Chow Down Chicago: Good Eats from the Windy City

What makes a cheeseburger a "cheezborger"? When it's served at an establishment known for a stray farm animal, a sports curse, a Saturday Night Live skit, and Chicago-style attitude. I'm talking, of course, about the Billy Goat Tavern and Grill, one of the city's most famous burger joints. And the story behind the Billy Goat is stranger than fiction. The Billy Goat got its start in 1934 when Greek immigrant William Sianis purchased a tavern across the street from the Chicago Stadium (now the United Center). One day, a goat fell off a passing truck outside and wandered into the tavern. Sianis adopted the goat, who he named Murphy, grew a goatee himself, and soon became known by the nickname "Billy Goat." He also named his tavern after his new pet, who became the establishment's mascot. Among other pastimes, Murphy developed a fondness for drinking beer. Murphy would soon become infamous when he played a key role in a feud between Sianis and the Chicag...

There's a special tradition at Chet's Melody Lounge, a neighborhood bar located on Archer Avenue across the street from Resurrection Cemetery in southwest suburban Justice. Every Sunday, the bartender makes a bloody mary and leaves it in front of an open stool at the end of the bar. The seat and drink are reserved for none other than Resurrection Mary, Chicago's most famous ghost. I'll give you a recipe for a special Chicago-style bloody mary that you can use to make your own offering to this legendary ghost, but first here's a little more about Resurrection Mary. Chicagoans from all walks of life know about this vanishing hitchhiker ghost who haunts Archer Avenue and surrounding areas. Various songs have been written about her,* and her story was even featured on an episode of "Unsolved Mysteries" in 1994.  The most common Resurrection Mary story goes something like this: A driver picks up a young woman in a white dress, often after a dance. When the car ...

  Jeppson's Malört was once a niche liqueur consumed mainly within Chicago's Swedish community. Now it's a Chicago favorite that can be found throughout the city and beyond. What caused this change? Turns out all it took was for someone to promote the comedic value of this extremely bitter-tasting drink. Malört is a Swedish liqueur similar to absinthe that is made with wormwood, a bitter herb. It has traditionally been used to treat intestinal parasites and other maladies such as indigestion, hangovers, and nausea. The word malört is Swedish for wormwood .  In the 1920s, Swedish immigrant Carl Jeppson started making his own version of Malört. (He came from a region in Sweden where wormwood grows wild.) Jeppson sold his liqueur door to door in Chicago's Swedish community on the North Side. He got around Prohibition laws by marketing his product as a tonic to cure stomach worms and parasites. Law enforcement concluded that because of its awful taste nobody would drink Mal...

Before the Chicago-style hot dog, there was the Depression dog. A more scaled-down version of the Chicago-style hot dog with its many toppings, the Depression dog is topped with only mustard, onions, sport peppers, and sometimes relish. It comes on a plain bun and is usually served with french fries that are either wrapped up with the dog or tossed on top of it. As the name suggests, Depression dogs were popular in Chicago around the time of the Great Depression (1929-1941). When looking at the origins of the Depression dog, it becomes clear that hot dogs and immigrants are closely linked. German immigrants brought sausage to the United States, and hot dogs became a popular street food in all major American cities that had German immigrant populations. The name “hot dog” was coined around 1890 and came from claims at the time that immigrants ate dogs and cats. (History repeats itself.)   During the Great Depression, vegetable cart owners in Chicago would sell hot dogs and fries wi...

Most people know the nursery rhyme "Hot Cross Buns," but lesser known is just how far back in history these treats go. Since ancient times, hot cross buns have been a way to celebrate faith, spring, and new life.  Ancient Egyptians, Greeks, and Romans offered small round breads with cross symbols to their gods and goddesses. Depending on the celebration, the cross symbolized the four seasons, the four quarters of the moon, or the horns of the sacrificial ox. In Greece, these ceremonial breads were called boun , which is where the word "bun" comes from. Pagan Anglo-Saxons baked crossed cakes to honor their goddess Eostre, who was celebrated with a springtime festival. Some elements of this festival were later adopted by Christians as Easter. In 1361, Christian monk Brother Thomas Rocliffe of St. Albans, England, developed a recipe for what he called "Alban buns" and distributed these crossed buns to the poor on Good Friday. Now the buns took on a Christian ...

Twinkies are one of the most popular snack cakes in America. Invented in 1930 in suburban Chicago, the Twinkie has enjoyed worldwide popularity and is still going strong today. The Twinkie was invented by James Dewar, a bakery manager at the Continental Baking Company in River Forest. Dewar wanted to find a use for the machines that made strawberry shortcakes that were dormant when strawberries weren’t in season. He made banana cream-filled cakes because bananas were plentiful year-round. The name Twinkie was inspired by a billboard that Dewar saw for Twinkle Toe Shoes. A pack of two Twinkies cost only a nickel, which helped their popularity since it was the Great Depression. The Twinkie soon took off.   In the 1940s, production using bananas was affected by World War II rationing, so the company instead used vanilla cream for Twinkie filling. It became popular, so they stuck with it. The Continental Baking Company was eventually purchased by Hostess, and production moved to a Sc...