Tag: soft-boiled egg

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Best Bites Chicago

This week’s Best Bite: Staff meal of greens, bread, butter & soft boiled egg, Cellar Door Provisions

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.

Buttered bread, Cellar Door Provisions
Buttered bread ready to dip into the soft boiled egg

Why it’s this week’s Best Bite: With a limited menu of seasonal breakfast and lunch specials and a small selection of artful pastries that routinely sells out before noon, Cellar Door Provisions is tightly focused in its craft. Since I knew I wanted to try the much-lauded bread, I went with the Staff Meal, a no-frills breakfast of greens, bread, butter, and soft boiled egg. This was no ordinary bread and butter, however. The bread itself had a dark crust and airy crumb – the best of both textural worlds – and the egg-sized, salt-flecked quenelle of butter was plenty to smear into every nook of both thick slices. Dipping the bread into the yolk of the soft boiled egg was even more satisfying, and peppery bites of lightly dressed greens helped break up the richness. The whole meal had an understated elegance that was so refreshing.

Staff meal, Cellar Door Provisions
Staff meal of greens, bread, butter, and soft boiled egg

The details: Cellar Door Provisions, 3025 W. Diversey Ave., Chicago.

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Categories
Best Bites Chicago

This week’s Best Bite: Spicy roasted garlic miso ramen, Wasabi

Spicy roasted garlic miso ramen, Wasabi Chicago
Spicy roasted garlic miso ramen with egg noodles, rich pork broth, berkshire pork belly, soft-boiled egg, marinated bamboo shoot, bean sprouts, sesame, scallion, roasted garlic, garlic chips, chili pepper, and sesame oil (plus a background pig to match the ramen!)

Why it’s this week’s Best Bite: This steaming bowl of ramen hit me with two primary flavors: lots of roasted garlic and lots of heat – both very welcome on a chilly evening. Together with two forms of pork (broth and belly) and miso, each bite was rich and savory. The very best bites included all the other textures, too: a bit of the beautifully soft-boiled egg, crunch from scallions and garlic chips, and chew from the bamboo shoots and the egg noodles themselves. The garlicky broth was luxurious enough to slurp on its own, a testament to the care that Wasabi’s chefs put into a complicated cooking process that takes 45 hours total. Wasabi also offers sushi and Japanese small plates, but when the ramen is this exceptional, it’s tough to order anything else.

The details: Wasabi, 2115 N. Milwaukee Ave., Chicago.

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Categories
Best Bites Chicago

2013 Best Bite #9: Soft-boiled egg biscuit sandwich, endgrain

Each day in December, I’m celebrating the rest of the best bites (and sips) that I didn’t get to blog about in 2013, posted in chronological order. Browse all of this year’s Best Bites, or look back at 2012’s Best Bites.

Soft-boiled egg biscuit sandwich with shaved vegetables, whipped herb butter, black garlic vinaigrette, chips, and pickles
Soft-boiled egg biscuit sandwich with shaved vegetables, whipped herb butter, black garlic vinaigrette, chips, and pickles

Why it’s another 2013 Best Bite: Opened earlier this year, endgrain is masterminded by Enoch Simpson, who spent time at Girl & the Goat and whose bacon-butterscotch doughnuts are still a menu mainstay at Nightwood. Food & Wine counted his biscuits among the best in the U.S., and called this particular sandwich “ethereal.” I would have to agree – it was a dreamy (and pretty!) intermingling of soft-boiled egg, crunchy shaved vegetables, and buttery biscuit. The aromatic duo of herb butter and garlic vinaigrette made the veggies pop even more.

The details: endgrain, 1851 W Addison St, Chicago.