Lucky's Sandwich Co.

When the BF first told me about this place, I was a little skeptical. I mean come on - a place that serves huge sandwiches with lunch meat, fries, and cole slaw?! It sounds pretty crazy. Nevertheless, we headed up to Lucky's in Wrigleyville one Saturday afternoon. 


All the sandwiches on the menu are the same price ($7.50) and come on thick cut white bread, seasoned french fries, tomatoes, and cole slaw. Yeah...these sandwiches aren't meant to be part of a healthy diet. 


After some deliberation I chose the corned beef sandwich. Even though the place was really crowded and they only have one server, the food came out surprisingly quickly. These sandwiches are so huge its hard to get everything in one bite. Buuuuut this was seriously 


the 
most 
delicious
sandwich


I ever ate! And this is coming from a person who usually will never eat cole slaw! The meat is perfectly tender and thinly sliced and the french fries are crunchy on the outside and soft on the inside -- exactly like a fry should be! I'm surprised to even be saying this but I think that the cole slaw really makes this sandwich. It really sounds crazy but the crunchiness and tangy-ness of the cole slaw goes perfectly with the fries. 

These sandwiches are so gigantic that its difficult to eat the whole thing at once, but if you are really brave you can enter the eating challenge. If you can eat three of these sandwiches within a half hour, they are free! (If you can eat all three in one hour, then one of them is free) 


Lucky's is so good I've actually gone back two times since I first went there and have been happy every time! I do have to say - my favorite is still the corned beef though! 


Check out their website here!

Sin

As long as I can remember my aunts and grandma have been making this dessert for Christmas and Easter family parties and let me tell you - it is SINFULLY good!! This recipe is so easy to make and I can assure you that it will definitely be a hit whenever you make it! 

Ingredients

• 24 Oreo cookies
• 1/4 c. melted butter
• 1/2 gallon vanilla ice cream (really you could use whatever kind you want)
• 1 (16 oz.) can Hershey syrup
• 1 (15 oz.) can Eagle Brand sweetened condensed milk
• 1/2 c. butter

Directions

Crush cookies and add melted butter. Pat into 13"x9" glass pan. Freeze 30 minutes. Soften ice cream and spread over crumbs. Freeze 30 minutes. 


Make sauce with syrup, milk and butter. Bring to a boil. (Be careful, mixture sticks to pan.) Stir frequently. Simmer 5 minutes. Cool. Add 1 teaspoon vanilla. 


Pour sauce over ice cream layer. Freeze 30 minutes. Cover with plastic wrap.

Flirty Cupcakes

If Mollys is my number 1 cupcake stop, Flirty Cupcakes is definitely a close second. when I first heard about flirty cupcakes, I was in awe. A van that drives around and brings cupcakes to people?? That's basically the adult equivalent of the ice cream truck for children! It was like a dream come true for me. and remember, this is before food trucks became the next big thing and you started seeing them all over the place. I started following them on facebook and waited patiently until the day that they said they would be stopping nearby. and finally, the day arrived. I logged into facebook to see that they would be arriving in about an hour. I waited not so patiently as the minutes ticked by, and i was out the door on my way to meet the van right on time. When I got there, I realized that I guess I should have prepared for a head of time because there was already a long line ahead of me. I ended up being even more disappointed when they called out that they had run of out cupcakes before I even got to the front of the line. It was a sad day for me and i had to wait at least another month before I got another chance at flirty cupcakes. I was more prepared this time, I think I got there as they were pulling up. i was basically jumping for joy while waiting in line behind a mother and daughter, who was also clearly very excited about her cupcakes. When i got to the front of the line, the girl in the van made some comment along the lines of "oh to be young and easily excited again..." I laughed along but truthfully, I was that happy to be getting cupcakes too.  I had already memorized what I was going to get; the curious george, s'more me over. It took some self control but i didn't eat all the cupcakes at once.

s'more me over: this is a chocolate cupcake with a graham cracker crust and frosting that's kind of a mix between frosting and a s'more and topped with a Hershey's chocolate. The cake itself was moist and delicious (not over powering like i think some chocolate cakes can be) and the s'more frosting was light and fluffy. The cupcake is a little messy with the crust but still super delicious. I don't know if i would go so far as to say its better than real s'more though..

the curious george: this is a banana chocolate cupcake with salted buttercream frosting. The cake is perfectly chocolatey and moist with just the smallest hint of banana, but its definitely there. The buttercream frosting tastes slightly more processed than i would prefer but still oh-so-yummy that i really don't care all that much. The saltiness balances out the frosting and chocolate and makes me want to consider sprinkling salt on every cupcake i eat. I have gotten this cupcake time and time again and it never gets old.

Check out their website here!

Kanela Breakfast Club

I first read about kanela breakfast club in the redeye, made a note in my phone that I should check it out sometime, and the promptly forgot about it for a few months or so. Months later I came across the note again and my phone  and though ohhh yeah, I should go there sometime. So on a Wednesday morning during spring break, I told my boss that I was going into work late and we headed up to Clark street to kanela breakfast club. I'm not entirely sure, but I think this is the kind of place that gets super crowded on the weekends, but since it was a weekday, there was only one other group in the restaurant, and we were seated right away.


While we were looking at the menu, the waiter came over and poured our waters, assuring us that all of their water is filtered for extra purity (something I guess I don't worry about too much, but apparently its quite a concern to some and now that I do think about it, with Chicago water you really cant be too careful). So we drank our filtered water and looked through the menu. The selection itself is pretty small, around 10 things to choose from probably, but everything sounded delicious. BF and I usually share whatever we order because i have the (not so?) endearing habit of wanting to taste everything that everyone around me ordered. I decided to go the sweet route with the bacon waffles (go ahead and drool right now...) and he went savory with the lorraine scramble.

We hardly had to wait at all for our our food, probably because there was no one there so it came out really quickly. I wasn't quite sure what to expect with the chocolate covered bacon waffles but it ended up not only being waffles with little bits of chocolate and bacon mixed in, but also three HUGE chocolate covered bacon pieces setting atop the whipped cream on the waffles. For all those people who swear that bacon and chocolate should not go together - let me tell you - you are wrong! the savoriness of the bacon goes perfectly with the sweetness of chocolate. this is probably one of my favorite breakfast things I've had. The heaviness of the waffles and the richness of all the flavors was a little much after a while so I couldn't finish the entire thing on my own, but it was absolutely divine.

Overall, its a little on the pricey side, but I've found that to usually be the case with specialty breakfast places, and the food makes it totally worth a few extra dollars! They have some awesome juice blends too so I definitely recommend checking those out too!!


Check out their website here!

Magnolia Bakery

I was SOO excited when I found out that the famous Magnolia Bakery of New York had opened up a storefront in downtown Chicago. You can probably tell that I LOVE cupcakes and I rarely find one that I don’t like. That being said, I was sadly disappointed in Magnolia Bakery. The store itself is located right in the middle of downtown Chicago on State Street (right by Macy’s) and it really is adorable inside with kind of an old soda shop feeling. We went on a Saturday afternoon so naturally it was extremely busy. The line moved quickly so that wasn’t a problem at all, but the seating inside is very sparse. They had probably less than 10 tables with only 2 or 3 chairs each. Maybe it was just bad timing with when we went but there were at least double that amount of people inside the bakery at that moment so we ended up not being able to eat there, which wasn’t a huge deal. 

The thing that I was most disappointed about were the cupcakes. I got a red velvet cupcake with cream The cheese frosting and the BF got a pumpkin spice whoopee pie with maple cream cheese frosting. The cupcake first…the cake was dry and almost flavorless in my opinion. Usually red velvet cupcakes are very strong in flavor compared to other cupcakes, and this one was sadly bland. It was also crusty and hard around the top -  maybe just a bad batch but it seemed extremely over-cooked. Unlike normal cream cheese frostings, which I usually find to be smooth and creamy, this was conjealed and lumpy, like it was mixed with the butter at the wrong temperature. Needless to say, it was one of the worst cupcakes I’ve had. The whoopie pie wasn’t much better..the frosting was about the same texture as that of the cupcake, but the pumpkin spice cake had a really good flavor which wasn’t over powering but definitely had a strong hint of pumpkin. 

I was really disappointed by my trip to Magnolia Bakery because I had heard so many good things about it and I just left feeling unsatisfied by what we had gotten. I am willing to give it one more try because suppodly their banana pudding is famous so maybe I’ll have to revise my opinion a little bit based on my experience with that but for now I give Magnolia Bakery (in Chicago) a big thumbs down.

Prosciutto Wrapped Asparagus

Yesterday I made these amazing prosciutto cups with veggies and a baked egg that I found on Deliciously Organic, one of the blogs that I regularly look at. I had some prosciutto left over so I decided to make prosciutto wrapped asparagus to go alongside the eggs benedict that I made tonight! If you are in a rush, this is a great side to prepare because it takes literally five seconds to prepare and then you can just stick it in the oven to cook! I had some of the honey Dijon mustard dressing left over from the eggs benedict and it ended up pairing really well with the asparagus.

 

 Makes 2 servings

Calories per Serving: 109

Total Fat: 4.1 g

Carbs: 9.2 g

 Protein: 8.5 g

Ingredients  

• 4 slices prosciutto (I buy the packaged kind)
• 1/2 bunch  asparagus 

Honey Dijon Mustard Dressing

• 1 tsp honey
• 1 tsp Dijon Mustard

Directions

1. Wash the asparagus thoroughly and cut off the bottom half inch from each stalk. I prefer thin asparagus, but if you are using the thicker stalks you may want to use a vegetable peeler to remove some of the tougher skin towards the bottom of each.
2. Wrap about 4 or 5 stalks with a slice of prosciutto.
3. Place each bunch on a foil lined pan and bake for about 20-30 minutes, until the asparagus is tender.
4. Top with Honey Dijon Mustard Dressing.

Ham & Cheese Eggs Benedict with Honey Dijon Mustard Dressing

You would think after the Easter holiday I would be sick of eggs but for some reason I just cant get enough of them! And when the BF brought home a whole big bag of ham from celebrating Easter with his family, I started thinking of what I could make to combine the two. Normally I’m not too crazy about ham but I do enjoy the occasional ham and cheese sandwich. I decided to combine that with the egg and came up with an open face ham and cheese eggs benedict with honey Dijon mustard dressing. It’s really just a small twist on the classic eggs benedict, and just a little bit more healthy with the addition of the greens and without the hollandaise sauce. 

 

Makes 1 Serving 

Calories per Serving: 232

Total Fat: 10.3 g

Carbs: 16.1 g

Protein: 18.5 g

Ingredients 

• 1/2 english muffin (I actually used half a Arnold Sandwich Thin but the english muffin is probably the more traditional route)
• 1 egg, at room temperature
• 2 slices ham
• 1/8 cup cheddar cheese (I use the Jewel fat free mild cheddar brand)
• A handful of spinach
• 1 tablespoon Dijon mustard
• 1 tablespoon honey 

Directions 

1. Boil a pot of water for the poached egg. Bring the water to a rolling boil, then reduce the heat by about half and add about 1 tablespoon of distilled white vinegar for every liter of water to help the egg keep its round form.  If this is the first time you’ve poached an egg you may want to keep an eye on it the whole time, but if you are already an old pro you can start getting the other stuff ready. The perfect poached egg has a rounded shape and is firm but the yolk should still be runny. You can test if its done by using a slotted spoon to raise the egg out of the water and poking it. The center should bounce back to the touch while the outer white portion should feel more firm. When done, remove from the water and blot dry.
2. Heat up a skillet on the stove top and place the slices of ham onto the skillet. Sprinkle the cheese over the ham to melt.
3. Toast the English muffin.
4. Place the ham, cheese, and poached egg onto the English muffin. Combine the honey and Dijon mustard and drizzle over the sandwich.
5. Enjoy!