Barnaby’s Northbrook | $$
960 Skokie Northbrook, IL 847-498-3900barnabysofnorthbrook.com
Chaihanna | $
19 E. Dundee Buffalo Grove, IL 847-215-5044
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Chaihanna, often spelled choyhona, means “teahouse,” and in Uzbekistan the teahouse is the center of social interaction. Ideally in a shaded outdoor setting near a stream, it’s a place where folks—men, for the most part—while away the hours, drinking tea and snacking at leisure. That’s hemispheres away from the soulless-looking suburban strip mall that houses Chaihanna, but inside, decorative touches like the gorgeous hand-painted blue and white dishes encourage a reasonable suspension of disbelief. And the pace is authentically relaxed. On a typical weekend night you’ll find long tables filled with multigenerational parties sharing plates of kebabs, blintzes, lamb shanks, garlicky spiced eggplant, and pickled vegetables. Uzbek food is a cuisine of conquest and commerce, bearing the mark of the many ethnic groups that have passed through—or been forced through—the territory. Along with the majority Uzbeks, minority Russians, Tajiks, Kazakhs, and Tatars have overshadowed smaller but significant groups of Bukharan Jews (who emigrated en masse after the fall of the USSR) and even Koreans who were forcibly settled there by Stalin in the 30s. It’s tempting to see those influences in foods like the pickled vegetables. The cabbage, carrots, and tomatoes aren’t predominantly spiced by chiles, though they’re heavily impregnated with other flavors—cumin, clove, garlic, dill—and the bracing, dissociative shock of fizzy, fermented, salty watermelon reminds me of nothing so much as a thoroughly aged kimchi. The noodles Berrina in the meat soup laghman are related to the liang mien of the Chinese Muslim Uighur minority—that’s lo mein to you and me. Turkish manti are small, ravioli-like beef dumplings, but the Uzbek versions here are supersize; one’s stuffed with pumpkin and redolent of baking spices. Samsas are crispy, baked, meat-stuffed cousins to the Indian samosa. —Mike Sula
Among foods in Korea said to improve virility (octopus, dog), goat seems to play a few more roles, at least according to posters on the walls at Morton Grove’s Chun Ju, which tout it as a tonic for wrinkles, osteoporosis, circulation, liver, kidneys, and poor vision. (It’s allegedly good for pregnant women and for stamina in the hot summer months too.) The specialty of the house here is jeuk suk yum so bok um, or goat stew, an exceptionally earthy tabletop meal (for two) that combines a huge pile of fresh wild sesame leaves and toasted seeds (with their own medicinal properties) with green onions and shreds of rich, gamy goat meat. The leaves cook down in a thickish, mildly spicy broth and mingle with the meat and vegetables. If enough of the cooking juices remain afterward, rice, kimchi, and bean sprouts are dumped in the pan and heated until crisp on the bottom; called nurungji, this is scraped and amalgamated with the rest of the rice and vegetables for a satisfying final course. There’s a good selection of typical Korean noodle and rice dishes, soups, and stir-fries here, but the real attractions are the stews, which aside from goat include beef, pork, tripe, octopus, and monkfish. Panchan are good quality and include a terrific, chewy, raw pickled skate with shredded daikon (ask for hongeo hwe if it doesn’t come immediately). Note: the menu is bilingual but the only identifying English outside says “Korean Restaurant.” —Mike Sula
Inovasi | $$
28 E. Center Lake Bluff, IL 847-295-1000inovasi.us
Over the years William George has fed high-ranking politicians and celebrated screen actors. But his bread and butter is supplying the working Keralite expats of Chicagoland with the everyday foods of their homeland, which include a remarkable variety of meat, seafood, and vegetarian dishes flavored with a brilliant palette of spices—cinnamon, cardamom, cumin, chiles, garlic, ginger, coriander, and turmeric. In rough translation Kerala means “land of the coconut,” and the meat of the nut finds its way into a great number of edibles, from the thin, almost translucent fermented rice flour pancakes called palappam to the chunky, fiery, beef fry to the family of dry-fried minced vegetable dishes known as thoran. For the most part George’s cooking represents Kerala’s Syrian Christian community, which is noted for brewing spicy stews from beef, chicken, fish, and mutton, typically eaten at breakfast with palappam. An alternative morning meal might include thinner, lentil-based vegetarian sambars, accompanied by coconut chutney, steamed fermented rice and lentil cakes called idli, and parippuvada, toothy deep-fried yellow split pea fritters seasoned with ginger, onion, curry leaf, red pepper, green chili, and fennel seed. Sour tamarind-flavored fish stews known as meen mouly are also common, as are coconut-based curries made with duck, mutton, chicken, or beef and a vegetarian dish called avial, a multitude of vegetables simmered in a creamy coconut and yogurt sauce. George is particularly well-known for his beef cutlets, gingery breaded deep-fried patties of minced meat, potato, onion, and garlic eaten with red onion salad. Carryout only. —Mike Sula
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