With the recent onslaught of trendy restaurants popping up in obscure neighborhoods, Jeff Ruby reminds us that fine dining Thai restaurant Arun’s is still going strong 26 years later in Albany Park. Having a religious experience with the salad of fresh cha plu leaf with a tamarind-coconut sauce often found at Buddhist temples, Ruby admits, “I may convert to Buddhism just for the food.” [Chicago Mag]
Mike Sula loves the texture and authenticity of Wicker Park Italian restaurant Ripasso, but feels chef Theo Gilbert exercises too much restraint in the seasoning department. Dishes like the polpetti are described as “filler in a one-note tomato sauce” while the meat-heavy sauce covering the pappardelle “presents four differences without a single distinction.” [Reader]
Crain’s writer Laura Bianchi visits two burger joints this week—one old (8-year-old Poag Mahone’s), one new-ish (25 Degrees, which opened in August). While 25 Degrees seems to have a bit of an identity crisis (“dresses like a 19th-century madame, sounds like a college dorm and cooks like a New Millennium chef, a crazy mash-up”), Biachi calls the number one burger “worth repeating.” Meanwhile, Bianchi has no beef with the burgers themselves, but says the sauces “don’t always meet their flavor quota” and the veggie burger “needs help.” [Crain’s]
