Here's another poem about unexpected vacation memories, this one from (once again) a trip to Chicago, this time in 2013. While visiting the Museum of Broadcasting (and acting like a kid on Christmas in the Radio Hall of Fame), my brother-in-law and I ate at the Billy Goat Tavern and Harry caray's Restaurant in the Loop, not far from the Museum. On an earlier trip, we had eaten at Uno's Pizza, which like the other two places, combined food with many reminders of Chicago's famous (and infamous) figures of the past. One of the Broadcasting Museum's attractions was a series of murals chronicling the history of prime-time television and one of the pictures I was able to get was a section on one mural which pictured Robert Stack as Eliot Ness on 1959-63 ABC-TV version of The Untouchables. Since the real Eliot Ness and the Untouchables worked out of Chicago and both my brother-in-law and I received loaves of rye bread for visiting the museum, well food becomes a unifying device. The title is a play on "A Taste of Chicago", a major summer festival featuring the city's major eating establishments.
Like your typical megalopolis,
The City of Big Shoulders has
more than its share of
best restaurants in town.
and like the typical metropolis,
The Windy City's simple little diners
even have their marks of distinction.
In a cellar under State Street,
a hole in the wall made famous by
ink-stained wretches (Royko sent me)
and an old Billy Goat.
Surrounded by pictures of the famous
and-or infamous, the patrons enjoy a meal.
Cheeseburgers with the Great Dumpling.
Pizza with Big Al, while at another table
a bigger group shares deep dish with Da Bears (Da Bears!).
Interesting travelogue in a poem. It was a rather different Chicago when we visited relatives there in the early 50s. I only recall the zoo and the Chicago River that looked like either mud or number two in the heat of an August without air-conditioning.
My knowledge of Chicago food was the end of the helicopter trip from O'Hare to Midway where I saw literally nothing of the Chicago skyline. Waiting for my plane to Paducah, I bought a vending machine bratwurst and discovered that it was a pale, yellowish gray. It didn't have the colorful look of the Wisconsin variety. Tasted like the hotdog that it was.
While I have driven "the loop" many times, I have never taken the time to check in on Oprah or visit the mobster restaurants or the home of Da Bears.
When people think of Madagascar, what may come to mind is a Pixar film, a lemur paradise, or the source of 80% of the world’s vanilla beans. In A Taste of Madagascar: Culinary Riches of the Red Island, Emmanuel Laroche—a Flavor Explorer and Culinary
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My knowledge of Chicago food was the end of the helicopter trip from O'Hare to Midway where I saw literally nothing of the Chicago skyline. Waiting for my plane to Paducah, I bought a vending machine bratwurst and discovered that it was a pale, yellowish gray. It didn't have the colorful look of the Wisconsin variety. Tasted like the hotdog that it was.
While I have driven "the loop" many times, I have never taken the time to check in on Oprah or visit the mobster restaurants or the home of Da Bears.
Ron