GQ - kitchen savant

Here's a fantastic article in GQ about Chicago's Schwa restaurant...


The writer of this article is just brilliant. I was on a flight down to Mexico. Headphones in. Laughing away. R had to lean over (more than once) to tell me to pipe down. I guess I was disturbing fellow passengers.

Whatever. I was having a great time. The writer even mentioned our Chicago neighborhood and our infamous tire dealership:

The restaurant is directly across the street from an ornate tire dealership festooned with fake palm trees, the coconuts neon bright. “It looks like a gay Colombian nightclub,” Carlson says.

Too. Funny. Was practically crying/laughing.

Here are a few other favorite quotes:

He is intolerant of attitude, saying, “Assholes get filtered out quickly. If anybody acts as though they expect to be catered to, they’re in the wrong place. We’ve had a couple altercations. One guy got up, gave us the finger, and walked out. One woman—she was wasted—accused us of stealing her wine. I bought her meal and told her to get out. There are not many places where the owner will come out and call a customer an asshole.”

...

On one wall are sepia-like photographs that Carlson took, one in Venice, the other in Paris. “We had a guy here, a curator of art from London, and he was making fun of them,” Carlson says. “To tell you the truth, I’d have velvet paintings on the walls if not for other people telling me not to. I’d be asking customers, ‘You like my velvet panther?’ ”

Definitely check out the article when you have a chance.

It's worth the read.