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This week — and through April 1 — we want to hear from you for our Readers’ Choice Awards. Cast your vote daily and tell us who made a difference in a dozen categories including Best New Restaurant, To-Go Cocktails, Meal Kits and more.
Meanwhile, as you’ve surely noticed, venues and restaurant throughout Chicagoland have continued to reopen, and the city is incentivizing outdoor dining on the West and South sides. Plus, we’ve got dinner options: our favorite Chicago Restaurant Week menus, a spring break-inspired recipe, and a “rising” take-and-bake pizza joint (get it?). See you Friday.
—Adam Lukach
We want you (to vote): Choose your favorite restaurants in the 2020 Readers’ Choice Takeout Awards
Awards season is in full swing, and that goes for the Tribune’s Dining section, too.
Last week, we shared our Critics’ Choice Award winners with you, celebrating the people who helped hold together Chicago’s hospitality industry during a trying 2020.
This week, the readers have the power in our Readers’ Choice Awards. Vote for your local favorites, and let the democracy of deliciousness commence.
As quick as you can say Grapefruit Sculpin India Pale Ale, Ballast Point’s storefront presence in Chicago has come and gone.
The California brewery cracked open the doors to an impressive space in Chicago’s West Loop in 2018. At first, the downturn in business caused by COVID-19 prompted Ballast to close its Chicago brewpub temporarily, but now it’s pulling the plug entirely.
Chicago Restaurant Week preview: 8 special menus we can’t wait to taste
Here’s a taste of something nice for 2021: Chicago Restaurant Week is back, and you don’t have to dine onsite to get the goods.
Diners will still get the typical Restaurant Week setup, with specially priced prix fixe menus ($25 for brunch/lunch and $39-$55 for dinner), but this year, they will also be available in takeout form.
Mayor launches Chicago Alfresco program to spur outdoor dining, offers limited $250,000 grants
What is this, Europe?
Chicago is doubling-down on its efforts to encourage outdoor dining with street closures that give off major piazza vibes. After the success of last year’s street closure program, the city announced plans this week to seek proposals from community organizations to create “community spaces anchored by outdoor dining” on the South and West sides.
Piece Pizzeria is back, Steingold’s delights, plus 16 more new restaurants and reopenings in Chicago
Restaurants are carefully planning their comebacks, and we’re running a tab of them. Check our latest list of returning restaurants and bars here.
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Harvest Moon Drive-In reopens this weekend, McHenry drive-in to follow
Medieval Times in Schaumburg will reopen castle doors next month
If nothing else, being stuck in a state of pandemic paralysis over the past year has provided plenty of time to reflect on the future for the developers of the Ramova Theater.
That meant a chance to reexamine plans to revive the 90-year-old, dilapidated movie theater and see how they could improve upon them.
Some great ideas come to fruition quickly. For new documentary “Flannery,” it took a decade.
The film about Flannery O’Connor — author of “Wise Blood,” the career-making short story collection “A Good Man is Hard to Find,” and a wealth of closely examined correspondence — comes to PBS as the brainchild of a pair of Loyola professors.
A beachy, spring break-inspired meal
Chicago weather changes by the day, so we know that here, “beachy” is a state of mind more than anything.
Check out Jean-Marie Brownson’s latest recipe, refreshing enough to put some spring in your step, at least until the weather stays warm.
What’s in season in spring: asparagus, spinach, peas and more
First thing’s first: Altamura Pizza was doing the “take and bake” thing before the COVID-19 shutdown made to-go operations a critical part of every restaurant’s business model.
The Hinsdale pizzeria and Italian shop was well equipped for the pandemic, which ironically bolstered their model. Here’s the story.