The Great Dane's French onion soup has long been a favorite of mine. I believe they make it with a brown ale which is odd in that they rarely have a beer advertised as being a brown ale on tap. Hmm...?
I attended a couple puppet shows in Chicago back in January and the first was preceded by a meal at Elephant & Castle - the one on Adams. French onion soup once more, wings, and their meat pie sampler. There was a table of genuine Englishmen behind us so I guess E&C's take on the venerable English pub isn't too bad/inauthentic. Either that or they have a wide selection of soccer, er, football games on their TVs.
I ate at Forage Kitchen for the first time a couple months back. My Cobb-like salad was tasty and I appreciated all the kombucha on offer. Methinks the restaurant's owners also own a kombucha factory.
Madison's Mexican dining options used to be Pedro's and Chi Chi's. Now you can't swing a dead cat in this town without hitting a taqueria. I stopped in at El Gran Taco Gato after a movie and had a tasty burrito. Bonus points for having "cat" in the name. The Big Taco Cat?
My second trek to Chicago for a puppet show included a stop at Athenian Room in Lincoln Park. My companion and I split a Greek salad which came with a shingle-sized slab of feta while the pork tenderlion kabobs were nice and tender and delicious. Opa!
Before going to see the Paul McCartney documentary on the big screen, my fellow music doc lover and I had dinner at Buraka. I hadn't been there in ages. The chicken tibs were delicious and I ate every last square millimeter of injera.
Somehow I believe that I'd never eaten at Elie's Café until just a few weeks back. The omelet was tasty and surprisingly full of jalapeño. My mug was a bottomless well of that elixir of morning.
One chilly winter evening I took a companion to La Taguara as they'd never eaten there and I was looking for a little variation from El Sabor de Puebla which has become something of a go-to in times of evening hunger pains and a lack of desire to cook. The grilled chicken was simple yet highly delicious, although another gallon of guasacaca wouldn't have hurt.
As noted above, El Sabor de Puebla has become a semi-regular stop for me as they have locations on the north and northeast sides - close to home. I splurged one day and got a burrito poblano which is a rather large burrito smothered in rich mole sauce and covered in sesame seeds. OK, not covered but I was going for a Waffle House thing here.
On the way home from a puppet show in Chicago, my companion and I ended up in Wheeling and stopped in at Fresh Farms International Market. It has an Eastern European slant to it and the bakery was wonderful.
We discovered a Georgian restaurant across the street from the supermarket - Kitchen House Cafe. I hadn't been to any place that served Georgian food for many years - since a visit to the now-closed Argo Georgian Bakery on Devon which had extremely delicous khachapuri. The ones on the menu here looked great too but I tried other dishes that night. I began my meal with a bowl of Chikhirtma, a.k.a. - Georgian chicken soup.
A dinner roll on one side and little cups of vinegar & diced garlic on the other. A rather generous portion of garlic too. It was all delicious but I had no idea that garlic was served with the soup and the meal ended up being a total garlic festival as I had also ordered Chkmeruli, Georgian garlic chicken.
The Chkmeruli was great and I think I ended up eating about 40 cloves of garlic with that meal. I could still taste it the next morning no matter how much coffee I drank.
Before the Los Lobos show at the Stoughton Opera House a fellow music lover and I dined at Water Street Tavern. The French onion soup was excellent. It was hot and didn't taste like it had been sitting in a stock pot for hours. There were about 2 pounds of cheese on top so it was a bit of a messy affair.
The Bún bò Huế at Saigon Noodle quickly became a favorite of mine since trying it last year and has filled a soup gap in my diet riven open when Wah Kee closed. Different soups, I grant you, but this Bún bò Huế satisfies that mid-winter noodle soup lust. One of my dining companions that night is Hmong and they highly rate this stuff so we are in accordance on its deliciousness.
Back in the early 1990's when I was a denizen of Witte Hall, the mother of one of my new friends would occasionally take us out for dinner. These occasions not only meant a free meal and one not from Gordon Commons, but also an opportunity to get away from campus and see more of Madison. One of the places we dined at was the late Smoky's Club. R.I.P. Another was Smoky Jon's #1 BBQ. Smoky Jon's has a special place in my heart for being the first north side joint I ever went to and a special place in my stomach because they have the best BBQ in town.
I now live fairly close to the restaurant and have been there a few times this year. The shorter, middle-aged fellow who runs the counter - that guy is great. He gave me and my dining companion burnt ends samples one time and he has the dryest, drollest sense of humor in all of Madison restaurantdom. I was relieved to find out after Smoky Jon died that they still pipe blues music into the dining room. A Madison classic.
When Piper died, I needed comfort food which meant Italian beef which meant Portillo's.
I try to meet a friend who lives in Middleton for dinner once a month or so. One recent excursion saw us at Taza, a place that serves Mediterranean cuisine. The beef shawarma was excellent.
One of the reasons why I chose the apartment I did was its proximity to the home of a friend. When we're both working from home and our schedules allow, we like to take lunch together and usually wander down the street to dine. The Tip Top Tavern serves a fine salad and my friend has high praise for their mac & cheese.
For one trek to Chicago this past winter to see some fine puppet action my traveling companion and I decided to park in Elgin and take the train into the city. That night we dined at Zaab Thai in the Chicagoland exurb before returning to Madison. The food was excellent though they were a bit stingy when it came to turning up the thermostat. It was chilly in there.
To start, their cucumber salad is probably the best I've had as it wasn't overly sweet like every other version I've eaten and had fresh jalapeño slices to boot.
The glass noodle salad was great too. Lots of vegetables and not just a little here and there atop a mound of noodles. I asked for very spicy and, for my sins, they gave me very spicy. Woo doggy! It was hot. As in endorphin rush hot. My scalp got all tingly. Despite the heat, it was very flavorful.
A real gem of a place tucked away in a mall tucked away on Elgin's southwest side.
On a recent stop at the Great Dane I acutally didn't order the French onion soup and instead got a tasty salad laden with shrimp. My dining companion ordered beignets.
Earlier this week I took my stepson out for dinner. He had a hankering for Pad Thai so we went to his local Thai joint, Thai Boat Noodle. Thai restaurants used to be rare as hen's teeth in these parts but no longer. Perhaps not as numerous as Mexican restaurants, nonetheless Thai places are now rather common. The spring rolls and chicken satay were fine, though I think the dipping sauces could use less sugar and more fish sauce.
I had Crying Tiger with a medium level of spice. It is a bit like larb but the meat wasn't ground. Slices of beef mixed with green onion and cilantro. And either their medium heat level is the equivalent of high elsewhere or the cook made a little mistake because this stuff was hot. Not blazing, not deadly but I did feel it. If I'd gotten their hottest level of spice I think I would have cried. As it was, very tasty.
And those are some of my gustatory exploits of 2026. I have gone to the cinema every day since last Monday and have either eaten at a restaurant or just prepared something quick at home like a salad or some Buona Beef. Today I am making lasagne, most of which is going to my stepson and his father, and baking a loaf of bread for them. Hopefully this is the start of more cooking at home.
But not before another trek to Chicago where I'll no doubt be dining somewhere in the Loop.
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