“Banana Karenina…the tragic injustice of it all! Unlike our poor heroine, you may have the object of your desire with society’s blessing. Chocolate pavlova with caramel banana pudding, roasted bananas, banana chips and hot fudge. Steer clear of the tracks.”
Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites »
Pastry chef Christine McCabe Tentori, who hails from kitchens at Gabriel’s in Highwood and Charlie Trotter’s and did a short stint at Joel Robuchon in Paris, is responsible for the artfully plated sweets. Suqi had already hired another classic French pastry chef (whose name he won’t mention) and developed a menu, lengthy descriptions and all, when a mutual friend introduced him to Tentori. He was blown away after tasting four of her desserts. “She’s a great fit for the place,” says Suqi. “She’s got a great way with combinations and textures, and we wanted this to be fun and whimsical–not as serious as the other chef wanted. And with two male partners”–Suqi’s co-owners are his brother Eddie and veteran nightclub owner Stephan Anthony Oakes–“we also needed a feminine touch.”
Her uncertainty is understandable: at this late-night sweet shop cum nightclub, seven of the ten menu pages are devoted to libations. Aside from by-the-glass offerings of dessert wines, port, Madeira, sherry, and champagne, there are hard-to-find vintages of sauternes and a lengthy list of late-harvest wines, botrytized wines (made from grapes that have been infected with a mold that shrivels the fruit, thus concentrating the sugar), and ice wines (made from grapes that froze on the vine and were pressed before they thawed). “I think dessert wines are some of the finest in the world,” Suqi says. There’s also a martini list with over two dozen concoctions, along with cognac, Armagnac, Calvados, grappa, and nonalcoholic herbal cordials.
