Encore

"It has been well documented that great white sharks prefer brisket over bacon." - George Burgess

The LLC, more like The LL FanCy

The ninth meeting of The Loop Lunch Club's second season was held this past Thursday at Encore, a stylish restaurant in the lobby of the Allegro Hotel at 171 W Randolph. Danny "White Snake" Rubenstein had selected this week's spot and emailed the group informing each of us to dress business casual and arrive at "11:45 sharp." When someone who just returned from an esteemed international karaoke competition in Japan tells me to look good and be somewhere "sharp" my expectations are heightened for both quality, and with less enthusiasm, price.

Dedicated reader(s) will recall The LLC's trip to Petro's and Rob Anderson's astonished reaction to the neon martini glass he spied out the window. That neon martini belongs to Encore, a restaurant that is the antithesis of Petro's. Encore will undoubtedly be the most modern and chic LLC experience of the season. Evidence for this can be seen in the phrase "Lunch Club and Liquid Lounge" that appeared on the snakeskin bound menus. I'm confident no other restaurant we patronize will be built around a circular bar that offers $400 bottles of wine.

Not your typical table

LLC Godfathers Anderson, Dan Spira, and Dan Ofman arrived on time and took seats at our strangely shaped corner booth. "Nice nook," said Anderson of the table whose shape resembled the body type of Blinky, the infamous leader of the Pac-Man ghosts. Waters and diet Pepsis were placed atop copious cocktail napkins. Despite having so many coaster options within arms reach I'm sad to report that neither Ofman or Anderson respect wood.

My busy schedule of once weekly blog posting and daily deep-dish consumption doesn't leave much time for television, but I'm well apprised of TV happenings anyway. Ten minutes with this trio and you'll get your fill of The Voice (and the experience of being a guest on The View). Honestly, not a minute passed before The Voice discussion broke out. "Blah blah blah," said one. "Blah blah blah," said another. This engaging discourse was brought to an end by the arrival of a jeans and sweatshirt wearing Bert and Ernie duo, 15 very sharp minutes late. With the full group in attendance the menu was reviewed. I was surprised by the variety and the reasonable prices. Using a popular terminology, the menu's "big 3" were the brisket, the pork, and the beef tenderloin. "The brisket is the far superior sandwich," said Steve "Great White" Lake. He went on to describe it as, "legendary."

Stick this in your business
casual and smoke it. Editors Note:
I wore a suit for unrelated purposes and
my neck isn't quite as thin as it appears here

The service at Encore will hurt its chances come tournament time. It was slow and often ineffective. Anderson's much discussed and highly anticipated wasabi coleslaw was mistakenly served as a side of fresh fruit and there was an unordered chicken salad brought to the table. I'll remind you of our Big 3 and let you decide if those items belonged on our plates. Refills were few and far between, but I will admit they knew how to refill in style. "That was astounding," I said to Anderson after his diet Pepsi was refilled from a pitcher. He and I both opened our mouths to stop the server thinking he'd be pouring water, only to find pepsi emerge from the ewer. Our eyes widened in disbelief like children unaware that there were really two people in that box and those legs wiggling independently from the head of the lovely assistant belonged to a fully intact and totally separate individual hiding in the other half of the box.

"This lunch has taken a turn for the better," said Great White Lake as the food was served. I think it's safe to say lunch always gets better with food (except perhaps at Petro's). My BBQ pork was tangy and tasty. It didn't melt in my mouth, which is fine because it's pork and I enjoy chewing it. I regretted my order when I realized I was wearing a tie and thus would have to engage my sandwich with the civility of someone better accustomed to a business casual lifestyle. In retrospect a Costanzian usage of the knife and fork may have classed it up a bit.

The Great White Lake feasts on a lowly salmon

Somebody's sandwich

"Wow, soft!"

"Good coleslaw," said Spira with an evil smirk on his face to a still coleslaw deprived Anderson. Rubenstein enjoyed his slaw employing the technique of dipping his house made chips into it. On a scale of Berghoff Chips to Perfect Chips these definitely registered on the Perfect end of the spectrum.

The general feeling amongst The LLC was that the sandwiches were great and whether you're a carnivorous marine predator or a guy on his lunch break wearing a tie you're going to enjoy you're brisket, pork, or tenderloin. Just as the meal was coming to a close our check was set down along with an encore performance (had to do it once, sorry) of 6 fresh chocolate chip cookies (right).

Encore Notes:

• Minimum Valet fee at The Allegro Hotel: $19 for under 2 hours
• One of the male staff members had a pony tail
• I didn't make any jokes aimed directly at Dan Ofman, and trust me I could have, because I knew he'd be embarrassed thoroughly in this video. He thought the boulder was unsafe for me to sit on. For a believer in mind over matter, I'm scoring this one 10-7 in favor of matter...