Our Taste of Chicago Eating Adventure

Lately, I’ve been all about food. I knew I wanted to go to Taste of Chicago if Chris had a day off during the festival, and luckily, Thursday was his day off this week. I loved that Thursday was our “weekend” so that we didn't have to deal with the crowds on Saturday and Sunday.

As soon as we walked in, we bought three sets of 12 tickets (it costs $8.50 for a set of 12 tickets) since we knew we wanted to try as much food as possible. People warned us that the food was overpriced, but after years of going to the Texas State Fair, we expected the prices to be higher.

The Taste of Chicago features 37 restaurants (including several pop-up restaurants that rotate) that all feature several large portions and two “taste of” items, mini portions to help you not get stuffed with the first thing you try.

Nothing says food festival to me like corn on the cob with butter, so I went straight to the O’Briens Restaurant booth for Celtic corn on the cob. I loved all the seasoning they put on it and would have gone for seconds if there weren’t so many other places to try.

My plan had been to get a lobster roll from Luke’s Lobster, but it was a small roll for a bunch of tickets, so I decided I would pig out on dessert instead. I headed to La Mexicana to get a taste of a strawberry mini paleta while Chris went for the corn fritters at Lawrence’s Fish & Shrimp. He ate them so quickly I didn’t manage to get a photo, so I think it’s safe to say he loved them.

It was time for Chris to pick his “meal,” so he opted for the taste of sautéed goat and plantain from Vee-Vee’s African Restaurant and the taste of slow roasted Cuban pork tamale from Dia de los Tamales, which were both winners. Meanwhile, I was on the hunt for more dessert and decided to get the lemon sorbetto at Mariano’s, which I loved so much I decided to go back and get another one.

At that point I was stuffed, so Chris got the rest of our tickets for his desserts. He tried the key lime cheesecake from Eli’s Cheesecake Co. (which I really liked because the key lime taste wasn’t overwhelming), and he finished off our extravaganza with a scoop of peach cobbler gelato from caffe gelato (which he liked but wished the peach flavor stood out more).

Before leaving the festival, Chris wanted to try the free samples of Spam entrees, so we took photos with the Spam mascot and stood in line for Spam fries and Spam coconut bites. I didn’t try them, but Chris really liked the Spam fries.

Taste of Chicago also included live music, a fashion section, and cooking demonstrations. It was fun to try food from areas of the city we don’t visit as often.

Linking up with Biana for Weekending since this was our weekend.