christine wrote:Thai Village has moved to a new, larger location in downtown St. Charles and is now called Thai Country. We are heading there tonight! Here is a news article with more details:

http://www.suburbanchicagonews.com/beaconnews/entertainment/2_5_AU31_REVIEW_S10831.htm

Has anyone been to the Blackberry Inn just across from the Fisherman's Inn? They have a sign bosting, "Home of the Belly Buster." It seems potentially a biker-friendly place from the few times I have passed it. I would love to hear more about it if anyone knows!

Also - I'm curious about Country House at Kirk & Fabyan - apparently one year in the last few they won best burgers in Chicago. Can anyone attest to their quality?

I'll post about Thai Country later.

Country House is near my home but I forget about it, wasn't impressed by my last visit. I have eaten at the Blackberry Inn a number of times when I worked out that way. The reubens and pork tenderloin were very good. There is a very small dining area and they have a patio but the main thing is that it is a bar. We went once after 2pm and were told the dining room is closed but we could go up to the hot dog stand that shares their parking lot, get something and eat at their tables. They do open up again for dinner and advertise specials for Mexican night on Thursday and a chicken night.

Yesterday I went to the Festival of the Vine in Geneva, and had lunch at Tuscana, the restaurant that has taken over the 302 West space. The restaurant is still lovely.

Service was an issue. My sister and I were considering a half bottle of Prosecco for $18. We mentioned this to the waiter, and asked how many glasses would be in a half bottle. He didn't really know, but tried to steer us to a bottle of Moet White Star ($59). This was to be the first of many attempts to steer us to more expensive menu items. For example, when we decided to have glasses of wine instead, he recommeded the Santa Margherita pino grigio, at something like $11 a glass. I think not.

On to the food. We started with an appetizer of mussels. They were excellent. The mussels were relatively small, in a white wine garlic broth that also had white beans and small slivers of sun-dried tomato. Great aroma when presented at the table. These were so good, in fact, that we ordered a second one. We were given good Italian bread as well, which made for great dipping. I think the mussels were around $9, and each order had about 16 or so. Really excellent.

For the rest of the meal, we simply had spinach salads. The half order cost $7.95, and consisted of spinach leaves, roasted red pepers and roasted onions, topped with toasted pancetta, pine nuts and gorgonzola cheese. The salad portion was very generous, with lots of gorgonzola cheese. It was really good, too.

Throughout the meal, the waiter attempted to sell us other dishes, which is fine, I guess, and I know it's his job. But I don't appreciate being steered toward high-priced items on the menu, especially when it comes to pino grigio.

I'll be going back for the mussels ASAP.

Tuscana Incredibly Italian
302 West State Street
Geneva
630-232-9500
http://tuscanaofgeneva.com/

On a separate note, I took a look at the menu for Niche, where I think most of the former 302 West staff migrated after the sale to Tuscana Incredibly Italian (what a stupid name). Anyway, the menu at Niche seemed very reminiscent of 302 West, with many seafood dishes, one beef, one poultry, etc. It also had butterscotch pudding as a dessert. Mmmmm....butterscotch pudding. Niche is open for dinner only, and is located in the old Chez Francois spot.

Niche
14 S. Third Street
Geneva

Thanks for the great info!!

What is the price range of Blackberry Inn? I am thinking bar food range, like $7-15 at the most. Is this correct? I always like to know lest I get blindsided, because that would spoil my meal if I felt overcharged for the food at hand. I could not find a website for them.

Has anyone been to Rain in Geneva? I admit I haven't searched LTH yet... I am off to!

christine wrote:Thanks for the great info!!

What is the price range of Blackberry Inn? I am thinking bar food range, like $7-15 at the most. Is this correct? I always like to know lest I get blindsided, because that would spoil my meal if I felt overcharged for the food at hand. I could not find a website for them.

Has anyone been to Rain in Geneva? I admit I haven't searched LTH yet... I am off to!

Blackberry Inn is definately in the bar food range, hey, that's still country out there!

tcdup wrote:For example, when we decided to have glasses of wine instead, he recommeded the Santa Margherita pino grigio, at something like $11 a glass. I think not.

The mediocrity of this wine is only exceeded by the aggressiveness of the marketing behind its distributor's drive for world domination; the $11 price per glass is typical and nonetheless shocking. At $4 a glass, I still wouldn't order it (though I confess to having generally little interest in the often characterless pino grigio)...

On to the food. We started with an appetizer of mussels. They were excellent... Really excellent.

That sounds like a nice dish.

... after the sale to Tuscana Incredibly Italian (what a stupid name)...

Indeed!

Antonius

Don't mean to go off on a tangent here, but I agree that pino grigio is a minor pleasure at best. I can't understand the price of the Santa Margherita here in the States. It's crazy.

Last fall, after a long, hot hour long trek from the Vatican to a neighborhood for pizza (only to find that it was take-out, not eat-in), we settled on a Chinese restaurant down the block. Santa Margherita was on the menu, at something like 7 euros for a half liter. I ordered it, since it was well-priced compared to the States, and I wanted to see what the fuss was about. I must have looked really frazzled, because when I came back from the ladies' room, the server had placed an open full bottle on the table (I guess I looked like we needed the whole bottle!). The wine was certainly nothing out of the ordinary, but was pleasant alongside our really nicely-done Chinese lunch.

So we went back to Aurora on Saturday to visit another Tourist Attraction No One Knows About-- the Aurora Regional Fire Museum. I highly recommend this to anyone with kids of an age where fire engines are right up there among the coolest things on earth-- it's the original Aurora fire station, complete with poles, stables, a pre-computer-age alarm system (how did they know, in 1920, which fire alarm was going off? This will show you), a tower to hang wet hoses in (never thought about how they keep the hoses from mildewing, did you?), old-fashioned sirens the kids get to crank, and half a dozen restored vintage fire engines. Ironically, and a little sadly, at the end of the tour they said something about raising money to put in computer kiosks and interactive exhibits "to make it more interesting to kids." Hey, I have a dumb old computer in my home-- what I don't have is a brass pole to slide down and a hand-cranked siren loud enough to wake the dead. If that isn't interesting to kids, what the HELL is?



Anyway, for lunch and dinner we pretty much did the Dicksond Western Suburbs Classic Tour. I had a vague idea of trying some of his recent Taqueria discoveries in Aurora itself, but when we stopped for gas near West Chicago I thought, we're here, this probably isn't the time to experiment, let's try By-By's again. I wasn't wild about the chivo this time-- what I got was very fatty and connective tissue-y-- but everybody else had gorditas or huaraches with all the fresh-fried masa goodness you could wish for, and pronounced themselves very happy.

After much aimless toodling (found a great Lionel train store in Oswego, the kids couldn't understand why I didn't immediately snatch up the Scrooge McDuck gold bar car for a mere $150), for dinner we first thought Katy's but, remembering that we had been there about 8 times this past year, and hadn't been to Fabulous Noodles since discovering Katy's, decided to hit that old GNR favorite for its beloved Yu Noodles Indonesian style, which were thoroughly enjoyed that night, and again the next day.

Someday we will go back, find the mysterious airplane museum which was most certainly NOT at the address we had found online, and try some of Dicksond's taquerias-- we passed by both Los Cabritos, which is in the kind of pointy building that bespeaks a 60s Mr. Swiss or something, and El Pollo Giro, which has moved out of its van (still parked in front) and appears to be operating happily in the strip mall.

Aurora Regional Fire Museum
Corner of New York and Broadway (Rt. 25), Aurora
(630) 892-1572

By-By's
142 W Washington St., West Chicago
630-562-1710

Fabulous Noodles
4663 Old Tavern Rd
Lisle
630-305-8868

Ageless Classics Museum of Transportation
100 S. River (not that we could see), Aurora
(630) 466-0888

Mike: The Aurora Airport, a few miles west of downtown Aurora, has a good sized collection of airplanes. Mostly former warbirds, both fixed-wing and helicopters. Could this be the museum you were looking for?

You beat me to it...the air classics museum is at the airport in Sugar Grove.

Right. Apparently there's more than one River Road/St./Whatever in Aurora, and the 100 S. address led us to a point a couple of blocks south of the fire museum which was not it.

River Street in Aurora is on the west side of the Fox River, the Fire Museum is on Broadway (Rte. 25) on the east side. The transportation museum you mention has been long gone, it housed the personal collection of cars of Lord Polumbo who owned the Farnsworth House in Plano at the time. Other kid worthy places in Aurora are the Walter Payton Museum, which is a half block north of the Fire Muesum, and The Schingoethe Center for Native American Cultures, which is housed at Aurora University. Check out this website for other attractions as well as places to eat and stay.

http://www.enjoyaurora.com/index.php?vi ... _galleries

I forgot to add Sci-Tech for kids of all ages, it's right in the downtown area too. To bring this back to food related, in the Aurora downtown is Tecilitan, a mom & pop family restaurant that is open for breakfast through dinner. I worked in the downtown for many years and my Mexican co-workers loved this place. It's about 2 blocks south of the Fire Museum on Broadway.

Tecilitan
35 S. Broadway
Aurora
630-892-8059

Sci-Tech
http://www.scitech.mus.il.us/

Good call on the SciTech Museum, it is good. It also has some arrangement with the Museum of Science and Industry so they each honor memberships of the other.

Have you been to Tecilitan lately? Seems to me the last time I went by it was closed and not just for the day, but I am not certain. And that is not how I would have guessed it was spelled, but I do recognize the address.

Sorry on the spelling, Tecalitan is correct. They are open now, they did do some remodeling recently, perhaps that's when you drove by. I forgot to mention that downtown Aurora is a series of one way streets and can be confusing, you might have to circle around a time or two to hit your destination but we're not talking about a big area, just about a 4 short block square.

Tecalitan
35 S. Broadway (corner of Broadway and Downer)
Aurora
630-892-8059

Tuscana and Rain in Geneva have closed.

tcdup wrote:Tuscana and Rain in Geneva have closed.

Yup, both owned by the same guy who has killed a few other places in Geneva over the last few years. Rain appears to have tax issues with the State and is reported in todays local paper as opening again soon as Social Club.

What? Rain has closed??

I have two $25 gift certs for there. They were thru restaurant.com, I think they can be refunded from what I remember reading.

Although I have to admit, the menu looked great around the first of they year - sorta of asian fusion-ish - and it was more steak house when I looked the other day. I had called them to ask a question, I mentioned the menu, and they said they change the menu as the chef sees fit.

Yes, Rain has been closed for a few weeks now and nothing new yet has happened there. They lost their State liqour license over tax issues.

We ate lunch at Thai Town yesterday. It is in South Elgin in the same strip mall as Blu Razz (Chinese Gourmet is also open now, btw, closer to the Dominick's).

I don't recall the entree names, mine was a wide rice noodle with veggies and was supposed to be spicy. I ordered it with beef. The beef was tougher than I had expected, in my mind, basically inedible. I think lots of Thai places use inexpensive beef, but it usually seems tenderized. There is no reason for tough beef, really. I inquired about it not being spicy at all, and I was brought a dish of crushed red chilis. I am not as up on my Thai as you all probably are but I guess I was expecting something wet to mix in for spice, not dried chilis. DH had spicy basil with beef & rice. His was spicy, it had actual jalapenos in the vegetable mix. Same beef as mine. I wish I had tried the chicken just so we'd know the quality of both meats.

The flavors were great, mine needed more spice and the beef is not a good choice. The decor was typical inexpensive Thai restaurant fare...cheap tables, pictures of Thailand. They did seem interested in making sure we enjoyed our food - the woman I presume to be the owner asked me if I was full when I asked to get the food wrapped. I think she was concerned I didn't like it. We didn't get anything else since it was just lunch and we didn't need a huge meal. I would go back, but I would get chicken next time, and inquire about spiciness level when I order. I might go one more time to try the yum woon sen and then make a final decision on the place. It isn't a wonderful Thai place, but it is close to home and if I can find a couple dishes I like enough to rotate between, I'd happily continue to go there when I want Thai close to home.

Thai Town
574 RANDALL RD
South Elgin, IL

We ate at Villa Verone in Geneva for the first time last night. Very good experience. Excellent service, good food. Not overdone like most American fake Italian (i.e. Olive Garden) restaurants. Quantities were just right; I'm not one who is impressed by the massive quantity places, I prefer just enough food, carefuly prepared.

Menu is relatively simple, with attention to detail.

http://www.villaverone.com/
416 Hamilton St., Geneva

They also have a location in Sycamore

Thanks for the review, Gargoyle. Their menu doesn't list prices - can you give us an idea what range they are in?

Gargoyle wrote:We ate at Villa Verone in Geneva for the first time last night. Very good experience. Excellent service, good food. Not overdone like most American fake Italian (i.e. Olive Garden) restaurants.

Italian born owner Pietro Verone would cringe if he saw that comparison.

christine wrote:Thanks for the review, Gargoyle. Their menu doesn't list prices - can you give us an idea what range they are in?

We ate very well for $50 for two people (without wine).

We generally don't order wine because I have a hard time paying $9 for a glass of Chianti when I can buy three bottles in Italy for that price. (curse the useless TSA rules that now forbid me from bringing two bottles back in my carryon each trip; now I have to ship them back).

LikestoEatout wrote:Italian born owner Pietro Verone would cringe if he saw that comparison.

My point being that his restaurant is the extreme opposite end of the spectrum from a fake place like Olive Garden.

Sig. Verone is charming, he was hanging out in the garden chatting with people and we enjoyed talking with him on the way out.

Gargoyle wrote:We generally don't order wine because I have a hard time paying $9 for a glass of Chianti when I can buy three bottles in Italy for that price. (curse the useless TSA rules that now forbid me from bringing two bottles back in my carryon each trip; now I have to ship them back).

Sig. Verone is charming, he was hanging out in the garden chatting with people and we enjoyed talking with him on the way out.

This place sounds interesting.

Regarding wine, you can still check a bag with some bottles, though you run into weight limitations. My least favorite wine story is when I was returning from Chile with a mixed case, nicely packed in my suitcase, and they made me remove the bottles and carry them. Then, changing planes in Miami, they complained that I had too much to carry on. It had already been a long day, and I believe I just went off on the poor lady who suggested this, since I was really aggravated by carrying all this wine around. She relented.

This was before they decided carry on liquids represented a terrorist threat. I could go off on another rant there, but it would either be forbidden political talk, or a security threat that would lead to the FBI shutting down LTHForum, and I surely do not want any of that to happen.