one sixtyblue

to finish off a busy week of work and school, J & i went to one sixtyblue as my finale to restaurant week (though she's going to at least 2 more this weekend...i've reached my spending limit already haha)! it's one of the restaurants that Michael Jordan owns, and it's always had a reputation for being an amazing place to eat. in fact, it's been on my "List of Chicago Restaurants to Visit" since 2007, and i finally had a chance to eat there!


J and i decided to each get different dishes so that we could try as many different ones as possible, so prepare to scroll through an amazing collection of pictures! (:


welcome to one sixtyblue - it's right off Ashland / Lake!

The Melting Pot

Chicago Restaurant Week has officially begun, and my friends (including J, AK, and my adopted older brother JT) and i decided to take advantage of that on Saturday by heading to The Melting Pot for lunch. Most people would probably spend about $50 plus tax & tip on a normal meal there, so the $22 lunch option seemed like an amazing steal.

the last time that i'd been here was for a party, so the entire bottom floor had been rented out and we had chocolate fountains flowing...i blogged about it before but i didn't document it very well, and was glad to have another chance to eat there.

the meal started off rather shaky, as one of our burners didn't work and they had to switch us out of our booth - not to mention our waiter ignored us for a long time and didn't get us our waters until about 45 minutes after we had been seated. after complaining to the manager, they were a LOT more attentive, and the real fun began!

hot pot!

for Valentine's Day / Chinese New Year, J & i went with HKSA to Chinatown to eat some hotpot (shabu shabu) and ring in the (second) new year! it was a long trip that spanned from 5 pm til 11:30 pm, but it was completely worth it!

the concept of hotpot is simple: dump food into a boiling pot of seasoned broth for minutes at a time, and then fish it out when it's ready to eat. dip it in as many sauces as you want to (generally you stick with satay sauce, garlic sauce, and other Asian creations) and shove it into your mouth. repeat until you are stuffed!

for $25 per person (plus tax and tip), all 11 of us ate the all-you-can-eat hotpot buffet at Lao Sze Chuan, a restaurant in Chicago's Chinatown that has grown rather famous for its dishes. i've blogged about it previously in my old food blog twice - the first time was amazing and the second was crap. i was hesitant to go there because i wasn't sure if i wanted to pay for a bleagh meal again, but i was happily rewarded with good food and good service this time!

pho.

J & i have been kind of slacking in terms of going out and eating.. even though we feel like we've been eating a lot, i think we've focused more on wine sampling than actually restaurant-reviewing. we decided to change this by heading to Argyle and getting us some authentic Vietnamese food this Friday!

this is technically only the second entry in the "Eating Our Way Out" series, but we'll pick up the pace soon haha. having tried 777, Tank, and 999, the only place left to go and get some warm pho was 888, which was recommended by the NU Asian magazine.

Japonais

this is going to be the first of a series titled "Eating Our Way Out of Chicago!" haha. what exactly is that? well, J and i decided last Sunday that we were going to try and eat out somewhere in Chicago at least once a week since we're both getting the heck outta here soon! we did some research, jotted down a few places of interest, and started today.

the place we chose for the kickoff was Japonais, a Japanese restaurant in the swanky River North area. the menu is slightly pricey, but they also have a few affordable dishes..though i wouldn't expect to spend less than $30 a person unless you only nibble on a single piece of nigiri or something.