Chicago, Illinois
7/21/2015
One of the issues with the 1000 places experiment – the
thing that wakes me up in the middle of the night in a cold sweat, screaming –
is the possibility that many of these places may cease to exist by the time we
get a chance to get there. [Sad, but true.] Sure,
Mount Rushmore may have a few more years in it, but I may need to speed up work
on getting that ticket to the Prairie Home Companion – with no disrespect to
Garrison Keillor’s youthful vigor.
Charlie Trotter’s was a world-renowned restaurant run by its
eponymous celebrity chef. (Patricia says it was a favorite of diverse spenders
such as Michael Jordan and the King of Sweden.) He is probably best known in
popular culture as playing an exaggerated version of himself in the Julia
Roberts’ film My Best Friend’s Wedding.
In 2012 Trotter unexpectedly closed his successful restaurant. A year later,
the beloved Chicago culinary icon was found dead of a stroke at the age of 54.
Not only was Trotter a great chef, he was apparently a
stand-up guy, who spent a lot of his time promoting culinary arts in the young
through his various philanthropic efforts. In one of those funny twists of fate,
although we naturally could not visit his restaurant, the museum inside the
Water Tower contained a special exhibit honoring Charlie Trotter’s legacy.
Artifacts included his recipe notes (he drew pictures of his
measurements instead of writing, to compensate for his dyslexia) and the apron
he worn on the last night of cooking at his restaurant.
Ok, so we didn’t technically get to eat at his table, but
certainly this was the next best thing.
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