Best thing I ate: The swine flu burger at Kuma's Corner

Burgers are my ultimate comfort food. When I'm feeling stressed out or down I crave a burger - it's the classic American combination that makes you feel better the moment you take a bite. Here in Chicago, amid the gaggle of chefs vying for the best burger in town (read: reinventing the ingredients until they end up with something vaguely recognizable as a burger) are a select few that really stand out. A few that have completely altered my perception of what a burger could be. The first of those to do so was the swine flu burger at Kuma's Corner. (I am totally aware of how repulsive that sounds.)

First of all, Kuma's has become the golden standard for burgers in Chicago. They were at the helm of the (what is now a completely overdone) burger trend that has been sweeping the nation for several years. Back in the day when Kuma's started gaining some street cred as the gourmet burger place I checked it out with a group of friends. The burger was amazing but it was the mussels that blew me away (it was the first time I'd ever tasted mussels) but that is for a different post. The place is essentially a tiny heavy metal bar with a fantastic beer list and every imaginable combination of ingredients on a burger being cooked by a multiple-tattooed chef in a kitchen the size of your biggest closet. Plus, every burger shares its name with a heavy metal band (think Slayer, Iron Maiden, Pantera). (I am totally aware of how intimidating this place sounds.)

It was my second time there when I had the swine flu burger. If you haven't already figured it out, this burger was a special during the first H1N1 outbreak in winter of 2009. They have since put it as a semi-regular on the menu under the name Megadeath. It was about a half pound of ground beef topped with chorizo and red potato hash, avocado, pico de gallo, and tortilla strips on a pretzel bun. It totally changed my mind about what belongs on a burger. Burgers weren't just lettuce, tomato, onion, pickle, special sauce for me anymore, they became about adventure and trying new and exciting flavor combinations. This burger was the panacea for my winter blues.

Since then, I rarely go to Kuma's since it's been a two to 3 hour wait for at least 6 years now. No really, you have to go there one and a half to 2 hours before you think you'll get hungry so that when you finally sit down to eat you won't want to devour the whole menu. Plus, there is a myriad of other places in town to get a supreme burger: Owen & Engine (they freshly grind their own beef), Au Cheval (sinfully greasy diner burger), Southport Grocery (cafe burger with the mind-blowing addition of sour cream) and the most recent best burger I ate, the kimchi burger at Little Goat.

Little Goat, the offshoot of Top Chef winner Stephanie Izard's, Girl & the Goat, is what I'd call an elevated diner. Open from 7am to 2am their entire menu is available all day long. I rarely go there for anything but breakfast but one day my friends and I decided to meet there after work for dinner. I'd heard legends about this kimchi burger so of course I had to try it. The menu states it as kimchi, bacon, egg, spicy mayo, on a squish squash roll. The squish squash roll is made with butternut squash, which gives it its yellowy orange color. This roll is like the best thing to happen to bread since bread happened to bread. It's squishy and pillowy and so soft with a subtly sweet slightly nutty flavor. This burger is insane and takes burgers to a level I did not previously think was possible. It doesn't come with a side for reasons I'm sure you can figure out. I'm still a sucker for a basic cheeseburger, but it's hard to eat anything that doesn't stand up to these bad boys.

Best thing I ate: Salmon at The Pump Room

I was 20 years old and I had just tasted my first real fish fillet. It was a breezy summer and my brother had been on a fishing trip in the Keys where he had caught a 42 pound grouper. Or at least that’s how I remember it. I was teetering on the cusp of adventurous eating so I tried some of this grouper, which had been filleted and grilled back home. It was, well, as most life-changing bites go, unlike anything I’d ever eaten before. But I was still with reservations because it was fish and psychologically fish wigged me out. I didn’t trust the sea (the sea totally still freaks me out but the deliciousness that it produces trumps everything). I was also distrustful of what went on behind kitchen doors in restaurants and mostly found myself sticking to chicken tenders and fries wherever I went.

So my friends and I decided to go to a fancy dinner out on New Year’s Day. After much deliberation we settled on The Pump Room. This legendary Chicago restaurant was about as fancy as our young minds could fathom seeing as, at the time, countless famous guests had been gathering there in the ever-beloved Booth One for decades. I mean, Paul Newman, Audrey Hepburn, Elizabeth Taylor (!) had all sat just a few steps away from our table at one point in time. I was swooning. We even hoped we’d make our own celebrity sighting that night. This was ten years ago and I can remember nothing but the white tablecloths, the feeling that I needed to channel my inner Emily Post, the wall smattered with photographs of all the celebrities who had dined in Booth One. I felt like royalty. And so I knew I wanted to take a chance. The menu had concoctions, yes that is what I would call them, that didn’t seem to fit together into my idea of a meal. But I ordered the salmon even though it came with a side of something that I didn’t even consider would be tasty so I ordered a side of something else that was fail proof (probably potatoes - my memory fades).

When the salmon arrived it was precisely the color of the salmon colored crayon in my box of Crayola at home. Ever so slightly cooked, it flaked with the slightest caress of my fork. I had never tasted a protein so tender, so melt-in-my-mouth, that I didn’t even have to chew. It was so fresh, I’d be willing to bet it was living just hours before it arrived, perfectly filleted, at my table. It turned out that the entire plate, including the side (I want to say it was braised cabbage), was one big spectacular course and the joke was on me. This is how I learned to start trusting chefs. It is also the first and only time I’ve ever sent the server to give my compliments to the chef. Just call me Audrey.

The picture quality is terrible but we had so much fun that night.

New series: best things I ever ate

Call me a foodie, a gourmand, an epicure, whatever adjective can be used to describe someone who has built a steady obsession with food over the course of one’s life (or, in my case, the course of the last 5 years). As a child, I had no tastes whatsoever. I was not only a fickle eater, I usually only ate a few bites of my food. I would take the cheese off of my pizza, eat the crust, and then devour the cheese (saving the best for last). I still continue to congratulate myself on this ingenious idea. A cheeseburger would remain intact all but for two bites taken out of it. One time, when I was about 7 or 8, I was eating fish sticks in my mother's kitchen and decided to investigate into the ingredients.

"Say, Mom," I asked, "what's in this fish stick anyway?"
I wanted to know why these breaded and crispy things were so delectable.
"Fish," she replied, as if that were obvious.

Apparently, I had never bothered to deduce that the name of a food was a clue to its ingredients. With that, I dropped the half-eaten stick onto my plate, started dramatically gagging, and never picked up another fish stick again (but picked up a great career in grade school theater). 

Every morning for breakfast before school, my mother would serve me Quaker Instant Oatmeal (maple and brown sugar; the only variety I eat to this day) or Eggo frozen waffles while I sat in front of the TV watching The Bozo Show. I knew I was going to be late for school when Bewitched would come on. For lunch, I usually had a Thermos full of Spaghettios or Raviolios or some kind of condensed noodle soup. Usually near the end of my lunch I would feel physically ill to the point that I’d have to look up at the ceiling while other children finished their lunches for fear I would vomit if I looked at another piece of food. (I was always the first to finish because, well, I usually only took two bites of my food.) If you would’ve asked me in grade school what my final meal would be if I could choose, the answer would've been (and still is to this day) my mother’s egg dish and potato casserole. This meal was only made on the most special of occasions (Christmas, Easter, a random Saturday in January because we were still salivating over it from December). I would, however, only eat it if she made it without green peppers and onions. I would eat her chili but I required it sans beans. My refusal to taste anything outside of my comfort zone stuck with me like a conjoined fun-sucking twin well into adulthood.

I didn't taste a runny egg yolk until I was 25, when my boyfriend at the time decided to cook me eggs Benedict in bed. If there is a God and he or she or it is charged with creating something for each specific person on this earth, a personal gift for being born, he or she or it has created the runny egg yolk specifically for me. My then-boyfriend bestowed upon me these soft pillows of divinity, which quickly became a contender on my top 5 list of things in life that are as close to heaven as you can get while remaining tethered to this planet. Poached has since become one of the most commonly used words in my vocabulary. (At least he was good for something, right?) You know those events that make you categorize your life as before and after? Before The Day of the Poached Egg, I was a breakfast opponent. It was my least favorite food to eat next to cold salads (like pasta and potato) and sandwiches (what I deem "picnic" food). I disliked breakfast so much that when I went for the first time to what would end up being my favorite restaurant in my neighborhood (Café Selmarie) I didn’t order the corned beef hash or the chilaquiles; I ordered the turkey, apple, and brie sandwich on whole wheat bread. And to this day picnic food is my least favorite food. Go figure. After The Day of the Poached Egg, I saw the world in technicolor and found the thing that had been missing from my life since birth. After The Day of the Poached Egg, I began to live for breakfast.

I didn't taste a real mushroom (it was a stuffed mushroom) by itself until I was 24. It was actually life-changing. One day, a few years ago, I decided, on a whim, to cook my scrambled eggs with green peppers and onions. I have since found that I don't enjoy scrambled eggs as much if they aren’t accompanied by these two ingredients (which, in my opinion, are more essential to building flavor than salt and pepper). Never mind that since The Day of the Poached Egg I have eaten a scrambled egg only on rare occasions (mostly when I am cooking at home, because I have not yet mastered the art of poaching an egg).

Canned convenience foods are now banned from my pantry (save for canned artichokes, which I didn't taste until I was 26, tossed together with some spicy Italian sausage, sundried tomatoes, and pasta; canned black beans, age 25, in everything Mexican and especially chili; canned tomatoes, well, that’s one I've always been fond of). Nearly every dish I make starts with sauteing a yellow onion or a shallot and the zest of a few cloves of garlic (and a dollop of Dijon mustard or vinegar at the end for that brightened acidic flavor). My obsession has turned into very rigid rules of eating now positioned at the other end of the spectrum from my childhood.

These days, I cannot bother myself with frozen pizza or boxed mac and cheese (or any convenience foods for that matter). It is just as easy to saute some spicy Italian sausage (casings removed), add a can of diced tomatoes, fresh basil, and garlic, spread onto store-bought pizza dough (okay, I give, this is one convenience food I failed to mention; I also have not mastered the art of the rising bread dough), and add julienned red pepper, and shredded mozzarella. (Not pre-shredded. Perish the thought; pre-shredded cheese has anti-caking agent added to it, which makes it not melt – and what good is cheese if it isn’t melty?) It is also just as easy to saute butter and flour with some leeks (if you're ambitious), add a few cups of warm milk, and cheese (usually Gruyere, but Gouda and sharp cheddar are just as delicious), Dijon mustard, cracked pepper, salt, and drizzle over cavatappi. I crush cornflakes for a satisfyingly crunchy topping. Why waste your money on something that is bland, overly processed, and unsatisfying when it is so much more fun, tasty, and gratifying to cook and savor the fruits of your labor?

My reverence for food and cooking has translated into a passion for dining out. Dining out has become one of the highlights of my life. I adore gathering with my friends for dinner and when I know I am about to do so I spend most of my time thinking about it until then. I always pick the restaurants for my friends (in fact, it's almost a fault - I have a really hard time letting someone else pick because I want to ensure the experience is going to impress us- and no one else can ensure this but me). I spend hours searching for the perfect place, researching menus, offering up options to my girls. Have a taste for barbecue? Well, Fat Willy's, Smoque, or The Smoke Daddy can jive with that. Looking to have a love affair with a bagel sandwich? Chicago Bagel Authority wants to be that lover. Craving comfort food? Cafe Selmarie, Table Fifty-Two, or Owen & Engine will all make you feel so good and warm. And comfort food isn’t even just chicken pot pie or steak and mashed potatoes anymore to me. It’s ramen soup at Wasabi in Logan Square, or tacos al pastor at Big Star in Wicker Park, or beef fried rice and crab Rangoon (with lots of Sambal Oelek) at Opart Thai in Lincoln Square.

I am lucky because I have had the pleasure of living out this awakening surrounded by the best restaurants in the country, some even the world. I get to walk out my front door and a block over is a pie café with the most soul-gratifying pie in the city. Two blocks west and I’m at my favorite taqueria for tacos al pastor fresh off the spit. One train stop east and I can eat at the best (and perhaps the only) Neapolitan pizza place where I can also order cevapcici because the owner is from Bosnia. This renaissance in my adoration of food has been completely enabled by the proximity of my home to America’s best restaurants. And I partake in them as much as I can because what fun is life if you're not indulging all your senses?

If I am going to eat at a new restaurant, I want to have some trust that they'll provide me with a food experience that I'll remember (and I do remember 99% of them). I seek to eat things so delicious that I want them everyday (calories could never come between me and my food). I hate to spend my money on mediocrity. Why go out to eat if it’s going to be anything short of wonderful? Fresh ingredients, innovative menu items, and flavorful compositions beckon me to try a new place. It's an adventure waiting to be endeavored. And when you're adventurous you are rewarded with better experiences, perspective-changing experiences. Having eaten at hundreds of restaurants over the course of my life, there have been quite a few perspective-changing meals. These will be shared in the upcoming series of posts: Best things I ever ate.