Dinner at Giant

I swear I was like, just sitting on a train in France and writing my last post.

Then I blinked. Now I’m on my couch, I’m a year older, and it’s been a month since I last wrote. I’ve really been letting myself go, lately. I’ve really been letting myself go… to a bunch of awesome restaurants.

But let me take you back for a moment, to three weeks ago when I returned from our vacation; I was in a food depression. The day after we landed at O’Hare, we drove up to Wisconsin for a wedding. I’ll paint the picture for you.

We ate cheese curds.

We ate buffalo wings.

We ate Taco Bell.

But as good as all of that was, it was fleeting. It wasn’t France. It wasn’t me, eating a full wheel of camembert, living my best life. So I knew I was going to need to remind myself of all the divine restaurants we have right here in sunny Chicago.

I smashed the glass on my “OPEN ONLY IN CASE OF EMERGENCY” safe (aka opened my nightstand’s top drawer), and retrieved a gift certificate that I was waiting to use in a time of dire need. Dire need of a dope meal. It was a $100 certificate to Giant in Logan Square that my past coworkers had given me for my birthday (in 2017). Ever since I turned thirty, I apparently turned seventy… because now I keep paper gift certificates and coupons in my bedside table and let them pile up like treasury bonds.

I’d been waiting for a special time to go to Giant, which opened in 2016, and was crowned the #6 best new restaurant in the U.S. by Bon Appetit in 2017. I figured, two years in, it would be easier to get into. We went on a Tuesday. It was completely, utterly, sardine-packed.

Chef Jason Vincent is someone who’s talents have been on my radar for a long time. First at Lula Cafe, then at my beloved (R.I.P.) Nightwood, I’ve never tried something that’s come out of his kitchen that I didn’t love. We had just about memorized the menu before we even sat down, so I knew exactly what we were going to get.

Or so I thought, until I realized we were sitting directly next to Chef Zoe Schorr (Split-Rail, previously Ada Street). And if Zoe is dining at Giant, I’m having what she’s having, because she knows food. Through some DEEP creeping, we were able to identify some of the dishes she had ordered, and coupling that intel with the I-think-he-was-stoned recommendations of our server, we had a game plan.

Step 1. Super uni shooters. MASSIVE disclaimer here: this is some of the worst iPhone photography you’ll ever see on this blog. But importantly, the food at Giant simply is not photogenic. It’s not styled to look like something out of a magazine. There are no edible flowers delicately draped across the plate, with Jackson Pollock-caliber sauce spatters. It’s not really styled to look like it was styled at all. It just looks like delicious food... which is exactly what it was.

Okay, so where were we… step 1. Super uni shooters.

Inexplicable, $5 umami-bombs of fried uni butter. Liquid inside, fried outside. Kimchi-like slaw on the side. The second we ate these, we ordered another round. It was a quick $20 for two bites but honestly, we contemplated just getting twenty orders and calling it a day.

Step 2. Crab salad and waffle fries.

There was no fun and games going on here. This was exactly what it said on the menu. Crab salad. And waffle fries. And some sort of sauce but it wasn’t too memorable. I could have eaten a two pound Costco-sized tub of the crab salad. Anyone who knows me knows that I’m not a fry fan, but these were pretty good. They reminded me of the waffle fries at Rainforest Cafe that I had one time in 1994. Those were pretty good, too.

Step 3. Marinated zucchini.

If it wasn’t for the beautiful, often angry people of Yelp, I probably wouldn’t have even considered getting this dish. Zucchini, pumpkin seeds, and cilantro were the only words to describe the dish, which in any other context would elicit an audible, “ew,” from me. But Yelp said it was amazing, and I love trusting strangers with my food choices. My God. This was SO good. As Chris and I divvied it into two portions, my eyes were darting back and forth to make sure I wasn’t getting bamboozled. I still think I did.

I would give anything to have this recipe and make it at home because then maybe I would eat vegetables.

Step 4. Sweet & sour eggplant.

Another one of those things you read on a menu and think, “why.” But please, don’t think. Just do. This concoction had pancetta and cashews in it and was served with two house made flatbread pitas. Everything about this - EVERYTHING about this, was perfect. We were on a hot streak, and Chris and I were now looking at each other suspiciously wondering why everything was so, unbelievably, good.

Step 5. Tagliatelle with king crab.

Two crab dishes in one night. What did I do to deserve this? This pasta was very good, but just too buttery for my tastes. And I eat small pieces of Kerrygold butter sometimes when I’m cooking because I have zero shame, so that says a lot. But if given the opportunity to eat it again, would I? Still yes, but, it was my least favorite dish.

Step 6. Potato Ravioli with rock shrimp.

Imagine if your old Italian Nonna made you fresh ravioli, but instead of putting ricotta inside… she put mashed potatoes. This. It was so weird, but I loved it dearly. Tiny rock shrimp, sweet corn, the whole nine yards. None of these things should have gone together, but for whatever reason, they were perfectly matched. 

By the end of step 6, we were full blown full. We looked at the dessert menu, but the one thing I had planned all day on ordering wasn’t available. I knew it was fate and that I wasn’t meant to eat dessert that night. We asked for the bill, and then discussed whether or not to get one more uni shooter. On the check, we noticed that there was a line item for health insurance for the restaurant’s staff - Giant adds 2% to each bill to help subsidize the cost of the full health benefits they offer everyone who works there. Now that’s an added fee I can get behind.

The whole meal (plus wine, plus insurance) was $160 including tax and tip, so a mere $60 with the gift certificate. SIXTY BONES. Best money I’ve spent all year. Even at $160, it would be a steal for the amount of food we had and the quality. We drove home raving about how much we loved it and already wanted to go back.

The Forkling says: 9.1 forks out of 10.0.

And now let’s jump back in the Delorean and hit today, November 4th, where I’m wedged into my sofa watching Say Yes to the Dress and thinking about how I’m going to have to say ‘no’ to every dress because I’m slowly turning into a potato ravioli.

As Regina George once said:

“Is butter a carb?”