This week’s Best Bite: Salted Carame’L’ concrete, Shake Shack

This Best Bite is one of the 20 foods and 15 drinks I’ve set out to taste and document in 2015. View the full list to see my plan and progress.

Why it’s this week’s Best Bite: I’ve never had the wear-withal to stand in line at the original Shake Shack in New York’s Madison Square Park (or any other location, for that matter), so I was happy to finally make it to the 2-month-old Chicago outpost. On this visit, I had my eye on dessert; specifically, the creamy frozen custard that’s just as beloved as the burgers and fries. The Salted Carame”L” concrete was spun with sizable hunks of banana and salted caramel doughnut, but still kept the focus on the sublime vanilla custard base. As one of the Chicago-exclusive concrete flavors – which explains its punny name – the doughnuts are locally sourced from Glazed and Infused, and a portion of sales support the Greater Chicago Food Depository. My only regret is that I didn’t snag a few of Shake Shack’s crinkle-cut fries to dip into the custard, Wendy’s Frosty–style, for the ultimate in sweet and salty.

The details: Shake Shack, 66 E. Ohio St., Chicago.

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