Feb 11
The Freddie from Calabria Imports (Claire Hungerford)
Inspired by a recent article in Dining Chicago on the city’s lesser-known signature sandwiches, I set out last week to find and consume three that are native to the South Side: the big baby, the Freddy and the mother-in-law. My expedition very quickly deteriorated into a desperate search, however. I met with caged, closed storefronts, wrong turns, and bad directions. I drove past blocks of boarded buildings, torn signs, and trash, then unexpectedly emerged into neat rows of houses, time-warped out of the ’70s. My physical journey through the South Side landscape to discover the sandwiches illuminated a historic movement of people, cultures, and tastes. Read the rest of this entry »
Sep 23
The story of Chicago’s Southwest Side is a classically American one. Immigrants—Poles, Lithuanians, Italians, Germans, Czechs—flocked to the area in the early 20th century after the extension of streetcar lines made it an easy commute. Railroads and stockyards—including the famous Union Stock Yard portrayed in Upton Sinclair’s novel “The Jungle”—brought an abundance of jobs to neighborhoods such as Brighton Park and New City. For the next half-century, the primarily residential area thrived, until the industry it relied on began to disappear. In the latter part of the 20th century, the Southwest Side experienced a decline in population and prosperity that coincided with increasingly tense race relations in neighborhoods like Gage and Marquette Parks, where school desegregation met fierce opposition from white residents who feared plummeting property values. Residents in some neighborhoods formed community associations to help cope with the conflict—often successfully, as in the case of diverse, middle-class Gage Park. Today, a growing number of Southwest Side residents are Hispanic—approximately 80 percent in Gage Park and in Little Village, where nearly half that number is foreign-born. The area appears to be on the upswing, thanks in part the construction of the Orange Line connecting Midway Airport to downtown, which has been a boon for property values and the local economy. Read the rest of this entry »
May 28
Illustration by Sam Bowman
Long rows of windows, which once filled large, open rooms with light, are now boarded and permanently shut. At night the alleyways, littered with trash, are pitch black, hiding loiterers who lurk in the shadows. These steel mills stand throughout the South Side, and for most Chicagoans, the abandoned lots are forbidden territory. But for Chicago crime-writers, these buildings are where their greatest stories begin.
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May 06
Sautéed shrimp with rice and ripe plantains at Garifuna Flava; Helenmary Sheridan
The menu at Garifuna Flava reflects the cooking of the Garifuna people in Belize and elsewhere in Central America, a fusion derived from African, Latin American, and indigenous cuisines. Fish, rice, corn, and bananas play prominent roles, and offerings range from familiar Latin standards with a Caribbean twist (guacamole served with plantain chips) to homey, comforting dishes offered few places else (cow foot soup, cassava cake.) We sat down with some ginger beer and Ting, a Caribbean grapefruit soda, and set to sampling.
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