Chicago Life: Friends in Town
Good friends made it easy to show off Chicago’s rich offerings of art, architecture, parks, museums and food this weekend. Affable and curious, they had ideas of what they wanted to see and experience while in town, but didn’t overdo it. With just a few hours left on Sunday, could they get to Ernest Hemingway’s
(...)Life: The Year’s Best
With the year coming to a close it’s a good time to reflect on the offerings that enriched my days and nights. I read newspapers, magazines, works of nonfiction, but my true love is fiction. In these three novels, the characters and situations were so alive to me I didn’t want their stories to end: Jonathan
(...)Chicago: Lunch in the Sun
After a particularly brutal winter and a long, cold spring we here in Chicago are desperate for sun and warmth. People stand at street corners or outside office buildings, faces lifted to the sun. Not waiting for the Rapture. Or sneaking a smoke. They’re jones-ing for a hit of sunshine. So it’s understandable that we
(...)Life: Visiting Chicago
I’m posting this out of frustration with the bland, dated advice in yesterday’s New York Times Travel section. A couple celebrating their 25th anniversary plans to spend a few days in Chicago in early December. What to do, where to go? Agreed. It will be cold. Let’s review the reasons to visit Chicago any time
(...)Food: Meals in Paris, Part 2
With less than a week in Paris, we foodies needed to plan our meals well. Haute cuisine, “le fooding,†brasseries, bistros, Middle Eastern, Moroccan: how to get a taste of it all? We didn’t, but here’s three we’d go to again: Gaya par Pierre Gagnaire (44, rue du Bac). Don’t be put off by Gagnaire’s
(...)Food: Meals in Paris, Part I
Six of us went to Paris last week to eat and shop and look at art. We had no trouble (volcanic ash) coming or going, and while we certainly didn’t plan to benefit from other travelers’ canceled plans, we found it easy to nab reservations at top restaurants, and lines at museums were remarkably short.
(...)Dining: Bar Lunch
I settled in for a bar lunch the other day at Joe’s, an elegant seafood and steak house off Michigan Avenue with my friend and colleague Barbara. I’d been to Joe’s (60 E. Grand St.) several times, for review or to meet with editors. It’s pricey, but the seafood — especially their signature stone crab
(...)Dining: Wells Street
A friend who owns restaurants says patrons come back, time after time, for a signature dish. Something no other restaurant makes or prepares in the same way. I’d widen the reasons for returning to a restaurant: portions, presentation, ingredients, certain servers, a special view. Two restaurants in my Old Town neighborhood, opened within the past
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