Check out Episode 6 of the new food podcast,
Chicken 'n Waffles!

Whole roasted snapper "picatta" with fried capers, herbs, butter and lemon at Avec.

If you were to ask me what my favorite restaurant in Chicago was, I would say Blackbird, hands down, no hesitation whatsoever. Blackbird restaurant is located in the West Loop of Chicago, and it focuses on locally produced, seasonal cuisine that is so unbelievably delicious, it makes me want to cry a bit thinking about my last meal there (which was in early 2007). The bill from my last meal also makes me cry a bit.

Meet Avec, Blackbird's younger, hipper, slightly cheaper yet equally delicious sister. Located right next to Blackbird, this wine bar is smaller, constantly packed, and sadly, does not take reservations. Good thing the food was better than free shots at a Russian amputee strip club.

Follow up:

We were dining with our old new friends, Evan and Laney.

We love eating with Adam and Leena!

They are old friends because we knew them before we left for Australia last February, but they are new friends because we had just met them before we left. We roped them in with our witty jokes and good looks, and then broke their hearts by abandoning our burgeoning friendship for Australia. If it wasn't for Adam offering them money or my nice rack, we never would have won them back. Thank God for the girls.

Sorry, the camera stops just short of showing the girls in action. Maybe next time, fellas.

A word of caution--on a busy weekend night, Avec is loud. Really loud. Can't hear everyone at the table loud. Accidentilly played footsies with the wrong person and didn't hear them tell you to stop touching them-loud. Not the best for trying to catch up with old friends, but for a group of friends going out to drink, I think it would be perfect.

Avec's menu is made up of small plates and large plates, all meant to be shared with a group. Thankfully, Evan and Laney were trusting enough to let me order everything, and bless them, they were mildly adventurous eaters too, which meant a whole lot of awesomeness was about to come our way. We started our meal with Avec's "deluxe" focaccia with taleggio cheese, truffle oil and fresh herbs ($14.50 USD).

The "deluxe" focaccia with taleggio cheese, truffle oil and fresh herbs. Doesn't look like much on the outside, but trust me, the inside was filled with cheesy, truffley-goodness.

This was a pretty good foccacia. It was a bit thinner than I expected, but I loved the cheese on the inside, and it was a good way to start the meal. Not too messy, warm and crunchy and chewy all at once. Yum.

Next came the whole roasted fish of the day "picatta" with fried capers, herbs, butter and lemon, which was a New Zealand snapper (the fish was market price, don't remember what that was).

New Zealand roasted snapper deliciousness.

Wow. If I didn't tell you this fish rocked my boots so hard the people next door in Blackbird felt the quake, I'd be lying. I don't personally cook a lot of seafood or fish myself, but I make it a point to eat it when I go out to nicer restaurants because, hello, their snapper is gonna taste a helluva lot better than the defrosted snapper fillet I can buy at Whole Foods. Look at this thing: the entire fish was lightly crisp on the outside, juicy and flakey on the inside, with the perfect amount of salt from fried capers and acid from the lemon. And how much fun is it to eat an entire fish at the table with your friends? SO MUCH FUN, let me tell you. It made me feel like we were eating it over a camp fire, except the camp fire was really a white tea light. Yup. Exactly like it.

Then we moved on to a bunch of small plates. We started with the dish Avec is famous for, the chorizo-stuffed madjool dates with smoked bacon and piquillo pepper-tomato sauce ($9 USD).

Pork, pork, date! Chorizo-stuffed madjool dates with smoked bacon and piquillo pepper-tomato sauce.

Like any dish that has pork, more pork, and dates in it, this was delicious, if not a bit heavy. I'm glad we were all sharing the dish, because if I was eating it myself, I feel like the strong flavors would overwhelm my palate for the rest of the meal.

That's right. I have a fricking palate. Sur La Table was having a sale.

The next dish was another one of my favorites of the night, an olive oil-poached salmon with melted lardo, grilled scallions, dill and lemon vinaigrette ($13 USD).

Olive oil-poached organic salmon with melted lardo, grilled scallions, dill and lemon vinaigrette.

I wish I took a better photo of this one, because man, was it spot on! I usually find salmon too fishy, but this was perfectly delicate, and let's be honest here, I think the lardo (basically pork fat) helped out a bit too. I really dug the dill with the salmon and yeah, I know, it's not a revolutionary combination, it was really classic and simple and I loved it. It made for a great salad with the fish.

We also had the roasted housemade paprika chicken sausage with fingerling potato salad and green goddess dressing ($9 USD).

The roasted housemade paprika chicken sausage with fingerling potato salad and green goddess dressing.

This was just okay, but it is totally not the sausage's fault. For one thing, there was no pork in it. Which is fine, it's just that when you have heaps of delicious pork and fish dishes, and then you get to basically a chicken sausage topped with salad, it is sort of anti-climatic. Still good, just not great.

Finally, we finished with the marinated hanger steak with grilled scallions, red onion, piquillo peppers and nichols farm asparagus ($14 USD).

The marinated hanger steak with grilled scallions, red onion, piquillo peppers and Nichols farm asparagus.

What a colorful dish. It made my eyes happy, that is damn sure. The food itself was good. Again, nothing mind blowing, just basically steak fajitas minus the tortillas, but I liked it, and with all the vegetables, it was fresh and lighter than I thought it would be.

And how did we end this awesome evening full of wine and friends?
There is really only one place to go after you have a great meal at a nice restaurant like Avec. One place that can truly continue the feeling and ambience that Avec had started the evening off with.

Two words: Dairy Queen.

Another four words: starburst crunch-dipped cone.

You can't buy class people. At least not as much as I have.

~LTG!
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Avec Restaurant
615 W Randolph
Chicago, IL 60606
312-377-2002
www.avecrestaurant.com