Biscuit Report - Alps West

This morning I did something I hadn't done since about 1991 -- I ate at Alps West at Irving and Elston. (Mrs. JiLS accompanied me, something that also couldn't have happened back then.) Anyway, Alps is a standard Chicago diner (actually a substantially cleaner and more prosperous looking diner than most) and though I'd like to go back and try the blintzes before nominating it for election, nevertheless I do need to report on the biscuit nirvana I experienced there today.

Here are the details. I ordered my default breakfast of biscuits & gravy with scrambled eggs and bacon on the side (and no, I don't usually eat breakfast, but I like to make it count when I do). The gravy was (typically for Chicago) just all wrong, being a plain milk and flour gravy with some chopped-up breakfast sausage tossed in it (I loaded it up with black pepper, which made it bearable, but the flavor ought to be in there when it's served).

However, under that wallpaper paste sat two little miracles, the two best, most perfect biscuits I've ever encountered north of Morgan County, Indiana. Most important, I think, they were the right size. With biscuits, bigger is NOT better. These little fellas were about an inch and a half or two inches across and just that high, as well. I don't care what you do with the ingredients, I don't think biscuits can bake right if they are too large -- they just come out either dry and inedible or gooey and doughy, or just taste like lard bombs. These, by contrast, were light (but not "pastry" light) and kept together (none of the "disintegrating biscuit" phenomenon I encounter so often). Anyway, I can hardly suggest someone make a pilgrimage to a diner just to try a biscuit, but if you do find yourself in Old Irving Park in the a.m., do check it out.

(And that's my 100th LTH Forum post ... glad it was on a topic I know and care about.)

Thanks Jim. Since it is about 100 ft from our church, we frequent there occasionally, but never was brave enough to order the B&G.

I find their pancakes passable and their coffee drinkable for diner food. Now I will have to try the biscuits - with butter and honey of course!

JimInLoganSquare wrote:Here are the details.

Jim,

I really enjoyed reading your biscuit details once again. You certainly know your biscuits.

Reason I'm posting to this thread is I thought of you yesterday while driving past Tommy's Grill on Damen. Sign on the marquee, iscuitsg gravy and a well worn look to the place that simply cried Biscuits and Gravy.

Please note, I did not go in, simply saw the sign, thought of JimInLoganSquare, Biscuit Man, swung around and took a picture. We may have a winner, I may owe you $3.95.

Tommy's Grill


Enjoy,
Gary

Tommy's Grill
456 N Damen Ave
Chicago, IL
312-421-3915

Is this merely a suggestion, or have you laid down the glove?

JimInLoganSquare wrote:Is this merely a suggestion, or have you laid down the glove?

Challenge, me issue a biscuit challenge to the resident biscuit master. Not me, no way.......

You been yet?