It was recently decided for me that, in order to address the increasingly turgid swamp of flesh that surrounds my bones, I would spend a two-week period abstaining from whiskey, ice cream, pasta, and most anything else that makes eating and drinking enjoyable. I’ve done this before. By the time you hit 14 days it doesn’t feel like such a big deal. But man, when you’re struggling through the first week you feel like you’re ten years younger—and living on a desert island. When I began this fast I’d just finished scolding a restaurant for deboning chicken thighs before frying them, and there I was every day, poaching boneless, skinless breasts in the pooled tears of my own regret.
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Those days are over, I’m relieved to report, but in the midst of them I found some relief at the Chop Shop, the multipurpose butcher shop/restaurant/bar/performance space in the shadow of the Wicker Park Blue Line stop. The ownership has some old-school-butcher cred—one of the partners is a scion of the family behind Niles’s great Minelli Meat & Deli, which has been around since the late 50s. But the Chop Shop bears little resemblance to that, nor does it have much in common with the new breed of butcher that includes the scrupulously resourceful Butcher & Larder and the dazzlingly varied Publican Quality Meats.
It’s a model that can make you feel disciplined, even virtuous, as you contemplate firm, fennel-y sausage mingling with a few red peppers or a half chicken with root vegetables, its roasted breast almost as silky as its sous vide thigh.
2033 W. North 312-342-1909chopshopchi.com
