Chicago’s Alinea

This weeks feature has been on our “bucket list” since 2018 when we saw the Netflix Chef’s Table episode highlighting Grant Achatz’s restaurant Alinea in Chicago. For those of you interested in checking it out it is Season 2 Episode 1. We had reservation in April of 2020 but they were canceled due to Covid closing everything down. Fast forward 4 years and here we are.

Alinea, which means “beginning of a new kind of thinking” is located in Chicago’s Lincoln Park neighborhood just steps from the Steppenwolf Theatre. Alinea is in a modest gray brick building with no external signage other than it’s street number. There is no bar, no lobby and only seats around 70 people in its 2 levels. The interior décor and table settings are purposely minimalistic. They don’t play music in the dining room, to keep your attention focused completely on its masterful food preparation.

For those of you who do not know of Alinea, or Grant Achatz, you are in for a treat. Grant Achatz was born right here in Michigan in 1974. His parents owned restaurants where he worked as a teenager, which gave him his love for food. He studied Culinary Arts in Hyde Park NY at the Culinary Institute of America, graduating in 1994. Following graduation, he landed a job at Charlie Trotter’s in Chicago and later at Thomas Keller’s The French Laundry, in California, where he worked his way up to Sous Chef.

In 2001, he became the Executive Chef at Trio in Evanston, Illinois. It was at Trio, that he crossed paths with his now business partner Nick Kokonas. In 2005 Alinea was opened.

Achatz and Alinea have won numerous awards including

Best restaurant in the world by Elite Traveler
Best Restaurant in North America by The World 50 Best Restaurants
3 Michelin stars since 2010.
*One of only 13 three Michelin star restaurants in the entire country.
Numerous James Beard Awards for Service, Chef and Restaurant:

They are only open for dinner, with prepaid reservations only . . . which get sold out months in advance. There are 3 tiers of dining offered:

The Alinea Kitchen Table, the highest dining expression offered for parties of 3-6 at $495 pp,
The Gallery which provides a multi-sensory menu combining fine dining with experimental moments for parties of 2 or 4 ranging from $435-$495pp
The upstairs Salon for parties of 1 to 6 ranging from $325-$395pp.
They also offer a 3 tiered wine pairing ranging $115-$495pp.

Since we were a party of 6, we went with the $395 Salon menu which was a 13 course, mind blowing, tasting menu. Start to finish we were there a little over 3 ½ hours.

Alinea is known for its unique style of Molecular Gastronomy Modern Cuisine. The meal is designed to touch every one of your senses throughout the evening, with dishes that may look like one thing yet taste completely different. Some courses require instructions from the patient waitstaff, but trust us — you won’t complain. I must say, if you don’t have an open mind or palate. this may not be the place for you . . . but you can enjoy it vicariously through us.

LET’S TALK ABOUT THE FOOD WE ATE!

The starting course was Osetra Caviar 2 ways. Ostera is one of the most prized and expensive types of caviar, second only to Beluga caviar, so this was a special way to start the show. The one dish was designed to feel like the caviar you were eating, while eating it. For the second presentation, the dish was served upside down. You would eat the caviar bite first and then flip it over to enjoy the 2nd part of the dish.

OSETRA - SWEET CORN, HONEY, OLOROSO CANTALOUPE, SMOKED YOLK, CHAMOMILE, MUSCLES

The 2nd course was the infamous Black Truffle Explosion featuring a truffle topped ravioli filled with truffle broth which “explodes” in your mouth. We were instructed to eat it all in one bite and keep our lips firmly shut. It was absolutely heavenly. My only complaint is I only got 1. I could have eaten a dozen!

EXPLOSION - BLACK TRUFFLE, ROMAINE, PARMESAN

The 3rd course was a great combination of hot and cold potatoes. A hot potato ball, topped with a slice of black truffle, suspended on a pin over a paraffin wax dish of vichyssoise. This is one that the wait staff had to walk us through to eat it properly. You had to pull out the pin to drop the hot potato and truffle into the cold potato soup and then you shoot it like an oyster.

HOT POTATO - COLD POTATO, BLACK TRUFFLE, PARMESAN

The 4th course was one that was probably the most creative of the evening. There were 2 decorative dishes on the table from the moment we had sat down, that were opened to reveal what appeared to be sardines. They were actually eggplant that had been shaped and prepared to look and taste like sardines. They were served with buttered rye toast, herbs, an egg yolk and dish of greens and marigolds to garnish. I made a nice open faced sandwich.

ABERDINES - EGGPLANT, RYE, BUTTER AND HERBS

For course 5 we went to the kitchen for some fresh popped Bloody Mary popcorn made with the nearly extinct Jimmy Red popcorn and a cornbread topped with king crab and tabasco. It was served with a corn cocktail made with Mellow Corn whiskey and a butter foam. It was wild being in the kitchen, seeing the food prepared and see all the chefs.

KING CRAB YELLOW ON MELLOW - CORNBREAD, TABASCO, CELERIES WITH POPCORN BLOODY MARY

For course 6 we returned to our table, to find it reset with colorful glass chickens. More on those in the next course. This course was a “surf and turf” course and I believe one of the evenings standouts. Pork belly, spiny lobster in a mango sauce with a crunch spiral of deliciousness and Uni (sea urchin) with a macadamia puree served in a sea urchin spiny dish to enhance your sense of touch while eating the Uni.

HONEY MANGO - MANGO, HOLLAND PORK BELLY SPINY LOBSTER, UNI, MACADAMIA

Course 7 is where the colorful chickens come into play. This dish was chicken 3 different ways. 2 white meat bites on one plate with and almondy sauce and charred dark meat with a Fernet sauce. There were small glasses of tea as well as cream filled pastries, that looked like eggs, to eat between the 2 styles to cleanse your palate. (Yes we getting full and the wine is taking it’s effect so we aren’t paying 100% attention to the descriptions at this point.)

BLANCMANGE - POULET, ALMOND, FERNET, FIORI DI SICILIA

Course 8 was a crusted lamb, served on a piece of slate as the plate. It had a lot going on and was a beautiful plate . . . and super tasty! It was topped, tableside, with shaved olives and served with a dish of peas that were outstanding.

LAMB - NICOISE OLIVE, BLOOD ORANGE, EUCALYPTUS

Course 9 is a prelude to the dessert course. This came out as a bowl of eucalyptus leaves which had been frozen in liquid nitrogen. The server swirled the bowl to reveal 3 balls in each dish. Another mouth explosion! Eucalyptus, olive brine and a chewy piece of orange. Interesting to say the least.

EUCALYPTUS - OLIVE BRINE, CHEWY ORANGE

Course 10 is a fun play on bubble gum. A peppercorn and hibiscus bubblegum flavored concoction in a test tube with plug of crème fraiche. We were instructed to shoot it like a test tube shot while sucking out the cream plug . . . and yes it tasted like bubble gum!

BUBBLEGUM - THAI LONG PEPPERCORN, HIBISCUS, CREME FRAICHE

Course 11 was something that I still cannot believe I liked, and the course I believe we talked about the most. It was a root beer float, but made with black truffle ice cream pearls. This is where my brain said “what?” . . . but I couldn’t stop drinking it! Truffles are the most earthy mushroom you can get. They have a distinct super strong flavor. It is a flavor that we had already had numerous times throughout the meal, but not with root beer and in an ice cream form . . . but it worked! I had to keep going back for a little more just to make sure I liked it, because something in your brain says you shouldn’t.

FLOTTEUR VACHE NOIRE - BLACK TRUFFLE ICE CRAM, ROOT BEER, CHERRUFFLE

Course 12 was the feature course of the evening - dessert! Alinea is known for their “table dessert” where they rollout a silicone table cloth and design your desert right in front of you. They made a work of art almost too pretty to eat. They finalize it with a delicious chunks of liquid nitrogen Earl Grey ice cream, crumbled Russian tea cakes, lemon tarts and cucumber sandwich wedges.

PAINT - LAVENDER, EARL GREY, TARRAGON

Course 13 can’t help but make you laugh. An edible sugar helium balloon with a green apple taffy string. You inhale the helium and talk like Alvin and the Chipmunks for a minute while laughing and eating the balloon.

BALLOON - HELIUM, GREEN APPLE, TAFFY