Hello Chicago! A city known for deep dish pizza, hot dogs, architecture, and sports, Chicago has it all. Granted, it doesn't have the best reputation (hello violent crime!), but it's important to be on your guard in any big city. We stayed for about a week and absolutely loved our time there.
The trip started off with a little hiccup. I slept through my 2:30 alarm (can you blame me?) so I only had 5 minutes to get ready before we had to leave for the airport. Thankfully we had the foresight to put away our luggage in the car the night before.
We landed in Calgary first for a short layover before arriving in Chicago around noon.
O'Hare is actually the world's most connected airport. It's huge, but thankfully easy to navigate. We decided to take an Uber to our hotel for convenience sake.
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Instead of staying downtown, or "the loop" as it's called, we stayed at The Emily Hotel in West Loop, which as the name implies, is "west" of downtown. As I made our itinerary, a lot of the restaurants I wanted to try were in West Loop. So it made sense to stay somewhere within walking distance, helping to limit the number of public transit/rideshare trips we had to take, especially at night.
The Emily Hotel is a boutique hotel located right across the street from Chicago's Google offices. A bit stark in furnishing, but we really liked our stay. For one, the location was amazing. It was a block away from the subway and an easy 5-10 minute walk from the restaurants we went to. It was still tucked away from busy main roads, so it felt safe and quiet.
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After we checked in early and set down our things, we set out for our first meal of the day. And you know it had to be deep dish pizza! There's a few big names you'll hear in Chicago. Lou Manalti's, Giordano's, Pequods, Gino's East, etc. After some research, the general consensus on the interwebs was Lou Manalti's is one of the best.
Lou Malnati's opened their first pizzeria in 1971, but their namesake owner had decades of deep dish experience since the 1940s. Today, there are over 60 locations in Illinois, and 20 locations split between Arizona, Wisconsin, and Indiana. We visited the location in West Loop.
We ordered a small deep dish Malnati Chicago classic ($23.69) which has lean sausage, extra mozzarella cheese, vine-ripened tomato sauce on their trademarked butter crust. The pizza takes at least half an hour to cook but it comes straight from the oven to your table. As it bubbles away in the piping hot cast iron, the server cuts it up, making for some pretty epic cheese pulls.
Deep dish is certainly not for the faint of heart. It's rich, it's heavy, it's indulgent. I did like the chunkiness of the tomato sauce. It tasted fresh, and the acidity of the tomatoes helped cut through the fat of the sausage and the cheese. The crust was crispy but it was more of an afterthought for me. Overall, my first experience with deep dish was good. Not mind-blowing, but good. It's just a lot of cheese to consume in one sitting. Have Lactaid on standby.
We also passed by Hamburger University! Did you know that Chicago is home to McDonald's global headquarters? Apparently it's a training facility for different levels of management. There's also a McDonald's in the building that serves unique global menu items!
On our way to the subway, we passed by Molly's Cupcakes and stopped in for dessert. They were the winner of Cupcake Wars on Food Network so they must be doing something right.
Molly's is famous for their center-filled cupcakes which means all sorts of fillings and puddings are piped into the middle of the cupcake. I went for the creme brulee ($3.90) while LT chose the chocolate decadence ($3.90). The creme brulee was a vanilla cupcake filled with creme custard and then torched with sugar to replicate that classic creme brulee top. Such a unique twist on a cupcake! If you know me, you know that I love creme brulee and this was all sorts of *magical*.
After the quick dessert break, we hopped onto the subway, or the 'L' train as locals call it. There were some pretty interesting characters on the subway and I'd say it was the only time I ever felt a bit uneasy in the city. To be fair, I would probably feel the same way riding the LRT at home. Thankfully our subway rides were always pretty short.
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Our next destination needs no introduction. THE BEAN! Cloud Gate is its official name, but I, and many others, prefer the bean. It's pretty neat to see it in person and I love how the cityscape is reflected in the mirrored surface. Another item off the bucket list. Bean there, done that!
Just steps away from Cloud Gate is Crown Fountain. The pillars feature video of actual Chicago residents' faces. I'm a bit sad that it was raining so the 'water' aspect of the fountain wasn't turned on.
Arguably a Chicago landmark itself, we stopped by Garrett Popcorn for their famous Chicago mix. It was named as one of Oprah's favourite things back in 2002. A mix of cheese popcorn and caramel popcorn, it's a weird combination that actually works well together. Salty-sweet, that sort of thing.
We buy the Chicago mix from Costco a fair amount, but it's so much better when it's fresh. The cheese popcorn is reminiscent of Cheeto dust while the caramel popcorn had a slight burnt toffee flavour. A good snack to have stashed in the hotel room.
Goth Target! We continued making our way down State St. which is a popular shopping area in the loop. Target is always a must whenever we're in the states and this location is probably the coolest Target I've ever seen.
The Chicago Theatre was our last stop for photos before we headed back onto the subway to the hotel.
After a power nap, we headed out later at night for a casual dinner. Shake Shack was just a block away from our hotel (right beside the subway and Molly's Cupcakes from earlier!). It was my first time trying Shake Shack so I was pretty excited. We got two shackburgers ($7.09), fries ($4.09), and just a sprite ($3.39). The patties are like smash burgers, so quite thin with a crispy crust. They were topped with cheese, lettuce, tomato, and shack sauce. A decent burger but nothing too special. They are on the smaller side, but it was actually the perfect amount for us. Glad I tried it, but I'll have to try In-N-Out next to compare!
Before we ended the night, we hit up another American classic -- CVS! We actually just needed to buy water so it was handy that it was just around the corner.
More adventures to come!
- CT
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