(Greg Clarke/for Chicago Magazine)
Several years ago a friend sent me a text from New York: “At Nami Nori, so good!” Attached was a lurid close up of her X.O. scallop and miso cod hand rolls in their wooden stand, their fillings abundant, their nori wraps shiny and brittle.
“Want!” went my inner food monster. Then what followed was a silent lament that we didn’t have anything like this in Chicago. The gods heard me, because several hand roll bars soon opened here. Yokocho Handrolls and Omakase Bar was one of the first (if not the first), though Noriko Handroll Bar underneath Perilla Fare was the most rapturously welcomed and, for a while, the hardest reservation in town. Others — Akiro Hand Roll Bar, Roll Up By Oui — have joined the party. Midosuji, the former omakase in the Chicago Athletic Association, has remade itself as a hand roll bar. I stopped in for two hand rolls and a whiskey highball, had a nice conversation with the only other guest, and spent $75. A nice snack when you’re feeling gilded.
At omakase restaurants, a hand roll is typically a penultimate bite — the fish trimmings minced, seasoning with a flutter of scallion greens and handed across the bar. Only a sweet something remains, such as tamago (egg) custard. At Shō, however, a progression of five hand rolls that you build yourself with sheets of nori and seasoned rice serves as the centerpiece of the meal.
While all this speaks to the emergence of a trend, what impresses me more is that hand rolls are on the verge of jumping free of their sushi silo. Gingie, the new Boka Group restaurant (in the former home of GT Prime) features a very next-gen menu from chef Brian Lockwood, who served as a consultant on The Bear. Lockwood (who also oversees Midosuji) offers a selection of hand rolls among appetizers more in line with the restaurant’s luxe steakhouse vibe, such as a Caesar salad, roasted oysters, and tuna tartare. Order the Dungeness crab with pears and a miso-egg dressing and it arrives with small dishes of rice and nori sheets on the side. It’s a fun way to start a meal.
I’m guessing it won’t be long until hand rolls earn a spot on The Menu, which is what I call that list of dishes that is designed to reassure as much as entice, to make a restaurant seem both desirable and safe. Today’s iteration features hamachi crudo, burrata salad, deviled eggs….you know it.
With that, let me make some predictions about what we can expect to see on The Menu in the coming year:
Serious french fries. Creepies continues to get great national attention for its fresh take on French bistro food in general and its fries in particular. In a recent review, The New York Times called them “fantastic with a crisp, rich shell, craggy in places, tender inside.” Have I mentioned my love for the fries at John’s Food & Wine a million times? Yes, I have.
Rotolo lasagna. A lot of places are putting lasagna on menus, specifically the Italian style with bechamel, parmesan, and a meat ragu. I’ve been noticing rolled versions, such as the big seller at Beaumont’s, a born-again tavern in Lincoln Park with very dialed-in food.
Coal-roasted sweet potatoes. We are all starting to understand something that has long been a part of Korean and Japanese street food culture. When sweet potatoes are roasted over live coals, they not only turn creamy inside but they develop an odor that is hard to describe but entrancing, like truffle. Look for them all over, from Brasero, to John’s, to Black Briar, the new West Loop spot from Jimmy Papadopoulos, where they ride along with pork ribs.
Skewers. Smaller portions of meat served on skewers as appetizers or small plates are all over, thanks perhaps to high costs and the national hunger for protein-heavy diets. You’ll find skewers featured prominently on the menu at Arla, the “Mediterranean Japanese” showcase in the Gold Coast that feels like a testing ground for the most up-to-date iteration of The Menu. Sushi rolls? Check. Dips and spreads? Check. Whole branzino? Caesar salad? Raw oysters? They’ve got all of it.
The thing about The Menu is that it’s always in flux, always making room for the newcomers. Remember beet and goat cheese salad, tuna tartare towers, and bruschetta? Once we learned to pronounce that last one, it was over. So watch out, hamachi crudo. Hand rolls are coming for your spot.
John Kessler is a freelance columnist and dining critic at Chicago magazine.