Top Notch. Period.

Restaurant: Top Notch Beef Burgers

Intersection: 95^th & Hoyne

Rating: 5/5

June 27^th, 2011

            I feel things strongly. Always have, always will. I think quickly and deeply and I feel strongly. It makes dating next to impossible. A first date is hard when you look 12, but it’s worse when you know that there’s probably no way that they’re feeling anything with the same intensity. You just end up terrified that you’re coming off as a babbling idiot and sticking to the idea that silence is golden. But gold is heavy. Gold is inconveniencing. Gold isn't worth shit if you can't sell it and my tenure selling tickets on Navy Pier proved I'm no salesman.

            A poet friend of mine used to live in one of the studios above 1000 Liquors on Belmont & Sheffield. Anyone who’s seen Belmont & Sheffield after 2am, knows what a show it can be, especially after last call at Berlin. We’d get drunk on red wine and stare out her window, watching the streetwalkers and nightcrawlers talk, fight, kiss, transact and all other forms of nocturnal congress. I was fascinated by her and she was fascinated by an Eastern-European prostitute named Ruby.

Every now and then we’d descend to the street to talk to people, or she’d invite them up,  like a homeless person who mostly rambled before producing a crack pipe, taking a hit and returning said-pipe mid sentence. This was only fall of last year, but, after an extremely stressful and caffeinated spring, it feels like a millennia ago. I got used to the trees being bare and being able to see her old apartment from the Belmont stop. Maybe I just haven’t turned around in a while, but today I noticed that spring had come and gone and, in the scorching summer sun, I could no longer see that window that our faces frequented. It’s covered by leaves that budded while I wasn’t paying attention. I feel things very strongly and, currently, nostalgia is caving my chest with the vicious accuracy of a firehose in 60s Montgomery.

The redline soon puts me out of my misery and whisks me away, south. The first time I ever noticed the southbound redline ended at 95^th, I assumed it ended at the top of some other Chicagoland town. Then I saw that wasn’t how it worked. Numbers didn’t go up in Chicago, they went down, like the south side was doomed to pull away from the north side from the very start. People think Chicago’s full of racial tension, but a redline map will tell you it’s tension by civic design…ok, a lot of it is probably racial, too, but the geography isn’t helping. Up is down, west is flat and east is obstructed, that’s just asking for trouble.

It’s amazing how easily one can zone out on the redline. It seems like I get on at Belmont, start looking at the route map, start listening and all of the sudden I’m at 95^th. It’s the highway. I’ve always been able to lose myself in the sides of a highway, the sides of anything, really. When you’re going forward, what’s in front of you never changes, it just gets closer. The stuff on the sides, however, changes at whatever rate you’re traveling. Once at the 95^th transitpalooza, I find my way to the 95W bus. Go west, young man.

The far south side of Chicago amazes me with it’s ability to transition so smoothly from suburb to shambles. One intersection is 95^th and Normal,  looks like a warzone. The next block is a Walgreens, a nice one. It just keeps alternating like this, block by block. I disembark at Hoyne and 95^th…and here comes the photo of the sign!

Top Notch Beef Burgers is a wood paneled wonder. It’s a lost world kind of place. I’ve either gone back in time or wandered onto the set of a Scorscese film. It’s just a step off the space time continuum, there’s no real awareness of the outside world.

I take a seat at the end corner of the counter. I like a place that trusts me to sit down and get my own fucking menu. My waitress speeds over with water and cutlery. She’s confused when I ask for a few minutes to look over the menu and I soon learn why. The menu doesn’t really have much except burgers. It’s a lot of burgers and a lot of ways to have a burger and then some greasy spoon essentials. I settle on a single cheeseburger with bacon and fries.

While waiting my food I examine my surroundings a little more. This place is old school Chicago. Founded in 1942, the first full year of the second great war. Some served their country and some served burgers. As I examine a bottle of mustard I notice a technological rarity, the Muzak central brain.

For those of you that don’t know, Muzak has soundtracked your boredom without you knowing it. There are a lot of places that don’t want to have to pay attention to the music in their restaurant/shop/store/airport/elevator/etc. So, they buy Muzak and they have preloaded playlists, and that was the central brain. That’s the actual embodiment of boredom and right now it’s set on 50’s/60’s hits.

From inside my head:

I should’ve gotten a milkshake. What the fuck is wrong with me? I’m at this amazingly retro lost world and I just got a coke? I am a complete fucking jacka-oh my god what is that amazing smell?

My burger is here.

There is no way I can make this burger look like much. It’s a plain looking burger and above-plain looking fries. That’s because this photo can’t capture the pyrotechnic blend of meat and salt and iron, the beautiful burger smells that radiate off this burger like rippling summer pavement. This smell assures me that a lack of milkshake is going to do absolutely nothing to get in the way of this experience. No hesitation, I must take my first bite.

I feel things very strongly, always have, always will. I’m truly paralyzed by how good this burger is. It’s meat. It’s animal. It’s tender. It’s warm. It’s blood and iron and tissue and muscle, ground up with something truly other worldly, but the cheese, the gooey, processed slice of Kraft keeps the whole thing planted in a very real place, dripping with pure Americana. The burger, the fries, all seasoned with the flavors of every single meal that came before them. No, gourmet bun, no fancy cheese, this is just a good burger, unfucked-with. This is how the burger became the hot dog or apple pie.  This is how the burger became a staple, places like this.

I have no idea if I ate the burger quickly or slowly, I was lost under the time bending effects of good taste. Eventually, I finish pretty much everything, pay a simple 15ish dollars and depart. Chicago’s an odd beast, travel southwest and you’ll reach heaven. Although, direction is all relative, there’s only forward, if you think you’re going backwards, maybe it’s time to turn around and face forward. I get on the bus to go back to the redline, so I can begin my climb back up to lakeview. After a couple of stops a disheveled man boards the bus, brandishing a bunch of lighters. “Lighters! Lighters for sale, I got lighters! 4^th of July! Firework lighters!” A fellow passengers asks him if he has “squares”. “Nope, just lighters. Firework lighters! 4^th of July’s coming, gotta have those firework lighters! Everyone loves fireworks. Up, up, up and boom.”

Multiverse

Restaurant: Palace Grill
Intersection: Madison & Loomis
Rating: 5/5

June 21^st, 2011

Manifest Destiny, America grew angsty and cramped and moved west. Through desert and over mountains and through valleys, Americans kept moving until they reached California, land of gold and freedom and…Asian immigrants, I guess. I don’t know. I don’t know because I started to pay attention in US History and then spaced off until the bell rang. I can’t help it, I’m a dreamer. It doesn’t mean I don’t want to learn. I just always feel like there’s a better use of my time. No matter what I’m doing. I’m learning when I could be dreaming, I’m dreaming when I could be learning and I’m writing a food blog when I could be getting a job. Life in the world is full of infinite possibilities and I’m going to think of as many of them as I can. It’s just what I do.

            There are many things I did instead of replacing my ATM card. That’s why I’ve been standing at this ATM for about 15 minutes. This is my thing, I stand at the ATM at  Walgreens from anywhere between 15 seconds to 15 minutes, when I need walking around money. There’s a scratch in my card’s already-shoddy magnetic strip and if I don’t swipe it just right, it doesn’t get read properly. It’s a barrel of fun. Especially on a day like today. You see, there are times where, if I’m swiping long enough, the machine will actually go out of order. Usually, the next one works, but today, today both of them broke. My negligence to get a new card has actually resulted in this Walgreens going ATMless. My laziness is just that powerful. Not wanting to arouse suspicion, I slink away from the pair of broken ATMs and try to blend in with the crowd waiting for the 77.

It’s hot today, been hot all summer. Humid and hot, my phone says it’s 86 degrees. The city likes to keep it’s buses icy and crisp. Sometimes I’ll just take little vacations where I’ll ride a bus for the air and see where it takes me. Not today, today I know where I’m going, it’s just a ways away.

I hop on the 77 and head west, yes, west, my Manifest Destiny. I don’t take the 77 for long though. I hop off at Belmont and Racine, knowing that there’s a Chase Bank where I can get my money and get a new card. Of course, they have a “Now Hiring” sign in the window, just to remind me of what I could be doing with my day or, really, any day. I get my cash and I order my card from a shiny-haired go-getter named Donnie.

Now, while I’m being responsible and getting my new ATM card, I could’ve been responsible and gone to the post office so that I could be assured that my debit card would make it to my apartment. But I didn’t and I can’t, so I have to have it mailed to my parent’s house and have my parents then ship it to me. So, I have to call my mom. My mom will want to talk. It’s hot out. I need to get on the bus. But I need to call my mom. I don’t want to be one of those people that has a phone conversation on the bus, public transit at all really. But I must. So, I do. I call my mom as I wait for another 77 bus.

My mother and I coordinate Operation Receive Debit Card as I board the 77. Not only am I having a phone conversation on the bus, but I end up having to sit next to the engine so I have to talk loud. Luckily it’s a simple conversation, the basic bullet points are my mom is my mom and I should go to the post office, but not before closing or at noon. My mom’s a better planner than I am. I think it’s because her ear has a direct line to her gut and she knows it. Whenever my mom and plans are involved, there’s always something very concrete about how they come out, no matter the time she has to plan. Back in 2005, U2 was on tour and my mother and I were frothing to see it. There was to be grandeur, spectacle and LED curtains. When that mad woman heard that her own brother had tickets to the tour’s Chicago’s stop at the United Center, she saw nothing at all crazy about pulling me out of school to attend a rock concert on a Wednesday. I was going to get a regular, school education, that was concrete, at the end of the day you can’t measure a school education. This concert was a chance at advancing my cultural education, which you can measure, since people like me wear on theirs on their sleeve. She had maybe a week to find a good deal on a flight, since my mom only gets good deals on flights, hotels too. Thanks to a rogue blog post and frequent flyer miles, we ended up with a window view at the Westin for a cup of coffee, and she only had a week to plan. The trip was amazing, not to mention the concert. It was concrete. She says she’s organized, I say she’s superhuman.

After the phone conversation, I end up at my stop, Belmont, Ashland & Lincoln. It’s a Chicago traffic anomaly that I call a Clusterfuck Intersection. I spend a few moments figuring out which street is Ashland and I then make my way to the stop where I can grab the 9.

It takes a while for the 9 to come. It wouldn’t annoy me, but I hate the architecture on this side of the city. It’s all brick without any of the jagged fun. Up north, the west side is to gentrified for me. I know that it’s people like me gentrifying the neighborhoods, but I didn’t vote for it.

Eventually, the 9 comes and I am able to just sit and stare. I can’t make out the entire conversation of the angry Mexican man, sitting next kitty corner to me on his phone, but it’s rushed, worried, excited. He barks his words like he’s making some kind of stir-fry of emotions. He’s meeting someone, I don’t know why and, from what I can tell, neither does he. He gets off at Fullerton and I am left to wonder the possibilities of his day.

Going south and looking west is an experience. There’s just something about watching the skyline shift from industrial nature of the northwest side to the water towers of the west loop. A poet friend of mine can’t stop singing the praises of the west side and I have no intention of stopping her. The west side should be sung about. It’s like an ocean bed of brick and metal, stained a pale, burnt orange like a photo in a Ken Burns documentary. It’s my redwood forest, where windows and water towers tell stories of a time I’ll never see.

Nothing really special about the ride on the 9, except the architecture, but I know I can’t do it enough justice. It was just me and others and a redheaded couple. I’ve learned redheads stick together.

Eventually, the 9 dumps me in Union Park, by Lake and Ashland. There’s something much wider about the west side. Just walking around I can feel more room to breathe, more room for breeze to give a quick break from the city’s swelter as I swagger down Ashland. Like I said before, I know where I’m going. The Palace Grill, it’s this little greasy spoon I heard about, next to a skating rink called Johnny’s Ice House. I head east on Madison and after one of those long, crosstown blocks, I finally see the tiny diner. I mean tiny, it looks like it’s the size of a large boxcar, black and white awnings and just overall, something about it feels out of place. It looks like some Midwestern suburb’s hidden gem or something. But here it is, on the sepia-toned west side.

Inside the building is like some kind of forgotten chain restaurant, but different, I can’t put my finger on it because I’m too distracted by the air conditioning, there is no way that it is still 86 degrees outside. If you’ve read before, then you know that I have a thing about greasy spoons and their waitresses. I like them to treat me like dirt. It’s what greasy spoon waitresses do to outsiders. But I also acknowledge, and equally enjoy, the other type of greasy spoon waitress. The kind that could make a bowl of bran flakes give you diabetes. Now, I don’t like overly kind people, or people who treat me like dirt for that matter, but a greasy spoon’s waitress says a lot about the establishment itself. A bad greasy spoon has servers who put on an act. Their bosses want the place to be a greasy spoon and so they force their staff to fit that mold. But there isn’t a mold for greasy spoons. A restaurant has to evolve into a greasy spoon.

So, what does this greasy spoon’s waitress say about the place? She’s young-ish, but there’s something just a little weathered about her. She warmly greets me and then immediately goes back to reading her paper, not out of rudeness, but out of trust that I can find my own seat in this small, empty diner. I take a seat at the counter. My waitress looks up again from her paper to get my drink order. As she fills up a plastic cup with ice and coke, I look over at the large griddle that’s behind the counter. A silent cook was placing strip after strip of bacon on the griddle, prepping it for future customers. My waitress delivers my drink and I know what I should order. Looking around, I’ve seen a lot about them having the “Best Breakfast in Chicago”. I always have a way to test this. The same way I tested it at the Ohio Coffee Shop, corned-beef hash, two eggs, white toast and hash browns. It’s my go-to breakfast, simply because everyone does it the same way, essentially. So, it’s not about how the dish turned out, it’ll always turn out edible. It’s about what makes their corned-beef hash and eggs different from everyone else’s. I ask for my eggs cooked over easy, because I am no longer a sniveling nancy boy who only eats scrambled eggs. My waitress hands the ticket to the cook, who leaves a baconless section of the griddle, my baconless section of the griddle.

I look around the Palace Grill for a while, all of the clutter on the walls starts to make sense. When I first walked in, it looked like a desperate attempt to seem like a “Real Chicago Joint”, but soon I notice that most of it is years of praise that they didn’t have room for anywhere else. The medals of a veteran that never asked for any. This place is too sincere to be kitschy, that’s what I couldn’t put my finger on before. Established in 1938, this is clearly a fully evolved greasy spoon. It doesn’t take long for my food to get to me. But me and my waitress both notice that she forgot my hash browns and has the cook throw some on for me, again, that section will go baconless.

There is nothing else to call this food, except absolutely beautiful. The eggs, the hash, my god. I am careful as I go to cut open my first egg. This is important. I want to cut in and watch the yolk leak. If it doesn’t, it won’t matter how pretty this breakfast is.

The egg cuts like a New Orleans levy, flooding the corned-beef hash with yolk. It’s a truly beautiful sight. That man slapping bacon on a griddle knows what he’s doing. The egg is perfectly cooked and the corned-beef hash is either house made or cooked just right, because it coats my mouth in flavor and has that absolutely perfect corned-beef hash texture, so mushy and lumpy but so consistent.

I’m not someone who usually eats breakfast at the proper time of day. Breakfast is usually at some mediocre diner, shoveled in my mouth, hurried bought in twilight, and that’s what it always ends up tasting like, twilight. That time of day where you can see all of the colors, but none are allowed to pop, there isn’t enough light. Twilight breakfasts have all the flavors, but none of them pop, they can’t. But this breakfast is a Technicolor breakfast, a breakfast filled with blinding light, each flavor pops with it’s full spectrum. My hash browns then arrive and continue the trend of making me one very happy camper.

After a while, a large man enters and is allowed to sit and have a glass of water while he reads the paper. That’s all he gets, a glass of water and my waitress seats him as happily and endearingly as she did me, this is a top-notch establishment. The man comes in hooting and hollering about some lawsuit against the city, some lawyer is suing because he lost his $90,000 Mercedes Benz during Thundersnow. I’m glad my parents were never those kinds of lawyers. It’s then that I get a phone call from a friend of mine who’d recently gotten in some legal trouble, in the name of confidentiality, all I’ll say is that he mostly went on about how great lawyers can be. Whether talking about great lawyers or douchey lawyers, I was engrossed in what ever I was talking about, because I was engrossed in the greatness of this meal, Technicolor breakfasts can have that kind of effect on me. I don’t even care that the hash browns were originally forgotten about, it only kept me from filling up on potatoes. There are infinite ways that this meal could’ve turned out and this is exactly the way it should have.

When I can’t eat another bite, I pay a quick $15ish and I leave and it’s really simple. But the heat, my god the heat. I’m full and I’m hot. I start to head west and that’s when I really get my bearings. I see the top of the United Center, just above the tress. I’ve been by it on the train a number of times, but I hadn’t actually been to the area since the concert.

Before I know what I am doing, I start sprinting down Madison. The breeze from running felt nice, like I’d hit Pacific Sea air. I stop in front of the ticket booth and take the building in for a moment. I cross the street and am hit by a chill. The building was emitting cool air, they air condition the outside for all the fans that wait around. There are no fans today. I am the only pedestrian in the area. Parking lots surround the United Center like an ocean of concrete.

If you’ve never experienced outdoor air-conditioning, then you should. It’s truly amazing. Looking around at these empty parking lots, I dance, I sing U2 songs at the top of my lungs. I balance on benches and drum on the walls. I’ve hit California and now I’ve gone out to sea and the ocean is big. There are infinite possibilities to what I could be doing, besides dancing and singing and making a spectacle in front of an empty stadium, but it doesn’t matter. I could be doing anything, but I’m talented and I’m well intentioned, I’ll end up doing something. Especially with this city on my side.

After a rather stunning rendition of “Who’s Gonna Ride Your Wild Horses”, I get on the 20, which will take me to the 8, which will take me home. I sit behind a man who starts barking about “Weak ass shit” and other phrases that just make him sound like an extra on The Wire. He’s rambling, twitchy and fascinating, but he soon gets off the bus, with a couple of notebooks and a cheap textbook. Where ever he’s going, he’s going to get shit done.

Snowpocalypse is a Stupid Word.

Restaurant: Yango's Burgers and Stuff

Intersection: Broadway & Surf

Rating: 2.5/5

February 2^nd, 2011:

            Manlius, NY will have an unexpected effect on you. You will, all of the sudden, not trust the local weather. 18 years there have colored me to expect big talk from the news and soft weather. Essentially, weather guy says, “Shit will go down”, I expect to be underwhelmed.

            But I’m not in Manlius anymore. I’m in Chicago. Shit went down. Thundersnow, to be exact. Lots of thundersnow. Lots of regular snow, too. Lots of cold. Lots of wind. It was the blizzard that the Channel 3 news had promised me for all of my Public School days. It was everything I expected and so much more[1].

            Now, it’s less than 24 hours later. The thundersnow has been silenced. The streets and sidewalks have been attended to and I’ve run out of Stouffer’s macaroni and cheese. I’ve never been one to ration properly. I’d make a terrible pioneer.

            It’s time to bundle and bundle good. Because it’s still fucking cold. One long sleeve shirt, one hoodie, a thick pair of jeans and a heavy coat later and I’m ready to venture out into this new tundra. My courtyard has been snow-blown into the only lesson I remember about World War I.

            It’s cold. Did I mention it’s cold? Because it’s cold[2]. Buckingham Pl. resembles something out of a Jake Gyllenhal disaster movie. The sidewalks have paths cleared in them, but the roads are a different story. Buckingham, like Aldine and Melrose after it, isn’t completely plowed. The point where these streets meet Broadway is covered in mounds of snow that’s just soft enough to sink under any’s weight. I cross these intersections, using a path made up of other people’s footprints, hoping that my one of my “Go-to Restaurants” is open. Alas, I get to Broadway and Belmont and Chicken Hut, like Chipolte, kitty corner to it, is closed. No, there will be no grilled chicken tonight. I keep walking down Broadway. The record shop is closed. The deli is closed. The diner is closed. The burrito place is…open. But I don’t want a burrito.

‘I’ve come this far’, I think to myself. I keep trudging down Broadway, to Wellington. But alas, Crisp, the greatest fried chicken place in the world, is also closed.

I’m hungry and all of my options have been shot down. ‘Wouldn’t it be fun’, I think to myself, ‘If that burger place was open.’

“I’ve come this far.” Yes, after being cooped up during [snow related disaster pun], I’ve begun to talk to myself. But I am right. I have come this far[3].

I keep trudging down Broadway. I get to Surf and, my god, the light is on.

I immediately scurry into this establishment. I can’t quite place what it is. It’s part Gyro-place, part Burger Joint. I don’t really know what to classify it as. There’s faux-brick on the wall and there’s very loud oldies radio playing.

I make my way to the counter. I order a Bacon Cheeseburger, fries and a Faygo root beer[4]. It comes to an even $10. Then the guy behind me orders a much larger item, also $10. I can only assume, on a day like today, the staff just doesn’t feel like doing math. I wouldn’t either.

I stand around for some time, holding my liter of Faygo and waiting for my Bacon Cheeseburger. Eventually, my food arrives and I sit down with it.

I’ll admit. This is a pretty ordinary burger. A little burnt. A little thin. The bacon is scorched and the fries came from a bag in the freezer. But overall, I’m happy. This is truly the only burger I can get right now. Alas, not being 21, I can’t get a bar burger[5].

But, I have to say, if there’s no place else you can eat, Yango’s Burgers and Stuff isn’t half-bad. I can’t truly relate the quality of this burger because of the circumstances.

I think that’s what this blog is really about, quite frankly. Who the fuck am I to tell you where to eat and where not to eat[6]? So, who the fuck am I to say that Yango’s shouldn’t be written about? Do they not get points for being willing to be open on a day like today?

I don’t finish my burger. I finish most of it. Most of the fries, too. I finish the Faygo[7]. I rebundle. I leave. I trudge back up Broadway. I go to Walgreens. I need more Macaroni and Cheese.

Walgreens is full of couples, bundled up and restocking. Holding hands. Giggling about surviving [snow related disaster pun]. I can hear one couple giggle about the “guy with three boxes of mac ‘n cheese and a bag of chips.” I know that's me.

“How lonely?”, I actually hear someone say that. It was followed by a giggle and an excited “Shh”. Well, I can’t say I didn’t impact someone’s day. I ponder hibernation. I’d need more Macaroni and Cheese for that, though.

---

[1] Did I mention THUNDERSNOW?

[2] So. Fucking. Cold. Holy. Tapdancing. Jesus.

[3] And I can just barely feel my face.

[4] I’ve still yet to find out how magnets work.

[5] Or some of that “We Survived The [snow related disaster pun]” sex.

[6] Ross Fucking Berman, that’s who.

[7] No, seriously, what the fuck’s up with magnets?

Burger Joint

I don’t know what there is to say, besides “How are you?” or “It’s been a while.” Better to just start back up, like I hadn’t been on a lost weekend.

Restaurant: Muskie’s

Intersection: Lincoln & Lakewood

Rating: 4/5

January 5^th, 2011:

            Chicago’s getting soggy, again. But this winter is much more fickle than last. One day it will be grey, soggy, brisk. The next day, it will be cold, raw, possibly sleeting.

            It doesn’t matter. I think my hair is falling out. I look down at my laptop keyboard and always have to brush away some loose hairs. Although, I am no doctor. For all I know, I have the opposite problem. Too much hair. My hair grows in such mass quantities that my head can’t handle all of them. On top of my head a war for survival of the fittest rages on.  A volatile civil war, as hair fights hair. To the death. The losers cast off my head like a retarded Spartan baby[1]. I don’t know. I don’t have time to find out if my hair is falling out.

            My apartment is a three story walk up. That also means it’s a three story walk down. It’s a lot quicker than the crowded dorm elevators I used to frequent. Now, it’s a simple three flight jaunt. It’s deceptive though. Because, while I have less to go down to catch the nearest bus,  I still have more to go. Back in the dorms. Life was simple. The bus was out front. The train was on the corner.

            Now, the bus is around the corner. The train is about three blocks over and three blocks south. And there’s the courtyard. I always forget that I don’t just go down three flights. I then also have to go about 50 feet through the courtyard. Not a lot but still, everything adds up.

I catch the Broadway bus, the 36, down to Diversey. Standing at the Diversey bus stop, I look at the Vitamin Shoppe. I have been told this used to be a record shop. I haven’t done the proper research, haven’t had the time, so I have no idea if it’s true. If it is true, then the late-era portrait of The Beatles, that reads “Now on iTunes”, is less a billboard and more a victory flag.

I wait, impatiently, for the bus to come. I have more to do today. A movie to see. I’ve become a film reviewer, along with food blogger, improvisational comedian, actor and, now, playwriting major. Whatever I end up doing, I’ll be talking for a living.

John, Paul, George and Ringo watch me board the 76 to head west[2]. I need a burger. When I last tried to reboot the Diaries, I had made plans to go to upwards of 20 burger places in a week. I can’t remember the actual plan, because by day 3 of nothing but burgers I went mildly insane. Now, I love a good burger. But, I’d made a terrible mistake and decided that Kuma’s Corner was the place to go on day 2. I ended up having the greatest of my life. A small religious experience that made all attempts to eat, let alone enjoy, a burger for the following week impossible. As the bus goes along Diversey, I pass by the first place I went to start off the infamous burger run. The Counter, this modern design-your-own-burger place.

            The 76 arrives at Diversey and Lincoln and I walk up about a block or two. I don’t walk for long. I am met by the shriek of nostalgia coming from Muskie’s sign.

            I have no idea how long Muskie’s has been open. The sign won’t tell me. I didn’t have time to check when I found the place online. I am a terrible journalist[3]. But it doesn’t matter how long it’s been here. Muskie’s is designed to be a classic “burger joint”. Small enough to keep people from lingering. Enough counter space to seat a small army. Plastic baskets. Paper lining. This isn’t a fast food burger place. This is a “burger joint”.

            I order a bacon cheeseburger, an order of fries and a medium coke. Then, intrigued, I order some of their “Mac ‘N Cheese” bites. The total is $12.86. Like I said, this place is a “burger joint”.

            I grab a stool at one corner of the restaurant, opposite you’re classic “sexy librarian”. Whole nine yards, loose ponytail, glasses, textbook with notes. It’s getting warm in here. At least, in the corner, it’s warm. Then I start to get this lovely scent. This meaty, greasy, burning scent. I realize I am sitting under the heat vent. And the heat smells like burgers. Pretty soon, I will smell like burgers. I wouldn’t have it any other way. Not too much longer and my food is ready.

            I try the burger first. I have to. It’s why I’m here. One bite is all it takes to know a good burger. If you ever find yourself unsure of a burger’s quality after one bite, then it’s not a good burger. This burger, is a good burger. You take one bite, you taste meat, bacon, cheese, medley of condiments. You always feel the bacon before the meat. But you always taste the meat first. That’s how it works. The cooks back there know that. The girl at the other end of the joint knows it, too. No one studies in a “burger joint” unless they really love burgers. Her order came before mine. Bacon cheeseburger, too. I like a pretty girl that eats bacon, nonchalantly. Because any girl can eat bacon. But if she’s pretty, then she either knows how to eat or she’s splurging. If she’s splurging, then she’s going to be slobbering over that bacon. She’s going to be making sure she doesn’t miss a single bit and will probably say something to someone along the lines of “isn’t this bacon so good? I’m splurging.” Splurgers tell you that they’re splurging, in the name of saving face. She’s not splurging. She’s eating the bacon cheeseburger like it was a peanut butter and jelly. I respect that. It’s how I eat a bacon cheeseburger. Of course, I say none of this to her.

            I then remember that I ordered the Mac ‘N Cheese Bites. I was not prepared for these. These are, literally, just Kraft blue box Mac ‘N Cheese, fried. I’m used to my fried cheeses having a stronger, sharper flavor. These do not. They are surprisingly creamy. Like biting into a McNugget and being greeted by Kraft Mac ‘N Cheese. I would’ve eaten more of them but the fries were phenomenal. Brown. Crispy on the outside. Bendy and tender on the inside. These are “burger joint” fries.

            Overall, the meal was solid. If I lived closer, I’d probably be here regularly. But as it stands, I’ll come if I’m in the area. I finish the burger and most of the fries, bus my tray and make my exit. I have a film to review in about an hour and a half. I hail a cab. I get in and look out the passenger window. I lock eyes with sexy librarian. My cab speeds off. I have movies to see.

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[1] It’s not insensitive if it’s true. And if it’s in 300, then it’s true.

[2] Who are YOUR guardian angels? ELO?

[3] But a phenomenal Tetris player.

Coming Soon...

I'm getting back out on the streets. Hungry. Pen and Moleskine Notebook in hand. Just wait. Tonight's the night, and it's going to happen again...

Now Boarding

Restaurant: Cozy Corner Diner

Intersection: California and Milwaukee

Rating: 2.5/5

Just Barely February 5^th, 2010:

            My horoscope[1] said I’d be exhausted today. I could’ve made that guess when I looked at the time. It’s 5:30 in the morning. I am on the blue line at 5:30 in the morning. I wouldn’t want to let my horoscope down.

Whenever I go home from Hot Doug’s, I take the 52 to the California blue line stop. There, nestled next to the tracks is the Cozy Corner Diner. Every time I see it I am way too full to even think about food, having just gorged myself on encased meats and duck fat fries. Since I couldn’t sleep, I’m specifically on the blue line to find breakfast. This is a food adventure.

            Breakfast. That is why I am the only non-airline employee on the blue line at the moment. Now, I know what you’re thinking. What about the airline passengers? Between printing your own ticket and self-check in, I often feel like an airline employee myself when I travel[2]. But I’m not going to some far off destination. I am going somewhere new. I am going somewhere I’ve always wanted to go. I will finally try the Cozy Corner diner.

            The whole time I am on the blue line, I can’t help but feel like the family sitting near me is staring at me. They are. I caught them. Understandable, like I said, I’m the only person that doesn’t have baggage with him. Well, I don’t have physical baggage. If I didn’t have any baggage, I wouldn’t be human. Writing a food blog, I find that I should check my bags before I enter a restaurant. Take Cozy Corner for example, I’m going to be comparing it to the mouth orgasm that was the Ohio Coffee Shop. It will either be a bigger flavorgasm or it will be a disappointment. I can’t check all of my bags however. If I go in with my mind blank, I’ll think that the shittiest scrambled eggs are the best scrambled eggs. My basic memories are my carry on. They’re what make the best scrambled eggs the best. That is why one of my rules is that I can’t review a place I’ve been. Places I’ve already been have too much baggage. I won’t be able to let this one experience at a place stand alone. It will always be colored by the last time I was there. I know I’m placing this metaphor on food blogging, but what’s true in food blogging is true in life. You need to check your baggage at the door, but keep your carry on. If you check your carry on, you’ll be mind numbingly bored and your granola bars will get crushed in the cargo hold.

            There is nothing cozy about the Cozy Corner’s exterior. It’s very simple. Not the fun kind of simple[3], it’s the boring kind of simple[4].

            I enter the restaurant and am immediately seated at a booth next to the window. Noticing the complete lack of sunlight, I order a hot chocolate. I then sit for longer than anyone who’s ordered a hot chocolate should sit without a hot chocolate. The waitress takes my order, the big man special, two eggs, two pancakes, ham, hash browns and I order a side of toast. That’s right I order the fucking big man special and it doesn’t come with toast. A note for any breakfast place: If your combos don’t come with toast, YOU’RE DOING IT WRONG. This is my carry on talking, not my baggage.

            I am waiting so long I feel like I got off at O’Haire instead of California. I can’t think of another time I’ve been this bored, this early in the morning. I keep myself entertained the same way I do in airports, people watching. Apparently, I’m not the only one that does this. The Mexican couple across from me have been looking at me the whole time I’ve been here. The woman, clad in go-go boots, is too drunk to be discreet about her people watching[5]. She keeps looking over, laughing and speaking Spanish with her significant other. Had I known I was moving to Chicago, I would’ve taken Spanish instead of Latin[6] in high school. My food finally comes and there is a lot of it.

            I immediately dig in and am immediately disappointed as my food blog baggage finds its way into the seat next to me. The eggs, while well cooked, are no where near as good as they were at the Ohio Coffee Shop. The ham is ham. It’s hard for ham to be special. It only has to be warm. The pancakes are ok, nothing special. The hash browns are damn good though. They are the saving grace of this meal. Crispy, buttery, potato-y and all around evenly cooked. The toast is toast.

            Despite not really liking this meal as a whole, I eat a hefty portion of it. After all, breakfast is the most important meal of the day. My waitress, while originally very slow, keeps bringing me water like there’s no tomorrow. That’s when I realize, while shoveling boring food into my pie-hole, that there is no tomorrow. Normally, you fall asleep one day and wake up the next[7]. When I get home, I will go to sleep and wake up on the same day. Tomorrow is a foreign concept at the moment.

            It is not my baggage that made this meal bad. My carry on told me that this isn't a breakfast worth much, except for the fact that it's still not light out and this place is open. The best thing about this meal is that the ungodly hour I have chosen to consume it makes me eligible for the Early Bird Special. I get all of my food for $3.95. Plus toast, plus hot chocolate, my meal comes to about $10. Exactly, $10.23. This was not a $10 meal. I am pissed, much in the way I feel having dealt with the airline.

            By the time I get on the blue line back home, I am exhausted. I still feel like I am in an airport. I am tired but cannot sleep, I need to hear when my stop is called. I have to be awake. All I can think about is that moment when you finally get on the plane and can finally fall asleep. That is what my bed will feel like[8]. A few stops after California, a woman gets on and she is very attractive. But she is trying to be attractive, make up, lip gloss, the whole nine yards. I feel like a bored housewife whose husband has just asked for sex. I am too tired to even think about sex. All I want to think about is my warm bed and this other woman’s powerful mullet.

            I get home. I ride the elevator up to my room. I climb into my bed. I am now cleared for take off.

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[1] …My Facebook horoscope.

[2] Working for the airline would explain where my health and dental have been coming from.

[3] Like the simple pleasure of an old man getting hit in the nuts.

[4] Like the times that old men reminisce about.

[5] A key skill for people watching.

[6] Semper Ubi Sub Ubi.

[7] Except on weekends.

[8] Except with more leg room.

Cheese Madness

Restaurant: The Fast Track

Intersection: Lake and DesPlaines

Rating: 4/5

February 3^rd, 2010:

I had an epiphany this morning. I was eating my Sausage McGriddle and my pancakes and I realized that, between the syrup on the pancakes and the syrup nuggets in my McGriddle, this meal was syrup-tastic. While dipping my Sausage Biscuit in my left over syrup, I thought about the versatility of certain condiments. Condiments are like the EMTs of the culinary world or culinary duct tape. Don’t like your salad? Here’s some balsamic vinaigrette. Bad hot dog? Here’s some spicy brown mustard. Afraid of how fried bologna will taste[1]? Here’s some hot sauce. Condiments make bad things good, good things better and, sometimes, the most basic sexual positions kinkier.

            I am walking down Wabash because I don’t normally walk down Wabash. It’s another Blower’s Daughter in Chicago and I need some fresh air. I head up the stairs of the Madison/Wabash station. Anytime I’m waiting for a train in the loop, I always feel like Tommy Lee Jones is chasing me[2]. I get on the green line because I don’t normally take the green line. I make sure to sit behind a large group of people so that it becomes harder for Tommy Lee Jones to apprehend me.

            I get off the green line a free man. Jones will just have to try and get me on my next green line excursion. I walk for a few blocks and eventually I am ripped out of The Fugitive and planted squarely in Dazed and Confused or American Graffiti. The Fast Track is a restaurant that would be more in place in a small Texas town instead of under the El tracks on the Near West Side of Chicago. Normally all of my pictures are taken by me, on my cell phone, but I nabbed this picture of The Fast Track from Yelp.

            Looking at their massive menu I notice a condiment that I had forgotten about earlier; cheese. There is no better universal condiment than cheese. I order a cheeseburger, a cheddar dog and a side of cheese fries. Unfortunately, cheese soda has yet to catch on so I get an orange soda.

            I sit down as the only person in the restaurant that was raised on the English language. I am also the only person here that isn’t a cabbie. I understand why cabbies like this place right away as my food is quickly delivered to me. There is a lot of it.

            I start with the burger. This is a good burger. Just enough from the condiments, a little onion, a little relish and a whole fucking pickle spear. There is, on the bottom, an entire pickle spear in this burger. As someone who always feels gypped when it comes to pickles on a burger, between the pickle spear and the relish I am a happy fucking camper.

            The fries are soggy. I am always disappointed by flaccid fries. There isn’t a single crispy one in the bag. They have a nice flavor but something went wrong somewhere. Luckily, I have a universal condiment, cheese. I dip the fries in cheese and nothing matters anymore. I could be given old socks and as long as there’s a side of cheese sauce those bad boys would end up in my stomach.

            While the cheese saved the fries, it hurts the hot dog. I love a cheese dog as much as the next guy but using just cheddar ends up making the sharp, beautiful taste of the cheddar fight with the wonderful, garlic taste of the hot dog. This is a battle that neither of them win.

            I end up basically inhaling the burger, pickle spear and all[3]. I’ve always found that the more food I order, the quicker it’s gone. The hot dog is gone. The fries are gone. I am inhaling air through my straw, the orange soda is gone. I am happy but disappointed. This food was good but I let my own cheese madness get in the way. There is such a thing as too much of a good thing and that good thing is cheese.

            I exit the establishment and head toward the green line. No, that’s exactly what Tommy Lee Jones wants me to do. I throw my arm up and scurry into the backseat of the cab. Tommy can search every warehouse, safe house, out house, hen house that he wants. I’ll be back at my dorm. I didn’t kill my wife.

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[1] Not anymore.

[2] Mostly because he is.

[3] A whole fucking pickle spear. I love these guys!