Entries associated with the tag "Oktoberfest":

saturday11

The North Park Village Nature Center hosts a free Harvest Festival today and tomorrow with a farmers’ market, food vendors, tours of the nature preserve, a scarecrow-building contest, storytelling, and live music. Sat-Sun 10 AM-3 PM, 5801 N. Pulaski, 312-744-5472.

The Culinary Historians of Chicago presents The Sweet History of French Pastry with Mark Seaman, pastry chef and owner of local catering company Marked for Dessert. He’ll discuss regional variations on French desserts and the influence of the French Revolution on madeleines, macarons, and crepes. “Reference materials” include samples of Seaman’s pastries. 10 AM-noon, Kendall College, 900 N. North Branch, 708-788-0338, rsvpchc@yahoo.com, $5.

The Alliance Française presents a class on cooking with cider, from beef and onions braised in cider to cider-soaked pain perdu with apples and cinnamon-apple ice cream. There'll also be a tasting of hard ciders from around the world. 10 AM-12:30 PM, 810 N. Dearborn, 312-337-1070, $85 ($75 members).

Taste Food and Wine hosts an Oktoberfest celebration with beer (including Spaten), cheese, and sausages. 7-8:30 PM, 1506 Jarvis, 773-761-3663, $25, $20 in advance. 

sunday12

The Andersonville Dessert Crawl is actually two crawls, each hitting a dozen restaurants: the Swedish Stroll, 1-4 PM, includes Ann Sather, Swedish Bakery, and Pasticceria Natalina; the Rainbow Route, from 3-6 PM, features Big Jones, Kopi, M. Henry, and others. In Fine Spirits is also offering ten-wine tastings at 3 and 5 PM. Both routes start at the Swedish American Museum, 5211 N. Clark, 773-728-7552, $25 for one, $40 for two, $20 for wine tasting.

wednesday15

Galleria Liqueurs on Southport hosts a champagne tasting of ten brands, including Moet & Chandon and Veuve Clicquot. 6-8 PM, 3409 N. Southport, 773-857-6200, $10.

thursday18

The Hokkaido Fair at Mitsuwa Marketplace starts today and continues through Sunday, featuring vendors from Hokkaido, Japan, selling products including miso butter corn ramen, Sumire ramen, ice cream, crab and squid bento boxes, pastry, and deep-fried fish cakes. 9 AM-7 PM, 100 E. Algonquin Rd., Arlington Heights, 847-956-6699. 

LTHForum is now taking nominations for its Great Neighborhood Restaurant awards (i.e., places other than the 90 already named GNRs). Nominations will continue through September 30, and discussion through October 15, with the winners announced in November.

The Berghoff's annual Oktoberfest continues through Saturday, with German food, beer, and live music. 11 AM-9 PM, corner of Adams and Dearborn, 312-427-3170, free admission. 

saturday20

The Chicago Foodways Roundtable presents Exploring the Culinary Collections at the Newberry Library, with Riva Feshbach, the library’s exhibits manager. Feshbach will discuss some of her favorite discoveries from the collections and share tips on how to use the catalog to find tomes like the 1494 De Honesta Voluptate et Valetudine (“On Right Pleasure and Good Health”) or John Drury’s 1931 Dining in Chicago. 10 AM, Kendall College, 900 N. North Branch, 847-432-8255 or chicago.foodways.roundtable@gmail.com, $2.

The Urban County Fair at Garfield Park Conservatory is a harvest celebration featuring composting and food preservation classes by instructors from the UIC Extension, a beekeeping demonstration, and a tour of neighborhood community gardens. There are also a farmers' market and food vendors (including honey), garden tool sharpening, a recipe swap, and live music. 11 AM-5 PM, 300 N. Central Park, 773-638-1766, free.

Oktoberfest at Sheffield's is a fixed-price affair with six craft brews, brats, and other German-style food, plus music by the Polkaholics. Noon-6 PM, 3258 N. Sheffield, 773-281-4989, $25. 

At Tea Time With Eva Eliscu [PDF], the writer and restaurateur will explain how tea, coffee, and cocoa changed the history and culture of the Western world. After a champagne reception, attendees will have afternoon tea, with finger sandwiches, pastries, and scones with Devonshire cream and lemon curd prepared by Chalkboard chef Gilbert Langlois. 2-4 PM, Chalkboard, 4343 N. Lincoln, 708-383-7543, $49.

sunday21

The Mitchell Museum of the American Indian hosts its annual Buffalo Roast and Fall Festival, with a buffet of roasted buffalo meat, wild rice salad, fry bread, and wojapi, a Plains Indian berry pudding. There’ll also be a demonstration of powwow dance steps and traditional Native American storytelling. 1-4 PM, 3001 Central, Evanston, 847-475-1030, $25, $10 kids under 13.

tuesday23

Delilah's hosts a tasting of Oktoberfest, harvest, and pumpkin beers, including Ayinger, Paulaner, and Hacker-Pshorr Oktoberfest, Sierra Nevada Harvest Ale, and New Holland Ichabod and Dogfish Head pumpkin ales. 5-9 PM, 2771 N. Lincoln, 773-472-2771, no cover (beers can be purchased in two-ounce samples or by the bottle).

wednesday24

A Three Floyds Brewery Dinner at the Galway Tribes Irish Pub & Ale House features six Three Floyds beers and five courses—the last beer comes after the meal. The brewery’s motto, “It’s Not Normal,” is the theme; fare includes ostrich meat loaf and turnip-whipped mashed potatoes with mushroom-wine sauce (paired with Alpha King Pale Ale), corn succotash and “a bushel of Irish corn dogs” (with Gorch Fock Helles), and chocolate-pumpkin creme brulee (with Moloko Plus milk stout). 6 PM, 9680 Lincoln Way Lane, Frankfort, 815-464-9881, thegalwaytribes.com, $49 plus tax/tip.

The Wine Discount Center's Elston Avenue store hosts "a unique and oddly healthy" event Thursday, pairing fruits from Seedling Fruit--fresh, grilled, and in salads, entrees, and desserts--with wines. It starts at 7 PM and costs $25 per person.

Pastoral offers a free tasting Thursday of Point Reyes blue cheese, plus a chance to meet Jill Giacomini-Basch, part of the family that makes the cheese. She'll be at the Broadway store from 6-8 PM.

Feeling flush? Friday at 7, Eno is opening its three bottles of 1945 Chateau Latour, one of the rarest and most expensive wines in the world. They're offering 2-ounce and 6-ounce tastings, which will cost $250 and $750, respectively. Reservations are recommended.

Even if a taste of some of the world's most expensive wine is out of your price range, tasting the most expensive coffee in the world might be feasible. On Saturday at 7 PM at its Roasting Works, Intelligentsia brews the famous Geisha coffee beans from the Hacienda la Esmeralda estate in Panama, for which it paid a record $130 a pound at auction. $25 gets you a taste of the premium coffee and a quarter pound of beans from the same estate, though not the super expensive ones. If you want to buy those, it'll set you back $55 for a quarter pound or $99 for a half pound.

Oktoberfest, with its brats and beer, is all over Chicago this weekend:

• The Seventh Annual Oktoberfest Chicago (which used to be called the St. Alphonsus Oktoberfest) is this Friday 5-10 PM, Saturday 11 AM-10 PM, and Sunday 11:30 AM-8 PM in Lakeview and costs $5.
• First St. Paul's Oktoberfest at its Evangelical Lutheran Church, Saturday 5-10 PM, includes live polka music by Flechsig's Oktoberfest Band. It costs $10-25; proceeds benefit First Saint Paul's ministries.
• St. Michael's Oktoberfest is Sunday from noon to 5 PM in Lincoln Park; it's $10.
• ELVN's Oktoberfest, Sunday from 3-7 PM in Wrigleyville, is the only one to boast a pig roast. Its $20-25 entry fee goes to benefit six local charities.

The Brookfield Zoo's annual Wines in the Wild fund-raiser is Sunday from 4-7 PM at the zoo's Discovery Center, featuring a tasting of more than 60 wines, hors d'oeuvres, and both a live auction and silent auction. Tickets are $100 per person; proceeds benefit the zoo's conservation and education programs.

The Highland Park Historical Society hosts a talk Tuesday on Learning to Cook in 1898: A Chicago Culinary Memoir. Presented by author Ellen F. Steinberg and Eleanor Hudera Hanson, it's at 7 PM in the Highland Park Library auditorium.

Also Tuesday at 7, Next Food Network Stars the Hearty Boys sign their new book, Talk with Your Mouth Full, which provides recipes and catering tips, at Borders on Michigan.

Addendum!

Speaking of pumpkin beer,  Tuesday it's the Oktoberfest and Pumpkin Beer Festival at Delilah's. On tap are tastings of just about every Oktoberfest brew available, including a four-year vertical tasting of Ayinger Oktoberfest offerings, plus pumpkin ales from New Holland, Dogfishhead, Lakefront, and others. Two-ounce tastes are $1 a pop, or throw down $20 and try everything. It's free to watch everyone else get drunk.