Baby, You're A Firework... Pop Pop!

Basically, I spent the weekend on the Chicago Food Tour. I flew into the Windy City Friday afternoon ready for a weekend of good food, good shopping, and most especially good friends. Let me tell you, Chicago delivered.

Friday afternoon I took a cab downtown to meet up with one of my best friends, Emily, at her work. We dropped my suitcase off at her apartment, and then we met up with Christina at Naha for an early reservation. It was restaurant week in Chicago, so Naha had their pre-fix menu going on, and it was wonderful (though, not so wonderful as the food to come). We laughed, joked, caught up on each others lives, and generally had a pretty perfect, if very early, dinner. After we finished eating we headed over to this amazing bar called The Violet Hour for cocktails. The place will kick you out if you use cell phones, the lighting is incredibly dim, and we were led to the last room through curtains and curtains of heavy blue velvet. The place has high-backed chairs and filigree on the ceiling and basically looked like we were in some trippy Alice in Wonderland tea party. I had a Pimms/gin based drink with lots of fruit flavoring-- incredible. Emily had a drink called The Duck Hunter made with egg yolk-- apparently using egg parts in drinks is the thing these days... I wouldn't know here in my small little town with two bars :). After cocktails, we turned in early.

The drive home was the best, as we all sang loudly to Katie Perry's "Firework" after Emily commented, "Sometimes I really do feel like a firework." Christina harmonized. It felt like one of those absolutely perfect moments, when you just feel like life can't get any better, riding in a car with old friends, full of good food, happy after a wonderful evening, and singing loudly to a stupid song. One of those red-letter moments I will never forget, where life can't get any better and it all feels so worthwhile.

We then spent the evening watching our favorite movie, St. Elmo's Fire. What screwy lives those characters lead... and how incredibly unrealistic are most of the plot lines. We did feel sooo old though when Demi Moore said, "I never thought I'd be so tired at 22." 22!!?? How did we get older than the St. Elmo's Fire crowd?

Saturday, Emily and I had breakfast a great little cafe called Julius Meinl-- baked eggs with Parmesan, carmelized onions, and truffle oil, plus an almond creme croissant. Amazing. Then we spent hours in Anthropologie. I used my Christmas gift card on-- surprise!-- a pair of my favorite style of jeans-- and they were on sale! Then we took a bus up to an Urban Outfitters and looked around there, then headed back to Emily's neighborhood for some traditional Chicago deep dish pizza. So good. Plus I got toasted ravioli, which is seriously lacking here on the East Coast. Since it was snowing, we spent the rest of the afternoon/evening inside watching The Big Chill (also a crazy movie) and an episode of Community and listening to music while we got ready for a very late supper at Paris Club.

We met up with Charlotte at the train, arrived at Paris Club, and then went to the bar for a cocktail while we waited for our table. I got a kir. It took awhile to get seated, but when we did-- fantastic! We did 'small plates': duck cracklings, croque monsieur fingers, French Onion Soup fondue, macaroni and cheese, and small desserts-- I got the Pistachio Pot de Creme. Since our reservations we so late-- and since we had brunch the next morning-- we turned in after dinner (at about 1:00). And how to explain Sunday brunch?! Emily, Charlotte, and I went to the Publican for the best food ever-- ricotta and honey with dates and walnuts, red-wine poached egg, and waffles with honey butter and raspberry jam. Plus french fries with garlic mayonnaise and the most amazing 'bacon' ever. I was stuffed.

Then it was time to come home. Emily and Christina drove me to the airport, and off I flew, here to the warmth of Virginia. Weekends like this make me realize how very lucky I am. I have the best friends in the world, in the most interesting places, and I wouldn't trade it for a thing.