LTHForum.com

Really, do I need to post anything more?

There has been some debate as to whether the GNRs should recognize well-publicized fine dining establishments, but if they should, I can think of no establishment more worthy and more appropriate than Schwa. There should be, I think, no need to extend the award to include Schwa, as Schwa has extended itself to the award by carving out its own niche of downscale, neighborhood fine dining. Schwa has blended into its neighborhood so skillfully, in fact, that in the glow of the neon-lit rim shop across the street, it might easily be mistaken for an abandoned storefront. At other restaurants, this might be seen as a cynical attempt at speakeasy pseudo-cool, but at Schwa it comes across as genuine -- a tiny restaurant whose character is an extension of its chefs, not a marketing ploy. Carlson's decision to eschew a front of house staff in favor of direct kitchen-to-table service makes Schwa a very personal creation, one where the food is the absolute focus and the fauxhawk-clad fellows who prepare it are fully involved in the experience. As for the food itself, by my count, Schwa dishes appeared on nearly a third of the 2006 personal top ten lists at LTH, a remarkable feat given the difficulty involved in securing a reservation and the fact that it arrived on the scene so late in the calendar year. Carlson's creations are both playful and delicious, frequently combining seemingly disparate flavors to remarkable effect, but he has also commanded LTH love with purer, bolder expressions of familar flavors. Dishes like the lobster with gooseberries, potatoes and lavender, the prosciutto consomme and Carlson's take on steak and eggs have all garnered much appreciation here. And the quail egg ravioli, which needs no introduction, has inspired enough sexual metaphors that I believe Schwa has met the qualifications for an AVN award as well as a GNR award. As always, there is some dissent among the ranks, but given the amount of love thrown in Schwa's direction last fall, I only hope it hasn't fallen off everybody's radar since. The food itself should be reason enough to make Schwa a shoo-in, but the fact that it is served in such a personal, casual manner by a chef who has undoubtedly turned down some big bucks offers to stay true to his little neighborhood joint should be the icing on the cake.

It is my pleasure to nominate Schwa for a 2007 GNR.

The main Schwa thread can be found here.

Schwa
1466 North Ashland
773-252-1466
http://www.schwarestaurant.com

Seconded, and I should warn people that the AVN Awards site is not safe for some workplaces

I disagree completely.

To win an AVN award you need to be pumped full of silicone and be dyed blonde, where Schwa is much more real than that-- more Suicide Girl than Jenna Jameson.

Otherwise, I agree completely, especially with this part:



Personally I give nominations of fine dining restaurants much more of a gimlet eye than those for holes in the wall-- a million guides already have that territory covered, they don't need our award next to their Mobil stars and AAA recommendations, and besides, it's no trick to run a pretty darn good restaurant when you have all the advantages in your corner. From fine dining I, at least, want to see not merely excellence but evidence of an interesting personality that is helping shape our scene and, equally if not more importantly, a real sign that a place has meant something to our community, prompted discussion, been embraced, mattered to us. Schwa obviously fits that bill, having inspired a dozen or more thoughtful, rapturous posts or more and established itself as a place we measure other places by.

FWIW, Mike, I share your general feelings about fine dining and the GNRs, but it's as though Schwa is a restaurant born to bridge that gap. Glad to hear you feel the same way.

The discussion as to whether a fine dining establishment can or should win a GNR is not new, and has generally been settled in favor of the simple affirmative - if the LTHForum members think a place is deserving, it is deserving (similar to Gypsy Boy's struggle as to whether a place needs to be a sitdown restaurant to be meritorious - no it does not if our members think it is deserving).

But since Mike has resurrected his "higher hurdle" argument for an haute cuisine joint, I feel obliged to resurrect my reply to it.

I think the posters on LTHForum are sufficiently savvy to already apply a higher standard in their evaluation of more expensive places. Or to put it more concretely, for $2.50 I am just looking for a good quality, tasty hamburger; for $15 I am looking for awonderful burger, and for $25 I expect an urburger - a transcendental experience. If they serve me the same good quality burger as at the $2.50 joint, they will just get my scorn.

So, for a place that charges $50 or more pp to get consistent praise here, it has already qualified as something special. No higher standard is required in the GNRs (IMO) since the posters have already applied a higher standard in their evaluations.

For further discussion on what should, and should not be considered for a GNR, please post in the Site Chat thread.

Had I noticed that the GNR awards were open, I was going to nominate Schwa. It is a Great Restaurant and it is very neighborly. My two meals have been superb, and I trust my third one will be as well.

I've never had a bad meal at Schwa and never been treated less than wonderfully there. It's an intimate and unique stage for culinary innovation, where what comes out of the kitchen is even more distinctive and memorable than the place itself.

Even though dining at Schwa requires a fair amount of pre-planning, I'm envious of those who live nearby. I try to dine there at least 4 times a year but if I lived closer, that number would be much higher. This is another one of those rare places that would be a fantastic addition to any neighborhood.

I heartily endorse this nomination.

=R=

I had one of the best meals of my life at Schwa, but I think it would be more qualified for the anti-neighborhood award. Schwa makes absolutely no effort to support, educate, or even market within it's own neighborhood. I'm not suggesting that it has to, or even should do these things, but I can't see how one could call a place that never allows walk-ins, requires reservations months in advance, and is priced well out of the range of most people who live nearby, a neighborhood restaurant. A Great Restaurant, absolutely. But there's an N in that award.

further emphasis of my point: I don't know where dmnkly lives, but look at the addresses of the other Schwa supporters. Is there anyone in Wicker Park/ West Town that would actually call this place their neighborhood restaurant?

Neighborhood can mean many things. In the case of Schwa it refers to the community of diners, rather than to those who live in geographical proximity. I have been surprised when Michael Carlson calls to confirm my reservation or brings his food to my table - and it is not just me: this is how the restaurant operates.

We had a debate about Trotters - and could have a debate about other fine restaurants in the area - as to whether they are neighborhood restaurants. In my mind Schwa clearly is one. Perhaps they can not deal with walk-ins and I don't know if they participate in the life of their quasi-neighborhood. But if there was ever a nationally influential restaurant that was a neighborhood restaurant, Schwa is it.

Bucktown.

(Until recently moving to Baltimore, that is)

But in any case, I understand the argument but I think it's the same one that could be used to make a place in a strip mall in the middle of nowhere completely ineligible no matter how good, how welcoming, how friendly. In short, it's a supertechnical argument. It's casual, welcoming, the guys are enthusiastic and fully involved in your meal, and it's run with an excess of passion and a minimum of pretention. Personally, I think that's far more meaningful than whether or not they're putting flyers on the cars in the surrounding blocks.

But then, I'm the guy nominating them.

Also, a very small anecdotal item, but the elote soup that they were making for a while this past winter was inspired by and an ode to the carts in their immediate neighborhood. That a fine dining restaurant would a) be inspired by the local corn carts and b) bother to give them a shout-out says something, I think. You could call it pandering, I suppose, but I believe it's genuine.

I was responding to Kennyz over here, but I'll throw a little support for Schwa here too where it belongs.

"Neighborhood" is fairly loose for me, and at the risk of repetition, the "LTH neighborhood" is really what I'm looking at. Evaluating neighborhood in the more conventional sense seems to difficult.

I had a great meal at Schwa, and moreover, they've really captured the imagination of this community (along with lots of other communities, but that's okay).

The food is fantastic, and the low-overhead, BYOB fine dining model--whether a calculated marketing move or simply a way to get the restaurant going--surely resonates with the LTH community.

Michael Carlson (and wife, and dog) hang out in Bucktown at the Churchill dog park. Not sure if they've been their post-baby, but they are neighborhood people.

and Rick Roman, who owns the Signature Room in the Sears tower, can often be found jogging in the loop.

A general question at the risk of sounding glib - what exactly does the phrase "capture the imagination" mean? In my very literal mind, I've always been a little confused by this phrase. Isn't the criteria for a GNR not that it exists in imagination, but shouldn't it be a real, existing restaurant serving good food and that has been written up repeatedly on these boards?

I wish there would be some clarification of what GNRs are because, in reading some of the endorsements for the recent round of GNRs, I'm more confused than ever. I've read the description of a GNR, but I'm confused in its application. What is a "neighborhood restaurant?" I found the discussion in the Bonsoiree thread to be especially confusing. Is its nomination premature? Is it being nominated for its three course menus only, which are written up well, but not the 7 course?

Following up and clarifying my remarks in my previous post, if the "Great Neighborhood Restaurant" award is to have any significance, the term "neighborhood restaurant" has to be interpreted according to its common, everyday usage. To me, that means a restaurant that does not have a citywide profile necessarily, but exists primarily to service its neighborhood and does so better than it needs to, and has been positively and significantly discussed on LTH (I don't know about that capturing the imagination thing). It is also a restaurant that is generally ignored when mainstream media award time comes around. I think that's the spirit in which Bonsoiree and others like it were nominated (setting aside for the moment whether they are deserving).

I don't think that the common usage of the term "neighborhood" can be legitimately extended to mean "LTH" as a neighborhood (virtual or otherwise) or as a synonym for "community." That, in my opinion, is not common usage. I've heard the term "online communities" but not "online neighborhoods" to describe message boards. The common usage of the term neighborhood implies a physical geographic area with boundaries. If we want the Great Neighborhood Restaurant award to have any significance beyond this board (and to the restauranteurs who are awarded it), I think only the common usage of the word neighborhood should suffice. (Webster's first definition: "a district or area with distinctive characteristics.") Indeed, if the intention is to substitute "LTH" for the word "neighborhood" in the term Great Neighborhood Restaurants, I think it becomes a bit asurd. Why not just call them "Great LTH Restaurants?" Isn't that clearer?

Having said that, it appears that the nominations for GNRs take on three general forms. First, the "neighborhood" restaurant which I've discussed above. Second, it's the restaurant that was discovered on LTH and/or was the subject of numerous written accolades or discussion on LTH. This category is broader and I would guess that Schwa most appropriately fits into this category (as does Avec, David Burke, Avenues and Alinea, but no one has nominated them). (The third category is the odd nomination by someone who really loves a certain restaurant, but it is not necessarily the subject of significant discussion on LTH.) To some, it appears that restaurants deserving of a GNR need only fall into the second category. However, given the title, "Great Neighborhood Restaurant," to me, restaurants must also fall into the first category in order to deserve the award. Which is why I threw my support behind Stop 50 even though it is not located in Chicago, it is the sort of "neighborhood" restaurant that seems like a natural for these awards given that it is way more committed to quality and artisanship than it needs to be, the LTH community has supported and discussed it on these boards, and it has generally been overlooked by the mainstream media.

But if we're calling them "Great Neighborhood Restaurants," then I don't think Schwa can remotely be classified as a "neighborhood" restaurant. That it happens to be located in a neighborhood does not make it a "neighborhood" restaurant. I don't think it was ever the intention of Michael Carlson to humbly serve food to the Bucktown masses. And it's even less deserving when people's trips to Chicago revolve around a reservation. At that point, why not award a GNR to Alinea (located in Lincoln Park)?

I'm not saying that Schwa isn't deserving of some type of accolade from this board because the LTH community supported this restaurant long before even the mainstream media substantially wrote about it; but it's not a "Great Neighborhood Restaurant."

I guess the term "Great Neighborhood Restaurant" connotes something specific, and is perhaps, too restrictive. Maybe that's why those other awards are called Emmys, Obies, ESPYs, and Oscars.

** I've also supercopied my more general remarks (although everything I've said relates to this discussion) in Site Chat.

Jim-in-Logan-Square and I (and our wives) ate at Schwa yesterday for their new late summer menu (a menu from scratch - other than an off-the-menu repeat of the quail egg ravioli. Again Michael Carlson called to make sure we would keep the reservation and he was frequently in the dining room serving our plates. The food hasn't lost any of its style and creativity (although Michael's beard has grown a bit). I hope at some point to include my photos of the meal, but for now, let me say that his cauliflower/white chocolate soup and his watermelon granita were the sparkling high points of the meal, melodies of flavor. As with chefs who like to change their dishes there were a few missteps and a few dishes that were not startling, but at its best Schwa can compete with any Chicago restaurant and its often at or near its best. Hopefully more later.

Living about three blocks away from Schwa, I wish this was my neighborhood restaurant, but unfortunately, it is a destination. The calling before you go, reservation, etc. I've popped my head in before on the off chance they had a cancellation, and it was like, what?, never, get out...
To me, Hillary's was a GNR, go anytime, BYOB, $15 fabulous steak or tuna with two sides and a soup or salad (still miss that place).

LTH,

From current reports on the Schwa thread it seems they are as good, if not better, than before the hiatus.

Thumbs up for renewal.

Enjoy,
Gary

Based on my dinner last night, I can wholeheartedly endorse Schwa's GNR renewal.

The food is just at a staggeringly high level and Michael and his team could not be more warm or inviting. An absolute gem.

Schwa is not up for renewal yet. They were awarded their GNR designation in October 2007 and haven't received it yet.

Oops! Well, then I endorse them getting the award they have already won

Schwa has now received its GNR designation (last night) and Michael was very appreciative. It was a splendid dinner, even better than before its hiatus, we will have more to say on the main Schwa thread.

This restaurant is currently up for GNR renewal. Please post your comments below.

Thanks,

=R=
for the GNRs

We went right after the re-opening, and it was like the place never missed a beat.

I'm fully supportive of renewal.

I love Schwa, and will glady use my first ever GNR post to support its renewal!

I adored my one and only visit to Schwa a few months ago. Of the many dishes, just one was a miss. A few were spectacular. I appreciate any place that can get my parents to happily eat natto and jellyfish. Plus, I really enjoyed the whole vibe of the place and the willingness of Carlson and his team to talk to us about the food and pour us other folks' wine.

I think Schwa is pretty unique for Chicago (and probably for most cities). Where else do the cooks/chefs serve you creative, cutting edge, delicious food in an unpretentious storefront? And BYOB? I'd be hard-pressed to put it a category with any other restaurants.

100% for renewal.

Ronna

This past Saturday was my first trip to Schwa, and was one of the coolest dining experiences I've ever had. The place feels more like an underground supper club than a restaurant...the rowdy vibe, the blasting hip-hop (listening to "Black Mags" by The Cool Kids while eating quail egg ravioli was a unique, highly enjoyable contrast), the chefs wandering around chatting, joking & sharing wine with the diners, all of that together made me feel like I'd been invited into a secret club where hip, in-the-know folks get together to enjoy all of their favorite things - amazing food, fun company, good (and affordable) wines, and cool music, whether they all "go together" or not.

I definitely support & encourage a GNR renewal for Schwa.

More about Schwa here.

My last meal at Schwa was as good as my first. Yes, they occasionally misfire, but Schwa is an essential Chicago restaurant. I absolutely support renewal.