We were fortunate to be invited to this year’s Taste of Ravenswood, hosted by the Ravenswood Chamber of Commerce. The event featured a number of restaurants, brewers and spirit makers in the industrial, urban loft space that is the Ravenswood Event Center. With live music in the background and neighborhood locals around us, we set out to celebrate the diversity of the Ravenswood culinary community by tasting the sample bites that were prepared for us!
Below are the businesses we met and our (honest) thoughts on the food we sampled!
TASTE OF RAVENSWOOD
BIEN ME SABE: A newer restaurant that’s been around for three years, Bien Me Sabe offered us some authentic Venezuelan bites! We loved the refreshing seafood ceviche and empanada. We highly recommend the Fish empanada (Karim) and the Beef empanada (Salima)! Stop by its downtown location for an Arepas sandwich for lunch!
THE BISCUIT MAN: The main idea here – BISCUITS, duh! Attached to The Longroom Chicago, The Biscuit Man is known for making a variety of sandwiches for breakfast and lunch with biscuits. We tried the Mini Fried Chicken Biscuit w/ Spicy Maple Butter and liked what we tasted! While we’ve had, what we consider, better fried chicken, we’ll probably stop by to try out its Build Your Own Sandwich with Avocado and/or Jam!
LUCILA’S HOMEMADE: What a pleasant surprise! Lucila’s is an authentic Argentinian pastry shop that is best known for its Alfajor – a dessert dating back to the 19th century – two soft and crumbly cookies with a dulce de leche and caramel filling inside. While Argentinians eat these for breakfast or in the afternoon with tea, we can totally see ourselves devouring these little pastries as an after dinner desert!
LONGACRE PIZZA: Why pizza from the 313? Because it’s just that, pizza from 313! Every component of a Longacre Pizza is made from scratch, from Michigan…except maybe the mushrooms! But you get it! The dough, the sauces, the meats – all curated in 313! We tried ‘The Meaty Vegan’ pizza with house made faux meats and plant-based cheeses and it was delicious!
MAC DYNAMITE: Mac Dynamite is all about creating unique variations of familiar comfort foods – mainly Mac N’ Cheese! The team served us, what we like to call ‘Adult Mac N’ Cheese’ with all the fix-ins: Mushrooms, Shaved Parmesan, Panko Crunch and Truffle Oil. We have high standards for ‘Adult Mac N’ Cheese’ and as a family have perfected a variety of dishes that we believe rate higher than what we tasted from Mac Dynamite at this event.
MRS. MURPHY & SONS IRISH BISTRO: Three words: HOMEMADE. BREAD. PUDDING. Give it is a try, you won’t regret it! More info here.
ROJO GUSANO: The chicken tinga quesadilla with chipotle salsa, crema and queso fresco has us wanting more! More info here.
ROOTS HOMEMADE PIZZA: While we were hoping to get a taste of its highly acclaimed pizza, we were only able to try Root’s Handmade, Mozzarella “Sticks” (more like balls) with garlic bread crumbs and marinara sauce. The Mozzarella Sticks were enough for us to move Roots Pizza to the top of our must visit list.
STEINGOLD’S OF CHICAGO: We are NOT fans of lox and cream cheese…at least we thought we weren’t until we tried Steingold’s open-faced Mini Bagel with lox, cream cheese, heirloom tomatoes, lightly pickled cucumbers and capers. It was Steingold’s homemade cream cheese with some chive combination that has made us believers! We will definitely be visiting for some more!
TUSCAN HEN MARKET: While we couldn’t sample what this family owned restaurant had to offer (the sample had some pork in it!), we instantly fell in love with the owners of Tuscan Hen Market. We plan on visiting the restaurant for our next Italian Date Night!
We’re looking forward to attending next year’s Taste of Ravenswood and hope you can join us as well!
a fare affair 