Make me one with everything, please -- Scooby's Red Hots, Bensenville

(Q: What did the buddhist say to the hot dog vendor?)


Saturday, after sitting around watching it rain, and rain, and rain some more, and watching a Food Network special on hot dogs, we decided to have a little greasy treat for dinner.

So we ventured to Bensenville (right on the B'ville/Elmhurst border, actually) to Scooby's Red Hots, which for my money is the best greasy hot dog joint in Chicago. And Chicago knows hot dogs.

The place is nothing special -- I'm not sure it qualifies as a "restaurant" -- with about five tables and kitschy signs all over the walls. They have dogs, burgers, fries, tamales, shakes -- the usual. The hot dogs are great -- love those squishy buns, crisp pickles, the dogs themselves have a good flavor.

And the fries. Oh, the fries. Hand-cut, they actually taste like potatoes. Only greasy. Mmmmmmm.

And the shakes. Chocolate, vanilla, strawberry, banana and green river. I had a banana. Yum.

All in all, an excellent greasy meal with an excellent Chicago dog. We'll be back.

Tree Guys is awesome

Friday for dinner we used one of our zillion local coupons and tried Tree Guys Pizza & Pub in Itasca. The historic building is divided into restaurant with deck seating area and bar area. We didn't go into the bar area on this particular visit, but from what I understand, you can get the full restaurant menu in the bar. The restaurant side isn't super-big, and it's sort of oddly shaped, but it's very nicely decorated, understated with lots of dark wood and nice colors.

Although the pizza is emphasized in the name, they have plenty else on the menu, and we stuck with nachos and burgers. (The pizza did smell pretty good, though -- next time!) The nachos took awhile to come out, and were in the oven just a hair too long (the cheese was a little toasted), but they were good nonetheless -- slathered with chili, cheese, fresh tomatoes, lettuce, etc. The salsa was a bit thin but had a good flavor.

We agreed that both our burgers were quite delicious. I got a jalapeno parmesan burger; the husband had a smokehouse burger. The buns were great, lightly toasted and tastier than your average burger bun; the meat was flavorful and well-cooked. I got homemade chips; he got hand-cut fries, and those were also very flavorful and fresh.

Besides the food being fresh and very good, it was also quite reasonably priced -- only about $7 for a huge burger and fries/chips, and about the same for the nachos. It's rare for us to get out of a casual-dining restaurant for under $30, but it was closer to $20 with the coupon.

We'll definitely be back at Tree Guys -- it's a real gem hiding in the tiny burg of Itasca.

White Cottage Pizza

I forgot to mention in my last post that last Friday we got ourselves some White Cottage Pizza for dinner. This small local pizza chain gets rave reviews from a friend of mine, and it's pretty close, plus we had a coupon. So, dinner it was.

Besides pizza, pizza, more pizza and its usual acoutrements, White Cottage in Wood Dale also has La Dolce Vita restaurant attached, a sit-down Italian place. We chose take-out, though, and ordered a 16" pepperoni and cheese-stuffed garlic breadsticks.

First, the breadsticks: A total buttery-garlicky oozy-cheese indulgence. I'm sure they went straight to my hips, but oh my were they good. The order was fairly small (3 sticks) but the breadsticks themselves were large and deeeeelicious. I wanted to (but refrained from) lick the garlic butter off the bottom of the container.

The pizza itself was fairly straightforward Chicago-style thin crust, which is not to say that's a bad thing: plenty of cheese, a nice tangy sauce that didn't overwhelm, and a just-right crust. My only small nitpick was that the pizza was not quite piping hot and so the cheese separated itself from the crust, leading to the oh-so-attractive gnawing of a cheese-pepperoni square while the crust sits there, naked and lonely.

But that could just as easily be my fault, because I did transport it, after all, though White Cottage is a mere 5 minutes or less from home. (Depending on that pesky light/train-track combination at Irving Park.)

While there are an abundance of pizza places around us, my feeling is that they all tend to be pretty similar -- so we'll probably stick with White Cottage unless we have a compelling reason to go elsewhere. It was tasty and the prices were decent. And I'm guessing next time we'll have to try the deep dish.

On another note, we're leaving this coming Wednesday evening for vacation, and will be gone about a week, so while I may get another post in this weekend, I'm afraid you'll be awesome-less for a little while :) Fear not, I shall return.

Rocking the farmers market

We went back to Mount Prospect on Sunday, meeting a co-worker of my husband's for breakfast and then exploring the farmers market a bit more.

Breakfast was at Le Peep, which is a chain and not a local place, but it was still pretty great. I had a delightful spinach-cheese eggwhite omelet; the husband had some gooey-delicious looking french toast with crispy topping.

Then the farmers market, which let me tell you, I love. Enamored. We got end-of-season blueberries and peaches, and some cheesey popcorn just because. The blueberries are small and sweet and like antioxidant candy.

We also swung by the Wood Dale Historical Society's Fall Harvest Fest, which like many of the town's events turned out to be a good idea without much to it. Not to knock Wood Dale; I'm glad they do as much as they do. But I was expecting more food, more history, more crafts; there was a stand offering grilled corn on the cob, nachos, hot dogs, soda, and chips, a guy with a cannon (OK, that was cool), some sheep shearing, and a little antiques tent full of the sort of stuff you see at flea markets. Oh, ok, there were apple fritters and a bouncy inflatable slide. But you get the picture.

All in all, a lovely weekend, if not overly exciting.

good food, fun fests, farmers markets

It was a good weekend. Friday night we had dinner at a place not known as much for its food as other things -- Dave and Buster's. If you've never heard of it, it's sort of a grown-up Chuck E Cheese -- a restaurant, a bar, and a lot of games, from traditional video games to trivia to hoops to pool. We didn't actually play any games, just looked around, but I will say, the restaurant impressed me. It was nicely decorated with big belt-turned fans and lots of rich wood, and the food was pretty darn tasty. We shared Philly Cheesesteak Rolls (cheesesteak in eggroll form!); I had mini chicken sandwiches, served with chips and guacamole and the husband had chicken fingers and fries. I'd go there again just for the food, although it would definitely be fun to have a night with friends, drinking a bit and playing some games.

Saturday we trekked about a mile and a half from our apartment to the Wood Dale "town square" for the annual Family Fun Fest. It was pretty warm on Saturday -- mid '80s with 85% humidity, whew. So we got pretty toasty walking over, and it turned out to not be as cool as we were hoping. There was a handful of food booths, a beer/bingo tent, a few other stands with assorted products/businesses promoting things, a couple of bouncy inflatables for the kiddies, a rock wall, and a small classic car show. It wasn't completely pathetic, but I was a little disappointed. I'd really wanted a lemon shake-up, but I settled for a slightly melted Blizzard instead. Still, we did get a neat bag of goodies from the chamber of commerce.

Sunday, we discovered a gem of a suburb: Mount Prospect. I'd been through Mount Prospect before, but only more light industrial areas, so I didn't really have the best image of it in my head. But I was delighted by its downtown, and we have to go back to the Farmers Market when we actually need some produce. They had some wonderful looking produce, as well as locally raised beef, artisan cheeses, and other yummy looking foods. And the downtown area is quite nice -- lots of interesting looking shops and cafes in a few-block area around the Metra station. I'm looking forward to going back not only for the Farmers Market but also to look around the shops more, which were pretty much all closed when we were there (around 10:30 a.m. Sunday).

This coming weekend I've got a birthday party in Milwaukee and family stuff in the southwest suburbs, but perhaps on Labor Day we'll find someplace fun to explore...

Eat and get out

Last Friday I finally experienced the phenomenon that is Ed Debevic's. There's one at the mall in Lombard, and we had a coupon, so to Ed's we went. If you've never heard of Ed Debevic's, it's a pseudo-'50s style diner with wacky decor and rude waitstaff. Yes, they are paid to be weird, wacky, and amusingly rude. A common occurrence there is the slapping of the bill down on your table while being told, "eat and get out!"

Our waitress was just a little bizarre, and she stared us down for awhile before walking off without taking our order. She did come back, though. She also threw straws at us, which I saw a lot of waitstaff do.

Aside from the kooky appeal of the atmosphere, the food was pretty good. The husband had a burger, and I had a southwest chicken salad, and we shared some nachos. I wouldn't say it was stellar, but above-average diner food combined with a fun atmosphere made it an amusing and fun night.

Books are awesome. So is mini-golf.

Today we visited the Addison library, where we have reciprocal borrowing privileges via our home-town library.

The library recently moved into a new and very shiny building. It's really cool. Two stories, with lots of wood and natural light, modern-looking, but warm. Flat panel computer screens everywhere, a bunch of self-checkout desks, comfy reading chairs all about. One thing I noticed was that the shelves weren't full -- there were lots of them, a pretty good-looking collection, but the shelves weren't stuffed end-to-end with books like they are at most libraries I've been to.

We also went to the Links n Tees mini-golf course, which is part of the Addison park district. It's a good course, with some neat features, a three-level hole, and plenty of wooden "tiki gods". Two little things that bugged me, though -- one of the ponds was really gross and stagnant, not circulating as much as the rest of the water; also, the water was all dyed bright blue. Which struck me as unnecessary.

But it was fun, an enjoyable golf course, and reasonably priced. (We also had a coupon. Coupons rock.)

Tomorrow ... not sure. Found a few farmer's markets in the area that I'd like to check out, but I'm not sure if we'll get there this weekend.