TOC: Cheap Like Your Mom
Ha ha, I made a joke about your mother. But hey, it's TOC's Cheap issue! All things cheap! Because of the economy, but also because even before the economy tanked, a lot of us were poor anyway! Herewith and henceforth, the food parts;
• Fire up your dayplanner, because Heather Shouse has a day-by-day breakdown of dining deals at restaurants and bars. $13.00 all-you-can-eat tacos at Zapatista Cantina, free pate and olives with a glass of wine at A Mano — good stuff.
• David Tamarkin, master of the workaround: If you want to be organic (for the health benefits? for the social cred?), but you're lacking in the cash-or-credit department, he offers a slew of kinda-sorta options that bend the rules a little, preseving both your virtuousness and your bottom line.
• Julia Kramer investigates the least painful cafeteria options, venturing to such unromantic places the basement of the Bank of America and Chase buildings in search of the cheapest salad bars and most bang-for-your-buck steam lines. Speaking as someone who is congenitally incapable of bringing her lunch from home, I would like to say that my name is Helen Rosner and I approve of this article.
• David Tamarkin gets me to laugh out loud for the first time today (it's been a bleak day) with his collection of cocktail napkins on which he's scrawled notes about the budget-friendly alcoholic offerings at various chain restaurants (not to mention wondering whether he's been hit on by an animatronic elephant at Rainforest Cafe). Sneer down your nose at T.G.I. Friday's all you like, but they count to five when they pour the tequila.
• Jordana Rothman, who usually writes for TOC's New York sibling, checks out the imitation Achatz-Keller dinner put on by underground cooking club A Razor, A Shiny Knife. For a fifth the price — $300 a head rather than a grand-and-a-half — rogue culinarians Michael Cirino and Daniel Castaño prepped and served a nearly plate-by-plate reshoot of the culinary experience in NY, and are bringing the show to Chicago this weekend.
• I almost opened this bullet with "Heather Shouse rides the sausage train" but then I thought better of it. Instead, I made it meta! Anyway, she lists off three intriguing ways that local chefs are using entubed meat: Cassoulet from Mark Steuer of Hot Chocolate, lobster sausage from Troy Graves at Eve, and Peter Camphouse serves up jahrhundertwurst (Google it) at Century Public House.
[Photo of T.G.I. Friday's (if you squint, it could be Trader Vic's!) via jetalone's Flickr]
