[LouisVanDerWright]

^^^ Yeah it just goes back to what I said earlier about Chicago having a less pretentious dining culture. Honestly while accolades like James Beard Awards and Michelin ratings are great and all for city vs city pissing matches, I'm actually interested in what actual innovation is happening and on what scale. From that perspective Chicago hasn't slowed a bit with interesting establishments popping up all over the place including in former backwaters like Bridgeport, Pilsen, Little Village/Tri Taylor, etc. Sometimes these places get a Michelin Star, sometimes they don't. I don't really care.

L20 was great, so was Charlie Trotters, but those aren't what make Chicago interesting. Frankly I'm more interested in the origins of the Kronos Gyro, the hotdog, italian beef, etc. in Chicago's working class past than I am in the fact that a restaurant closed because the proprietor died.