Wednesday, June 8, 2011

A Taste of Chicago

Recently, my son, granddaughter, and I drove to Chicago for the long Memorial weekend. Besides participating in a 5K Run and Walk, we took in some of the sights, and of course ate our way through Chicago.

When we arrived in Chicago, we found the Field Museum, paid a pricey sum to park, and found out when we got into the Museum, it was only opened for another two hours. The Museum was fantastic! We enjoyed touring the Egyptian area and the Dinosaur area. I especially loved the big dinosaur named Sue. I was also glad that it was only the bones on display and not the real thing, because I doubt very much if I would be here writing this blog. The downside was that we didn’t have enough time to see everything. Next time, I will make better plans.

We did eat at the original Uno’s Pizza Restaurant, in the downtown area, where we ordered one of their famous deep dish pizzas. It was a pizza to definitely rival all others. We would sample the famous Lou Malnati’s pizza. Lou used to work at Uno’s and then left and started his own pizza business. A total of 33 Lou Malnati’s restaurants and pizza outlets are scattered throughout the Chicago and surrounding areas. Both Uno’s and Malnati’s pizzas are eaten with a knife and fork, so as to get every bite of pizza off the plate and into one’s mouth. I have had Lou’s pizza before and it was outstanding. But when we finally ate one this time…Uno’s won. Uno’s melted cheese, and oozing sauce; half with pepperoni and sausage left us happy and wishing our stomach’s had more room to consume the whole thing.

The next morning we checked out of the hotel, after a delicious buffet, and started on a confused and stressful ride around the city, trying to make our way to S. Lake Shore Drive, where the Museums are located. Our problem was that our GPS kept telling us to turn left. But we kept running into no left turns permitted and road closed signs. Road construction, a parade, and some sort of run,finally made us head out of town to the western suburbs, where my niece and husband lives. My advice… leave your car at home and use the El.

That night, we ate at a delightful family restaurant called Trattoria Peppino. Let me start with what we all felt at the end…Groan. The food was great. We ate a deep fried shredded zucchini ball with marinara sauce, bruschetta with chopped, seasoned tomatoes, bruschetta with goat cheese and marinara sauce, and bruschetta with a garlic artichoke spread and marinara sauce. Italians love bread and that was reflected in the antipasto selections. Then we could actually order our meal off of the menu. This is when the groan came in but we still ordered more food and ate most of it. If you haven’t figured it out yet – we love to eat.

The next day we decided to drive back into Chicago because my niece said we would spend more money and time on transfers. We drove on the Expressway in a huge downpour that was making it difficult to see out the window, despite having the wipers going full speed. We made it to our destination and spent 4-5 hours in the Museum of Science and Industry. This Museum was worth the stay and made me realize you could spend hours on just one floor. We returned to my niece’s house to go out and eat another deep dish pizza at Lou Malnati’s restaurant.

Touring, eating, and laughing were our goal and we did all three very well.

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