My Mission

Without children or mortgage payments, I'm free to spend my savings on lots of things that aren't practical. I have a closet full of shoes, another full of Bulls jerseys, and I love steak.

 
Joe's Stone Crab has always been my most frequented steak establishment since I moved to Chicago. The Lettuce Entertain You points and close proximity to my home have made Joe's a favorite of mine ever since I used to go there around Christmas time with my family. Sometimes when I get down, I pull out my Lettuce card and the sparkly gold reflection lets me know that everything is going to be okay. 

The service is usually great, I love their bread, and I always save room for a variety of desserts from the Gold Brick Sundae to the Chocolate Fudge Pie. I will even occasionally put down a couple of stone crabs despite a mild allergy that prevents me from breathing. The temporary lack of oxygen is always worth it the moment I realize that I'm going to live. Of course, this blog wasn't set up to discuss shellfish allergies or chocolaty desserts. Read the title. 

 

Due to a strenuous accounting busy season, I hadn't met up with my sister and brother-in-law in a while. I was delighted when a message from my sister popped up on my gmail offering the chance to not only meet and catch up but also to devour a delicious steak at Mastro's. (Paris Club was also presented as an option but was quickly dismissed based primarily on a lack of prime steak). 

That Thursday I was happy as a clam as I looked forward to the steak to come after work. I was sitting in my cubicle doing tax accountant stuff when I then received an exciting opportunity from one of my co-workers to go to Joe's for lunch. Two steaks in one day? I paused for roughly half a second debating whether it was practical to have two steaks on a day that I have a volleyball game before deciding this was an extremely rare opportunity that could not be passed up.

 

Off to Joe's we went for what was sure to be a spectacular meal. Then our waiter happened. Befuddled by our request for more bread, this guy was a bit slow and off to a rough start. I ordered the "Dinner Size" variety of the strip steak. It wasn't so much that I needed a huge steak but the thickness of the cut is vital to my steak enjoyment. Instead of my rare plus dinner sized strip steak, a bone-in medium-well strip steak was placed in front of me.

 

After a couple of bites of trying to convince myself it was still good, I gave up and asked them to make it again.  They accidentally brought me the bone-in version again for the 2nd time. Rather than acknowledge that my rare plus was cooked about 10 minutes too long, they must have determined that they needed to overcompensate the other way and brought out a nearly uncooked steak. I'll take that over medium-well so I ate it and it wasn't bad. I left very happy I had a good lunch but still somewhat surprised they hadn't got my steak right in two attempts. This was, after all, my favorite restaurant. I went back to the office and fueled by my meat, continued on to have a productive afternoon. (Or slept in a food coma, I don't remember).

 

Later on that night I met my sister and her husband "Big Al" at Mastro's. I figured walking from the office to the restaurant might make it easier to digest my lunch in time for dinner but I still felt a bit full and wasn't sure if I could pull it off. We were quickly seated and after sharing taxation stories, North Korea travel advice, and engaging in discussion over how weird my brother Patrick's blog pictures are, our steaks quickly arrived. What followed was 16 ounces of pleasure. Mouthwatering steak that only made me want more with every bite. Every bite was beefy bliss as my steak was cooked to perfection. The meal was spectacular.

 

I fought through the two steaks that night to partake in 3 glorious victories for the Fist People volleyball team. When I got home though, rather than focusing on the victory with my fellow Fist People, I couldn't stop thinking about how good my steak that night was. I love steak. Shouldn't every steak be that good? What if I was short changing myself by always picking Joe's?

 

It then occurred to me that not only do I not have a favorite steakhouse, there are a lot of steakhouses in this wonderful city of Chicago I've yet to try. What if there was something even better that I was missing out on? It was a deeply disturbing thought that there could be great steak out there that I'm not eating. As I lay awake, thinking about steak, I then realized that I need to try every steakhouse in Chicago. I need to never let a good steak go uneaten by me. I want to find the best steakhouse in Chicago. This is my mission. This is my blog. The time I've wasted of the couple people who will probably read this (my brother Patrick? my sister Kathleen? Big Al if I'm lucky?) is just collateral damage.