My friend Ann came to visit over Christmas. She’s from here but lives in Florida so I barely get to see her, she only comes in a few times a year to visit her parents and friends. She’s a big part of Veve’s, doing all the design work and product photography, plus thinking of ideas. So, I do get to talk to her often, but spending time together is a treat.
This visit we decided to eat at Xoco. It’s a Rick Bayless restaurant that features tortas (sandwiches) and caldos (meals in a bowl) and fresh churros. It’s fantastic! I’ve been to one of his other restaurants, Frontera, before and it was amazing too. I think the greatness of Xoco is that the menu isn’t huge, but everything is made with the finest ingredients and perfectly prepared.
We had to wait for a table for about 30 minutes, but it wasn’t bad because it was right around 6pm and it took us about that long to decide what to order anyway. We started with the salsa and guacamole, and all agreed it was the best any of us have had. I ordered a caldo, the carnitas. It’s slow-cooked pork, potato dumplings and veggies in a broth. It’s true that it’s a meal in a bowl, it was hearty and delicious! Ann and her boyfriend Josh ordered tortas, the gunthorp chicken and the pepito. They both loved them, and I tried bites and loved them too!
For dessert we had a tiny coconut and lime tres leches cake, and churros with chocolate sauce. The tres leches was very good and the churros were the best I’ve ever had. They are amazing on their own, but it’s the rich chocolate sauce that makes them exceptional. It’s thick, and a bit creamy, and packed with flavor.
It’s hard to describe how we felt when we left the restaurant. We all felt very happy and satisfied with the meal, food-drugged in a good way! It was a great meal and a great experience.
salsa and guacamole with fresh chips
a hearty torta
my carnitas caldo
i ate the whole bowl!
tres leches
fresh churros ♥ ♥ ♥
the best part: chocolate sauce
I really wanted to try the breakfast tortas, so a few weeks later me and Ve went. We split the chorizo and egg torta and churros. She had had a classic hot chocolate and I had a latte. It was as amazing as last time! We got there right before 10am, which is when they stop serving breakfast, so it wasn’t crowded at all. Throughout the meal Ve couldn’t stop talking about how good the food is!
churros for breakfast!
chorizo and egg torta with salsa verde
Ve had been asking me for a few weeks to take her ice skating (I think she was inspired by D.W. on Arthur!). It’s been a few years since I went and it’s always fun, so I decided to take her to the rink at Millennium Park. She was excited about it up until she had to walk in her skates, then the day turned into a disaster. She kept complaining about not being able to walk and wanted me to carry her, which I really couldn’t do in my skates. I was hoping that once we got on the ice it would get better, but she really hated it. She kept saying, “I can’t”, and I kept telling her that it’s hard but if she practices it will get easier. I tried holding one of her hands and having her hold the rail, and holding both of her hands, neither worked. For a few brief moments she stopped being scared and was able to take little skate steps, but then she remembered that she hated it and promptly fell down. We didn’t even make it a quarter of the way around the rink!
I wanted to take her again so she wouldn’t have a bad association with ice-skating, but she doesn’t want to go. I don’t want to force her to do anything, but I also want her to know that to get good at anything you have to practice. So, maybe next year?
ve's first time on skates!
