Menus Whet Apple Appetites
Apples and fall go together like tricks and treats. One of the season’s quintessential ingredients lends itself seamlessly to a smorgasbord of autumnal dishes and drinks, from savory to sweet. Here are a few noteworthy apple creations to partake in this season.
When people think of apple appetites in the fall, first things that come to mind are likely pie, caramel apples, and cider. These comforting staples are revered for good reason, a natural fixture for seasonal cravings. But while apple pie is well and good, it’s nice to venture beyond the crust a bit to experience the incredible versatility of the ingredient. Case in point, one of the most elegant and beautiful preparations of apples to ever hit a plate. It’s on the menu at Grace, a stunning amalgam of apples, lemon, and tarragon, exhibiting flavors at once tart, sweet, herbaceous, and acidic.
Now when it comes to venturing beyond the typical apple dessert template, your best bet this year might be the new ginger apple dessert at Graham Elliot Bistro. This spicy-sweet sensation contains baked spiced Fuji apples with almond-pecan-cranberry-raisin granola, cider caramel, bourbon-compressed apples, and ginger ice cream. Through a variety of apple techniques and preparations on one plate, the kitchen is out to show the innate dexterity of the dessert-friendly fruit.
Apples skew savory on the new fall menu at Scofflaw, where the kitchen is really upping the ante on bar food to match the excellent cocktail artistry. For starters, there’s housemade Burrata bedecked with charred scallion puree, pepitas, and apple, and for something heftier turn to the pork loin schnitzel sandwich with iceberg lettuce, mayo, pickled apple, and egg on a pretzel bun.
Fruits set the stage for new fall appetizers at Carnivale, where the restaurant’s innate zest for Latin cuisine serves to spice up apple’s commonplace sweetness and tartness. Salmon ceviche features apples, grapefruit-ginger sauce, grapefruit segments, carrots, and mustard oil, while cider-splashed tuna tiradito ceviche is outfitted with daikon radish, Thai basil, yuzu, and preserved wild lemon sauce.
Lush Wine & Spirits may be mostly regarded as a top-notch wine market with a killer wine bar. But don’t forget to throw back a cocktail or two, as the bar is well-versed in seasonal novelties. Like their new Them Apples cocktail made with Aperol, lemon juice, apple cider, simple syrup, rhubarb bitters, Sombra Mezcal, Pommeau du Domaine de Semainville, Stagg Jr. bourbon, and Crispin sparkling hard cider. It’s a mouthful to say and drink.
It’s practically raining apples across the menu at Marion Street Market. Here, you’ll find mussels steamed in hard apple cider, spicy crusted whitefish adorned with Granny Smith apple, and Parma broth soup splashed with pulled chicken, apples, and mushroom.
The signature Nico Torte at Nico Osteria gets a seasonal update thanks to apples. Pastry chef Amanda Rockman fills her torte with butterscotch pastry cream and apple butter before surrounding the confection with confit apple, fried rosemary, candied black pepper pecans, apple cider sabayon, and burnt vanilla gelato.
Flavors of maple, caramel, brown sugar, and apples dance together merrily on one mighty dessert plate at The Gage. Proving that apples are just as well-versed in cake as they are pie, the fall menu features a spiced apple cake with maple caramel, salted brown sugar peanuts, Granny Smith apples, and Chantilly.
For her latest crop of seasonal truffles, chocolate-whisperer Katherine Duncan of Katherine Anne Confections turns to autumnal pies for inspiration (or inspieration?). Available in November, her pie-themed batch of truffles includes an apple pie version made with white chocolate, market-fresh apples, brown butter, cinnamon, and pie crumbs.
Grace
652 W. Randolph Street, Chicago
(312) 234-9494
Website
Graham Elliot Bistro
841 W. Randolph Street, Chicago
(312) 888-2258
Website
Scofflaw
3201 W. Armitage Avenue, Chicago
(773) 252-9700
Website
Carnivale
702 W. Fulton Market, Chicago
(312) 850-5005
Website
Lush Wine & Spirits
1412 W. Chicago Avenue, Chicago
(312) 666-6900
2232 W. Roscoe Street, Chicago
(773) 281-8888
Website
Marion Street Market
100 S. Marion Street, Oak Park
(708) 725-7200
Website
Nico Osteria
1015 N. Rush Street, Chicago
(312) 994-7100
Website
The Gage
24 S. Michigan Avenue, Chicago
(312) 372-4243
Website
Katherine Anne Confections
2745 W. Armitage Avenue, Chicago
(773) 245-1630
Website
