Entries associated with the tag "pickles":

Rick's Picks, a New York-based company that makes artisanal small-batch pickles, is in town this weekend sampling out its products, including Phat Beets (beets pickled in a rosemary, ginger, and lemon brine), Windy City Wasabeans (green beans pickled in a soy-wasabi brine), Smokra (pickled okra with smoked paprika, curry, and a bit of cayenne), GT 1000s (curried green tomatoes with Spanish onions), and Pepi Pep Peps (roasted red peppers).

The pickles will be matched with cheeses at Pastoral on Friday: beets with Bucheron goat cheese, green beans with Bleu d’Auvergne, green tomatoes with Ossau-Iraty sheep cheese, and roasted red peppers with Zamorano, another hard sheep cheese.

And at Provenance on Saturday, not only cheese but also wines from the Pacific Northwest will be thrown into the mix. The beets will be paired with Hook's blue cheese, the okra with Chouda (a cross between Gouda and cheddar), and bread-and-butter pickles will be served with Brunkow six-year cheddar. Specific wines haven't been chosen yet.

Friday: noon-3 PM at Whole Foods Lincoln Park, 1000 W. North; 4 PM-7:30 PM at Pastoral, 53 E. Lake

Saturday: 11 AM-3 PM at Fox & Obel, 401 E. Illinois; 4 PM-6 PM at Provenance, 2528 N. California

Sunday 2 PM-5 PM at Whole Foods Lincoln Park, 1000 W. North

Paul Virant of Vie is one of Food and Wine's best new chefs of 2007. Sad to say, I've never made the trek to Western Springs to eat at his restaurant. A vet of Trotter's, Everest, and Blackbird, he's all over the local/seasonal produce action--but he's taken it a step further by becoming an avid pickler, putting up his farmers' market finds  to carry his kitchen through the off season.

You don't see a lot of pickles in fine dining. But maybe that's about to change. A girl can dream.