Chicago: The Purple Pig

To the uninitiated, the Purple Pig is to be regarded with suspicion. It is incessantly plugged in visitor’s guides and travel books. Everyone has heard of it. It’s on the Mag Mile, for Christ’s sake. Not tucked onto some side street. No, there it is, smack dab in the middle of one of the most tourist-trodden streets in America, next to a Nordstrom. To a New Yorker like myself, this is like going to a restaurant in Rockefeller Center, or even worse, Times Square. No self-respecting gourmand does it.

But then there’s that cheeky little tagline under the brazen purple sign. “Cheese, Swine and Wine.” Those three words are the first sign that this may not be your typical tourist trap of a restaurant. They embrace the kind of devil-may-care, hedonistic, and progressive attitude towards food that isn’t usually directed at the camera-toting fanny pack set. And while the focus is decidedly Italian, like so many other restaurants in Chicago, a glance at the menu of small plates reveals a carefully picked over roster of Mediterranean-influenced dishes, traditional in their elements, but reassuringly modern in their execution.

Razor clams with oregano, lemon and olive oil

Charred cauliflower, toasted breadcrumbs, cornichons, parsley

Prosciutto bread balls

Such precursory clues may assuage some of the fear, but any lingering trepidation dissipates when the first few plates hit the table. Razor clams on the half shell, playfully arranged like Jenga tiles, are fresh and plump, their toothsome meatiness offset only by some lemon and the faint herbal nuances of oregano. An antipasto of green cauliflower retains just enough crunch, and the charring imparts a smokiness that never crosses over into bitterness. They are again dressed with a bit of lemon, but the initial tartness eventually gives way to the delicate sweetness of the vegetable.

Milk braised pork shoulder with mashed potatoes

Pork neck bone gravy with ricotta

Pork, naturally, is king at the Purple Pig, and the kitchen pays its respects in several standout dishes. The milk braised pork shoulder is one of the restaurant’s most ordered items, and it isn’t hard to see why. It is a crowd-pleasing simple dish done right. The potatoes are creamy and lump-free, and the shoulder is tender with a rich savoriness. Pork neck bone gravy with ricotta, dubbed a ‘smear’ on the menu, sounds perplexing in theory, conjuring up images of a watery, country gravy rustled up with scraps from the neighborhood butcher. However, it arrives as a ramekin of red sauce, anointed with a little mound of ricotta, to be heaped onto thick slices of grilled country bread. The first bite is deceivingly disappointing, fooling you into thinking you are just eating bread with tomato sauce and cheese, a poor man’s cheese lasagna. But as you chew, you are alerted to the ropes of silky neck bone meat, the undercurrent of heat in the sauce, all coddled by the milky ricotta. It is startlingly good in both its familiarity and novelty - this isn’t your Nonna’s Sunday gravy.

Olive Oil Poached Tuna with Greek Lima Beans

The kitchen veers off course a bit with a cold appetizer of olive oil poached tuna with Greek lima beans. The tuna is tough and dry, its gristly texture giving no indication of the gentle poaching it was purported to have gone through. Although the beans are cool and appropriately creamy, the dish is entirely too salty.

Toasted cinnamon soft serve ice cream

Panino con Nutella: chocolate hazelnut spread, banana, marshmallow spread

The dessert menu clings to time-honored classics, with a few twists along the way. Instead of the usual gelato offerings, the Purple Pig opts for the trendier soft serve. The toasted cinnamon version is big on flavor, but the ice cream lacks the staunchly smooth mouth feel of a good soft serve; miniscule ice crystals are discernible throughout, compromising the creamy texture. A panino of Nutella, bananas and marshmallow cream is frivolously indulgent enough, but certainly nothing that couldn’t be whipped up at home.

Stacked up against its counterparts in other cities, the Purple Pig seems to have achieved the impossible: an enviable location on a glitzy thoroughfare, easy access to impressionable tourists, and the respect of locals, all the while maintaining culinary integrity at prices that won't force you to subsist on Saltines for the remainder of the week. It doesn't seem quite fair, but try as you might, you just can't hate the place. So you resign yourself to being another shameless groupie, only to realize, when you finally set down your fork, that you really don't care.

The Purple Pig

500 North Michigan Avenue
Chicago, IL 60611-3777
Phone: (312) 464-1744

Best dishes: Razor clams, pork neck bone gravy, charred cauliflower, milk braised pork shoulder

Hours: Sunday - Thursday 11:30 a.m to Midnight (Kitchen open 'til midnight); Friday & Saturday 11:30 a.m. to 2:00 a.m. (Kitchen open 'til 1 a.m.)

Chicago: Ruxbin

Remember your first post-college apartment? It probably wasn't very big, or in the best part of town. You most likely decorated it with a combination of IKEA and repurposed junk you salvaged from your parents' basement or the street. To anyone else, it might not have looked like much, but its significance derived from the fact that it was a space to call your own, free from the influence or control of others, a place where you could do as you wished. Ruxbin is much like that apartment. Located in the up-and-coming Noble Square neighborhood of West Town in Chicago, Ruxbin appears to be Chef Edward Kim's first independent venture into the Chicago restaurant scene, an establishment where he calls the shots in the kitchen, and exerts creative authority over his locally-sourced and continually changing menu.

It is a true labor of love, evidenced by the quirky but charming details that give the restaurant its trendy-industrial atmosphere and scrappiness. A queue of sexy, chunky spotlights are, upon closer inspection, fashioned out of deconstructed church pews. The slats on the backs of the banquettes are actually seatbelts taken from abandoned cars in a junkyard. Scattered, yellowed book pages had been screened onto the ceiling, their antique-y softness a perfect backdrop for the HazMat-orange ceiling beams.

In lieu of bread, Ruxbin serves popcorn sprinkled with nori.

Calamari bokkum: korean chilies, peanuts, baby potatoes and sesame

Chicken and waffles: roasted breast, dark meat "carnitas", cumin cheddar waffles and apple walnut compote

Ruxbin's dishes too, like the proverbial phoenix, seem to have risen from the ashes of their much humbler roots. An appetizer of calamari bokkum, a nod to Mr. Kim’s Korean heritage, is a marriage of the flavors of various banchan, the traditional small plates that accompany most Korean meals. Smoky peanut and sesame oil, sweet gamja jorim (Korean spicy potato), fiery chilies and vinegary marinated cucumbers mingle in a way that seems both familiar and new. The waffles in an entrée of chicken and waffles are injected with cumin and cheddar, while the chicken is treated to meticulous seasoning and roasting, rather than frying. The traditional maple syrup is replaced with the subtle sweetness of an apple-walnut compote. Tying it all together is a milky cinnamon-scented citrus vinaigrette.

Pan seared trout, bulgur wheat tabbouleh, asparagus, dates, basil

Crispy eggplant, roasted beets, cucumber, honey-cardamom yogurt

When Mr. Kim isn’t concentrating his energies on gussying up old favorites, his talents are directed at producing simple dishes with flavors that pop. A pan seared trout entrée boasts a perfectly crisp and seasoned skin, and is accompanied by a nutty bulgur wheat tabbouleh with a prominent onion flavor. The crunchy fennel and red onion salad (a side to the chicken and waffles) is superb. The only hiccup of the evening was a salad of crispy eggplant, beets, cucumber and yogurt – the eggplant wasn’t so much crispy as it was slightly chewy, and the dish seemed confused, as if the ingredients didn’t quite know what purpose they were supposed to serve.

Then again, one can hardly expect perfection the first time around, and Mr. Kim doesn’t miss the mark by much. At the end of the day, Ruxbin delivers what it promises – sincere, nuanced fare with integrity and not too much pretense. It isn't overly ambitious, but the kitchen's guileless forays into the unexpected make it clear that the evolution of this neighborhood spot is just beginning.

Ruxbin

851 North Ashland Ave.

Chicago, IL 60622

Phone: (312) 624-8509

Best dishes: Chicken and waffles, pan seared trout, calamari bokkum

Hours: Tuesday-Sunday, 5:30 PM to 10:00 PM

Things to know: No reservations taken; BYOB

Chicago: Hot Doug's

I've waited in many a long line for sustenance in my lifetime. Forty-five minutes at Clinton St. Baking. An hour-and-a-half at Northern Spy. Two hours at Shopsin's. I'm no stranger to the gut-wrenching hunger, the continually dashed hopes each time the hostess calls out a name that isn't yours, the resentful looks from your dining companions who are undoubtedly questioning why they ever decided to befriend you.

Then I went to Hot Doug's. No companions, no hostesses, no overwhelming hunger. The thirty minute wait in the ever present line out the door of this self-proclaimed "sausage superstore" should have been a breeze. What I had not counted on was the mind-numbing, balls-to-the-wall Chicago chill. In November. Five minutes into the wait, I suddenly yearned for a buddy to clutch onto for warmth, or a scantily clad hostess I could direct my misery-fueled sadism at. You dare withhold hot dogs from me? At least I'm allowed to wear a coat, skank!

But alas, there was no hostess behind the modest brick facade - only Doug and his bevy of cheerfully efficient cooks and servers. Doug Sohn is a man obsessed with the wiener. If this isn't obvious from the collection of cute sausage paraphernalia lovingly arranged in the glass counter or the various wiener witticisms jotted on the walls ("There are no finer words in the English language than 'encased meats', my friend."), it is clear from the quality and craftsmanship of the brats, wursts and other tubed meats that Doug features on both his permanent and daily menus. There is no question that you can get a great Chicago dog here, but the real draw at Hot Doug's is the variety of specialty sausages that are available on any given day - taut, snappy casings stuffed with everything from the standard pork or chicken to the more exotic kangaroo, alligator or bison. And then there are the toppings, which are often equally as inventive and unexpected: blackberry mustard, double cream Brie, coconut flakes, plantains.

Specials Menu

Foie Gras and Sauternes Duck Sausage with Truffle Aioli, Foie Gras Mousse and Fleur de Sel

I began my meal with one of Hot Doug's most acclaimed offerings (and a permanent fixture on the specials menu): the foie gras and duck sausage dog. Often times, a lowbrow dish that attempts a high-end reincarnation by way of a barrage of lavish ingredients ends up being underwhelming and gimmicky, or sickeningly overwhelming. Not at Doug's. The luxurious duck flavor of the sausage, the delicate richness of the foie gras mousse and the tempered tang of the truffle aioli operate in perfect tension with one another. The duck sausage is absurdly juicy and tender, with a faint but noticeable snap. Doug's hot dog buns are in a league of their own. Densely chewy but soft (think a more pillowy French bread), they are just as much a part of the show as the meat and toppings, and unlike regular hot dog buns, don't deflate into a mushy mess against the surface of the dog halfway through eating.

Wild Rice and Asiago Cheese Bison Sausage with Roasted Yellow Pepper Mayonnaise and Irish Porter Cheese

That week's Game of the Week was a wild rice and Asiago cheese bison sausage, topped with roasted yellow pepper mayonnaise and Irish Porter cheese. This dog assaults your senses with its depth and complexity. The bison sausage was dark and smoky, with a thick and snappy casing that lends a delightful texture to the dish. But it is the visually arresting beer-veined Irish Porter cheese that makes this dog. It perfumes the meat with its hoppy piquancy before dissolving into an intensely flavorful creamy emulsion in your mouth.

Duck fat fries

In addition to regular fries, Hot Doug's offers duck fat fries every Friday and Saturday. Perfectly crisp on the outside, they shatter into potato-y shards upon each bite, revealing a creamy, mealy interior. In short, probably some of the best fries I've had to date. They even managed to retain their winning texture after they had cooled off.

I have to admit that I questioned the greatness of Hot Doug's at several points along my lengthy journey to this fabled wiener joint. For instance, when I was walking along a lonely stretch of road after taking a city bus to the middle of some small freak-ass suburb on the outskirts of Chicago.

Or when I was freezing my boo-ha off in line behind a Chicago hipster with pungent beeswax-laden dreadlocks.

Thankfully, the line doesn't lie. It's worth the trek.

Hot Doug's

3324 North California

Chicago, IL 60618
Phone: (773) 279-9550

Hours: Mon-Sat, 10:30 AM to 4 PM. Closed on Sundays

Best dishes: Hot dogs, specialty sausages, fries.

Things to know: Cash only; duck fat fries only on Friday and Saturday; specials change daily