Belly Shack

I don't know if teachers still do this, but at the end of each school year, I was handed a summer reading list, a sheet of required and optional books that would prepare students for the coming school year. (I still owe a measure of revenge to the teacher...

Graham Elliot was an aspiring young cook in the late '90s carrying steaks to a party of 20 in the Charlie Trotter's Studio Kitchen when the restaurant's brilliant, mercurial owner stopped him in the hallway and grabbed one of the pieces of meat. "He...

OK, Bill Kim, owner (with his wife, Yvonne Cadiz Kim) of Urban Belly, Belly Shack and now your latest, 6-week-old BellyQ: What's with all the bellies? "Life starts from the belly, from the mother's womb," says Kim. "Everything starts from there, so it'...

Where you dine before or after the Big Ten tournament games depends on what time your team's game starts. If your team is playing at 11 a.m. (as Illinois and Minnesota do on Thursday, the winner playing Indiana at 11 a.m. Friday), you'll need a...

I have this problem. I made more New Year's Eve reservations than I can use. More than 100 of them, actually. Which is why, for the 12th straight year (and the 17th time in the past 19 years), I'll be giving them away to nimble-fingered readers who ask....

Charlie Trotter says he first thought of closing his namesake restaurant after his plane sat on the tarmac at LaGuardia Airport on the morning of Sept. 11, 2001. “I realized really how fragile the world is,” he reflects. “I love what...

Another month, another week of discounted dining. In January we had Chicago Restaurant Week; starting Sunday, and running through March 22, we have Chicago Chef Week, which will feature 75 restaurants offering three-course lunches for $22 and three-course...

A roundup of restaurants reviewed in 2012 by critic Phil Vettel. Acadia ✭✭✭ 1639 S. Wabash Ave., 312-360-9500. Ryan McCaskey's gamble to place a luxury restaurant in the South Loop is, so far, paying off. People are crowding into...

When it comes to adventures in dining and drinking, Chicago definitely delivered this year. Hot chefs expanded their empires with new restaurants. New words made their way into our nightlife vocabulary. And, of course, there were doughnuts. And pie. And...

Mini-review: The Peasantry 2723 N. Clark St. 773-868-4888 Rating: !!! (out of four) Off to a good start The gist: A brick-and-mortar restaurant dedicated to "elevated street food" isn't a new idea (see Xoco and Belly Shack), but it sure is a tasty one....

Add Bill Kim's name to the list of star chefs setting down roots along the Randolph Street restaurant corridor. The chef and owner of Urban Belly and Belly Shack is hooking up with the Cornerstone Restaurant Group (Michael Jordan's Steak House) to open...

Review: Belly Q 1400 W. Randolph St. 312-563-1010 Rating: !!!! (out of four) Already hot There’s only one person who mentions the word "belly" more often than a gossip magazine’s celebrity baby-watch section. That’s Bill Kim, a fine-...