Friday food porn: Plump and peppery at Ben Pao

Plump East Coast sea scallops are coated in a blend of pepper and Asian spices and served with Chinese broccoli.

21 freebies for Mother’s Day in Chicago

You could take your mom out for the usual Mother’s Day brunch this Sunday, May 9, but why not go where she’ll get a little something extra?

The best Chicago restaurants ever? Really?

What would you add to the list? What would you leave off?

Asian flavors blooming at Chicago restaurants’ spring classes

Learn about Asian gardening, tofu and spring rolls in April and May classes.

Broadway in Chicago’s ‘101 Dalmatians’ a dog of a musical

“Cruella de Vil, Cruella de Vil, if she doesn’t scare you, no evil thing will….”
Was there ever a scarier, freakier villain than Cruella de Vil? The scrawny, witchy society dame determined to make dog-skin coats out of Dalmatian puppies is scarier than ever in “The 101 Dalmatians Musical,” playing in a short run at Cadillac [...]

Gung hay fat choy! Chicago Chinese New Year celebrations

With a clash of cymbals and the bang of drums and firecrackers, as well as traditional dragon parades and lion dances, the Asian New Year will explode into the Chicago area on Sunday, Feb. 14, with a variety of events at restaurants and around town.
Chinese legend says the noise and dancing animals chase away evil [...]

Earn triple points at Lettuce Entertain You today

Today is Triple Points Day at Lettuce Entertain You Enterprises! Members the restaurant group’s Frequent Diners program will threefold points toward future meals if they dine at participating restaurants today.
Lettuce Entertain You was the first Chicago chain to offer a Frequent Diners program, one of many innovations the company, perhaps the single most influential [...]

50 Chicagoland restaurants and bars open on Christmas Day

You don’t have to eat Chinese food on Christmas.

Chicago Asian-American Jazz Festival mixes it up this weekend

The 14th annual Chicago Asian American Jazz Festival kicks off Thursday with the first of three CD-release concerts. The fest showcases the best of Chicago’s contemporary Asian American music and collaborations, bringing together the modern sounds of American-born jazz with the traditional music of the artists’ Asian heritage.
“Through music,” says saxophonist Francis Wong, “I envision [...]

Chicago tourists’ top 10 favorite restaurants

 
Jaunted recently listed five common mistakes tourists make in Chicago. One they missed was not listening to locals’ advice on the city’s best restaurants.
Chicago actor, playwright and sometime musician Paul Barile, whose day job is piloting hundreds of tourists around town in a diesel trolley or double-decker bus, says he gets asked about restaurants a [...]