Thank you to all the Chicago Reader readers who voted in this year's #BestOfChi reader's poll!
6/26/14
6/19/14
Country/Morning
Listen to Lula Cafe's co-founder Amalea Tschilds sing some country songs with Nora O'Connor on the Morning Shift:
6/9/14
Lula's Walls: Claire Ashley
The art at Lula is curated by two friends who used to work here when we had just the old single storefront. Like me, they were young artists at the beginning of their careers who for lack of better options ended up working as a server and cook. Now grown up, Marianne Fairbanks and Anders Nilsen have enviable careers in the art world but continue to curate the walls of Lula's to exceptional ends. I still cook.
Having a "cafe" in our name might take the expectations down a notch in art-cred terms, but Lula considers itself a gallery on equal terms to others in the city. In fact the SAIC President once said to an incoming freshman class that Lula was one of the best places to see new art in Chicago. Anders and Marianne search the city for exciting talent, do studio tours, map out a design for the space, price work fairly, and hang the art with the intent of creating conversations-- between the work and the space, between us employees, between our guests.
I try to let the curatorial team do their thing without interruption, closing my eyes to early images and press materials. On those four Tuesdays a month, when the shows change and a new artist hangs her work, I find excuses to stay away until late that night when everyone is gone. (I'm not sure Marianne or Anders knows this; up till now it was my secret.) Then I'll walk back over to the restaurant, turn on all the lights at once, and let the work reveal itself in a sudden flash of bright light. This moment of surprise is one of the great joys of my job at Lula, of seeing what (and who) Anders and Marianne have discovered, of giving myself time to experience the work in a personal and private way, of letting go.
I hope you'll come by to see the amazing work of Claire Ashley. And please come to the opening party. It's Tuesday night, 7-9pm, with a complimentary hors d'oeuvres and a cash bar, and the space will be open for you to experience the same thing that I get to do, on those late nights, since I have the key, when I sneak back in for a private viewing of what our Lula has next in store for me.
Having a "cafe" in our name might take the expectations down a notch in art-cred terms, but Lula considers itself a gallery on equal terms to others in the city. In fact the SAIC President once said to an incoming freshman class that Lula was one of the best places to see new art in Chicago. Anders and Marianne search the city for exciting talent, do studio tours, map out a design for the space, price work fairly, and hang the art with the intent of creating conversations-- between the work and the space, between us employees, between our guests.
I try to let the curatorial team do their thing without interruption, closing my eyes to early images and press materials. On those four Tuesdays a month, when the shows change and a new artist hangs her work, I find excuses to stay away until late that night when everyone is gone. (I'm not sure Marianne or Anders knows this; up till now it was my secret.) Then I'll walk back over to the restaurant, turn on all the lights at once, and let the work reveal itself in a sudden flash of bright light. This moment of surprise is one of the great joys of my job at Lula, of seeing what (and who) Anders and Marianne have discovered, of giving myself time to experience the work in a personal and private way, of letting go.
I hope you'll come by to see the amazing work of Claire Ashley. And please come to the opening party. It's Tuesday night, 7-9pm, with a complimentary hors d'oeuvres and a cash bar, and the space will be open for you to experience the same thing that I get to do, on those late nights, since I have the key, when I sneak back in for a private viewing of what our Lula has next in store for me.
- Jason Hammel
6/1/14
Farm Dinner: Green Strawberries + Chamomile
Sometimes we seem to write a menu based on the sound of the words alone. Their tone. The beat of them. You say "green strawberry, chamomile" out loud once or twice and suddenly the combination seems to sing. Strawberries are not green, of course, and the words kind of prick up in your ears -- they sound strange and compelling. Yet chamomile is the softest of words, a sedative, and it kind of just drifts in and steeps. It's in the meter, yes, the anapest of chamomile, three unstressed syllables in a row. Taking it easy.
This week we are pairing tart unripe green strawberries with the fresh flowers of chamomile we grew on our own roof top garden. This isn't a classic combo, but it's not experimental either. Really it's just a marriage of bright-sour-green-fresh with floral-wispy-sweet-grassy. If it makes sense on the palate remains to be seen, as we are just now clipping the chamomile from the stems and just now pickling the green strawberries in a little honey and white vinegar.
We take the risk because that's what farm dinner is about. The chance to listen to the sounds around us, to steal the flowers of the moment, and combine.
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