National Culinary Review

NEW CHICAGO RESTAURANTS chicago’s culinary trapeze
CARRIAGE HOUSE
1700 W. DIVISION ST. // (773) 384-9700

Tesori’s lamb shank with cipollini onions and fava beans.

ARTS AND TREASURES TO REGALE YOU

TESORI // 65 East Adams St. // (312) 786-9911

At most new restaurants, you’ll see nary a silver hair amidst ambitious project coordinators, aggressive sales folk and pretty young women scouting out prospective mates. Tesori is a whole different ball game, tucked into Symphony Hall and right down the street from the Art Institute. You can bet your blender that these mature diners are keeping the classical arts alive. This clientele wants comfort food, not revolutionary foodie hoopla. The environment signals mid-century modern, its sprawling light fixtures evoking Alexander Calder as a restrained lamp maker. Background music adds a curiously distilled sense of Frank (Sinatra).

Some deck themselves with diamonds, pearls, rubies and opals. Others lust after less-precious stones, such as tourmalines, or crave twinkly rhinestones. And some, like the crowds filling Tesori (which means treasures), find their gems in Mediterranean foods that are not too snazzy, not too dressed up, like treasure hunters seeking real jewels amidst the costume bracelets, necklaces and earrings saved by an old-maid aunt or your beloved grandmother, not so spectacular or glittery, but treasured because of their memories.

Take apple-cheeked chef Andrew Deuel. Douse him in Italian experience and French technique. Then ask him to cater to someone like the commanding female at the next table rhapsodizing about her perfumed duck sauced with blood orange marmalade. Eggplant parmesan rollatini wouldn’t offend a fly, not too sauced, not a hint of garlic, with a mellow drizzle of Parmesan and mozzarella. And who wouldn’t enjoy the lush yet mild roasted-beet insalata gussied up with velvety soft goat cheese? While white-root-vegetable minestrone was flavor-neutral, it did have marvelous crunch, as the room filled with laughter and happy talk of so many art and music lovers.

Our treasure hunt uncovered chef Deuel’s hunky, succulent lamb shank with cipollini onions and yummy fava beans. And what a joy to unearth wonderful, rustic wild-mushroom lasagna—all 21 layers separated by a four-cheese béchamel sauce, the work of a talented culinarian of Mexican origin named Armando. Add the royal service provided by Mimi (not to be confused with Verdi’s heroine), and you can round out your meal with the pleasure of being smack-dab in the middle of Chicago’s cultural hub.

It’s easy to inaugurate yourself as a Southern belle or beau. Just trot on down to chef Mark Steuer’s Carriage House, a culinary fantasy with traditional and re-imagined dishes, mainly from Charleston and coastal South Carolina, featuring food from the home of glorious sunsets, horse-drawn carriages, dainty colonial architecture and a filigree mindset. Count on mannerly service and big smiles, too, from Southern-friendly servers who treat you like treasured friends in a room the color of a robin’s egg.

With lots of small dishes and sides served in tiny cast-iron skillets and pans, my formerly hassled, mad-dog companion bucked up. Soon, we were both fantasizing that we were two merry Dixie pixies playing Southern doll house. A soft egg sets like a South Carolina sunset across luscious grits, oyster mushrooms and truffle vinaigrette. Count on the love of the Lowcountry seen in Pat Conroy’s novels. And lots of heaven in a pan. Corn-bread as tiny as a mini-muffin sweet-talks you with yummy apple compote and foie gras butter. My Favorite Slaw sasses you with peanuts, while bacon-wrapped rabbit wallows in smoked split peas, caramelized turnips and scuppernong mustard sauce.

This is your chance to be wooed with a Southern drawl. Bigger dishes include smoky, crispy braised pork shoulder with red peas and rice. And Carolina grouper. And a Lowcountry boil.

Pecan praline sundae left us aflutter with its bourbon caramel, brown-sugar shortbread and butter pecan ice cream. “I loved that best of all,” said one newly inoculated Southern belle who came waltzing by.

Then, at one point in the evening, we couldn’t help but notice something flying around the dining room ceiling fan. But it was only our joy, elevated by fried green tomatoes with pickled shrimp and creamed red peas in a hot-sauce vinaigrette. Later on, goodness gracious, there was something on the floor. But it was only me, the food critic, passed out after a delicately breaded fried chicken thigh set atop bread and butter pickles.

Many portions are so dainty you won’t know where to stop, but don’t tell mama if you overeat. After one charmed evening of homey, refined dining, you may need a hansom to haul you away. They don’t call it Carriage House for nothing.