Where to Break Your New Year's Resolutions
When it comes to New Year’s resolutions, you can either go all in and stay strong, or you can thwart them immediately. If you’re going to cave to temptation, it might as well be with something grand, like an all-bacon restaurant or fried chicken slathered in honey butter. Here are some of the best spots in Chicago for breaking resolutions.
Resolutions are best broken with bacon, which makes Burke’s Bacon Bar the perfect temple of rebellion. The tiny counter-service eatery nestled inside the James Hotel is a dream come true for bacon fiends, brimming with bacon in a myriad of iterations, both savory and sweet. The crux of the restaurant is the “handwiches,” small sandwiches with big flavor. These slider-like creations include a bacon burger, a CBLT with peppered bacon, bacon mayonnaise and cheddar cheese, a bacon hot dog, and a five-spice duck sandwich with Chinese bacon and hoisin sauce on a steamed bun. Bacon mac & cheese and bacon caramel popcorn comprise some of the sides, while bacon-chocolate chip cookies make for the perfect sinful finale.
When you just can’t decide whether you’d like to binge on sweets or savories, Cookies & Carnitas has you covered. The Green City Market vendor-cum-Edgewater cafe features pork in all forms, from tacos and pizza to some of the juiciest carnitas sandwiches in town. For dessert, cookies are the natural way to go. These hub cap-sized confections boast chewy, soft innards with a crisp, slightly caramelized exterior. As at Burke’s Bacon Bar, the bacon-flecked chocolate chip cookies are the ultimate indulgence.
The folks behind Logan Square’s Boiler Room pizzeria strike again, this time with burgers. Parts & Labor is a new burger spot with a nostalgic nod to South side institution, Wonderburger. The restaurant has long been owned and operated by the Grant family, and Parts & Labor marks Russ Grant’s homage to the time-tested family business. Classic griddle burgers are the name of the game at Parts & Labor. The no-frills menu focuses on double burgers with American cheese, onions, lettuce, pickles, and mayo, with sides such as fried giardiniera, curly fries, onion rings, and fried pickles. For dessert, there’s a fried Twinkie with raspberry sauce, and a couple floats.
One surefire way to up the ante on fried chicken is by slathering it in honey butter. The aptly named Honey Butter Fried Chicken does just that, shattering new resolutions with a menu full of honeyed fried chicken, corn muffins, pimento mac & cheese, chicken fat gravy, creamed corn, and chocolate-toffee-cocoa nib cookies. It’s a veritable wonderland of indulgence, and there’s no better way to start the new year.
A restaurant called mEAT is undoubtedly a solid option for resolution-smashing. This new spot puts meat front-and-center, most notably on skewers. Bacon-wrapped chicken, pistachio-crusted pork, beef tenderloin tips, and meatballs are just some of the skewers on hand, along with fondue, crab rangoon flatbread, bacon-onion tarts, creamed corn, and Greek potatoes. To drink, cocktails offer a modern riff on classics, like a maple foam Manhattan, a Magic Margarita with a sugar-salt rim, a Pisco Burgundy Sour, and The American Mule made with American Harvest vodka, housemade ginger syrup, fresh lime, and a lime and crystalized ginger skewer.
Burke's Bacon Bar
610 N. Rush Street, Chicago
(312) 660-7200
Website
Cookies & Carnitas
5757-59 N. Broadway, Chicago
(773) 769-2900
Website
Parts & Labor
2700 N. Milwaukee Avenue, Chicago
(773) 360-7840
Website
Honey Butter Fried Chicken
3361 N. Elston Avenue, Chicago
(773) 478-4000
Website
mEAT
3339 N. Halsted Street, Chicago
(773) 871-2682
Website
