knew would absolutely kill and THEY DID. A pound of butter, some salt, and the red potato skins mashed in there for texture... job well done. They deserved every single minute spent on them, which were a lot of minutes, because I was so full but my love of mashed potatoes meant leaving a little behind as possible. 

Course Four: DESSERT! Because it’s stupid to have two of the same thing on any table, I got the carrot cake and he got the cheesecake, and then I proceeded to eat two bites of the carrot cake and then eat most of the cheesecake since that was easily the star of the show. Everything was delicious though so there was no wrongdoing!!! Fleming’s is worth it even not during Restaurant Week, so go check it out if you want to have a fancy lil night out. 

2. EMA

So Ema is somewhere very familiar but I’m never sick of, given the atmosphere is literally perfect and the food is insanely flavorful and fresh for its price! It’s normal to start the meal with a spread or dip anyway, so getting to pick two for the first course for Restaurant Week?? I was sold on heading back there for a girl’s-night dinner to see if anything new peaked my interest. 

Course One: Anything with their fresh, hot house pita bread that has olive oil, salt, and rosemary sprinkled on top is a friend of mine so I got the spicy hummus and the charred eggplant spread as my two appetizers... AND WAS SHOOK. Usually I’m a hummus girl but sometimes it can taste a little too much like nuts (due to the chickpeas) and that evening, the hummus was sooo overshadowed by the charred eggplant. I’d never had that before and since eggplant can be slimy, I was nervous, but near the end I even started eating the eggplant with a spoon since the bread was gone and I couldn’t fathom wasting the flavor. GET THE CHARRED EGGPLANT SPREAD. It’s so smooth and has a lemony punch that plays with the savory nature of “char” flavor very well. 

Course Two: Risotto! They had a butternut squash risotto on the Restaurant Week menu which I’d somehow never noticed on their usual menu, and my #1 choice for dinner at Ema is always the octopus because it’s a huge serving and comes with even more delicious sauces. However, on a wintery afternoon, butternut squash risotto with parm and crispy sage seemed much more appropriate. Then- the flavor punch NO ONE SAW COMING- SQUASH VINAIGRETTE DRIZZLED ON TOP. It all played together beautifully and had the rich, oatmeal-like texture of risotto but with a light kiss of balsamic and then the punch of sage that is so unexpectedly important. This dish felt like a blind date that ends up being your life partner... yup. 

Course Three:  DESSERT AGAIN!

I got the small chocolate cake that was a thick dark-chocolate gnache with a very smooth vanilla whipped-cream dollop on top, and it had chunks of freshly-ground sea salt sprinkled on the plate so if you got the perfect bite it would be like jumping into the ocean on a hot day. Refreshing, insanely pleasing, and then that flicker of salt on your tongue. This dessert did a lot for me and was only the size of a granola bar, so it wasn’t overly indulgent. 

You can see photos of this meal on in a saved story collection on my Instagram, just go to @abiteofnat and hit “Top Meals”. Enjoy!!! 

3. SIENNA TAVERN 

Oh Sienna Tavern, how I adore you. After going once freshman year for an over-the-top date with a friend to avoid the bars, I really got hooked on the intimate restaurant experience this place gives you. It’s low lighting, plush leather and dark wood accents, and upscale Italian-inspired food- what more can you want??? On Super Bowl Sunday this is where my sister wanted to celebrate her 18th birthday so away we went, enjoying the empty highways and empty restaurant since everyone was watching the Patriots get their ass handed to them, and my final Restaurant Week menu commenced. 

Course One: Since main courses at Sienna Tavern are delicious pizzas and pastas that you don’t want to miss out on, starter was a kale caesar salad that had truffle mixed into the dressing and made kale not taste so much like dirt. I loved this salad and the portion was huge, so everyone could take a little and it was ideal for sharing since the dressing was decadent. Eating kale makes you feel healthier too, so when the pasta laden with pasta came to the table we all felt slim + like we could bear to splurge. 

Course Two: BUTTERNUT SQUASH PANSOTI! It’s like triangle ravioli! To be fair this wasn’t on the Restaurant Week menu, but my sister got a pizza selection off it and I ordered this pasta so it all worked out. This pansoti is astounding: the al-dente pasta alone is at least 1/2 centimeter thick, which makes it a voluminous shape when also filled with sweet butternut squash paste, and then five of them are plated and covered in a heavy brown-sugar-butter “Alfredo” of sorts that you just want to coat your whole body in. And the black cracked pepper on top? Beautiful. It is easily the most filling, indulgent dinner on the menu and you can fight me on this, but it’s worth being uncomfortably full after finishing it. 

Course Three: DESSERT FOR THE THIRD NIGHT IN A ROW! We HAD to get their house favorite, the bombolini donut holes that you get to FILL WITH FILLINGS YOURSELF. These fat, meaty potato-based donuts are deep fried and coated in sugar, and then come in a little paper bag with caramel, chocolate, and raspberry syrups to infuse with. The raspberry is easily the most delicious since it’s a crisp, fruity finish to an otherwise dense meal, and the crunch of sugar makes the citrus in the syrup pop. OOOO SO GOOD. 

Sienna Tavern, you can do no wrong. 

So there you all go! I ate so much fucking food in one weekend that I genuinely don’t know how I made it to the gym without passing out the following Monday, and I want to thank each and every one of you who helped me accomplish this horrifying feat! To my boyfriend, thank you for one of the best meals + company to enjoy it with, to Luzi, I’m always thrilled to spend the evening with you and your beauty, and to my family, thank you for teaching me to love food and a good dining experience from my childhood through right now. AND TO YOU FANTASTIC READERS: GET OUT THERE FOR RESTAURANT WEEK 2019. SEE YOU ON THE BATTLE FRONT! 

Until next time, Happy Eating! 

-Natalie