Sweet Home Chicago
Fooding around the Windy City… badly
- Well, it’s been a long two y
- Well, it’s been a long two years, hasn’t it?
- Testing, Testing, Swab 1-2-3…
- Off to Heathrow (Take the coach they say. It’s fun they say)
- Cathay Pacific T3 lounge, Heathrow Airport
- AA87 London Heathrow to Chicago O’Hare International (Main Cabin Extra)
- Into the USA, Crown Plaza O’Hare
- Hyatt Regency O’Hare
- Airplane Art from the Hyatt Regency O’Hare
- Fooding around Chicago… Badly
- Starbucks Reserve Rosterary, North Michigan Avenue
- Exploring Chicago with a smartphone
- Back to O’Hare, British Airways Lounge
- BA296 Chicago O’Hare to London Heathrow (World Traveller Plus – Premium Economy)
- Welcome back to the UK, or how to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory
- To the Journey
Fooding around Chicago… with mixed results
Welcome to another chapter of “Kevin tries to eat his way around Chicago badly”. I’ll be a bit more original next time – this time was spent going from feeling “not that hungry” to “feed me now”
And there may be a lot of coffee. But you guessed that
Wowbao on State Street
$15 or so.
I’m stopping at Wowbao a little more, as it’s fresh food at not a bad price, combined with Asian flavours. I order a Chicken bowl with peanut and teriyaki sauce, with some extra potstickers/dumplings. Not bad at all, even though the order went through incorrectly.
Thankfully, this was corrected. Not a bad bowl of food at all – recommended for a good bite. On this day it was a choice of this or Chic-a-fila. I went for what I thought was the slightly more healthy option
Dunkin Donuts near Millenium Park/North Upper Wabash Drive
It seems that takeaways were sticking to the term “take away” as opposed to dine-in in a lot of respects within the City of Chicago. I had some Dunkin Donuts coffee as this stuff can work to get me first gear some days.
It failed and tasted more burnt than not. It also didn’t help that I left my camera behind when drinking this.
When will I learn when it comes to this coffee shop? (Never, knowing my luck).
Starbucks in Marshall Field and Company (Macy’s on State Street)
With temperatures falling like a stone in Chicago, I needed a slightly better coffee than Dunkin. I ended up longer in Macy’s than I intended with an Americano that tasted of coffee, whilst I warmed up and tried to plan a few things.
I was also happy that I brought some leggings earlier. Trust me- they were needed to deal with the cold the city was throwing at me.
Red Bar, Hyatt Regency O’Hare
One evening I needed to sit and relax in the hotel, rather than deal with delivery services. Also, I had to be social – a social risk these days. I had a burger from the bar and a cola (as my long-time favourite – the calamari had vanished).
The burger was more than passable, with an adequate portion of chips to go along with the burger – let’s put it like this: it filled more than a spot when I’m busy with the laptop trying to solve the problems of the world whilst 4000 miles away from the office.
Deep Dish Pizza Mistake -Bacci Pizzaria in Shiller Park via Uber Eats
I’ve got to learn not to be desperate for a deep-dish pizza some days.
My weekend was active – to put it mildly. It was to the point I was dressed and ready to go downtown, when the next thing I knew, it was getting on for 9 pm, with the latter part of Sunday afternoon and evening vanishing.
At this time of day, Giordano’s had shut and others shop names I recognised weren’t delivering via Uber Eats. I resorted to other places and tried Bacci Pizzaria in Shiller Park, whose idea of a deep-dish pizza was to use a thick deep pan base and layer everything on top.
It wasn’t great in any sense of the word. Next time, I’ll get takeout from elsewhere. That was just £40 of disappointment.
Starbucks Reserve Roastery – Pastry and coffee.
We’ll get there in a bit – this needs a little more exploration. How about in a chapter’s time?
Overall: I’ve got to try harder. And stay awake longer. Busy weekends, with a bit of the long tail of COVID, have a toll on me when it comes to trips and doing things.
But at least I learned one important lesson: Don’t compromise on Deep Dish Pizza. It will only end up in disappointment. And that’s just a waste of food.
Next: Starbucks Reserve Chicago Roastery
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