Ruxbin. It's Cozy, Creative, and Fabulous!

by Sun

I have a book club that's 14 years old with 6 other girls. I think everyone should have a book club or join/create something they enjoy that they can do on regular basis with a group of people. It can be 3 or 4 people. The size doesn't matter. It's all about the substance. After each book meeting, I always feel that we have such a productive, healthy and meaningful discussion that it's very satisfying experience.

Once in a while we go see a movie together. This time we saw "Bridemaids" which was very funny and had a good story line. A rarity in comedies today I think. I highly recommend it! We can always use more laugh in life.

After the movie, we decided to try a new restaurant called 'Ruxbin Kitchen' in the Wicker Park neighborhood of Chicago. There was a point where I wasn't too excited about Chicago's new restaurants. Because every time I tried a new place, they all seemed like they had similar types of "so so" food, with similar luxurious interior designs without much of it's own personality. Unfortunately or fortunately, most of those places have now closed down. Now a days, there are too many good new restaurants that I'm not feeling shy when it comes to bragging about Chicago's food world. Here is one of them.




(all images by Ruxbin)

Ruxbin Kitchen is located on Ashland avenue where it's starting to catch up with the rest of the Bucktown boom. The restaurant was picked by Bon Appetit Magazine as one of "The 10 Best New Restaurants in America".

They don't accept reservations so I was a little bit worried we might have a long wait. Luckily, it's a small space with only 32 seats, but we were seated right away and were even happy to be squeezed in a booth table.

The interior is cozy, creative, and in many ways different than any restaurant in Chicago. They created an ambience that is unique and true to who they want to be. This is the kind of restaurant I would love to see more of. The 3 owners are Ed the chef, Vicki his sister, and their friend Jenny who handle the front of the house, and who are all Koreans but were all born and raised in Chicago. Vicki told me that Ed was originally studying to be a lawyer but his friends, who were already unhappy lawyers themselves, advised him to do something else... something he was passionate about.

We ordered Pork Belly Salad, Endive Caesar as starters, followed by Halibut, Hanger Steak and Clams. It was all so good, I have to admit that we ended up licking the plates, something that hardly ever happens. Each dish is light with lots of flavor. Also the unexpected combination of ingredients such as pork belly with salad was surprisingly good! I see that pork belly is one of most popular items among the chefs these days. Usually the pork belly portions are pretty small but they add plentiful of flavor and taste to the dish.

Have I mentioned that I live for the moments discovering dishes that are so good that they make me forget all the worries in the world? Yes, I'm one of those constant worrying type. But not when I'm eating yummy food! :)

Good eating and forget the worries!

From our partner: LO+JUNE

From our partner: LO+JUNE
Artisanal French products in our Swiss fine food boutique