Mike Sula

6 days ago | chicagoreader.com | Mike Sula

Oysters are survivors. After all, they made it through the Permian–Triassic extinction event, aka the Great Dying, 251.9 million years ago when volcanic eruptions snuffed out 81 percent of all marine species. What the arousing bivalves can’t survive is the wanton over lemonizing and cocktail saucing of unthinking bipedal meatbags. They didn’t come all this way to die by mignonette.

1 week ago | chicagoreader.com | Mike Sula

Mexican soldiers were not likely eating discada on the morning of the Battle of Puebla, May 5, 1862. But I want to believe. The dish—a layered symphony of meats cooked on a disco, aka a steel “cowboy wok”—probably wasn’t invented until early in the following century. That was when the cross-cultural confluence of Chinese rail workers and Mexican farmers in northern Mexico discovered that repurposed train wheels, or tractor plow discs, made ideal outdoor cooking vessels for feeding a crowd.

2 weeks ago | chicagoreader.com | Mike Sula

Reader Bites celebrates dishes, drinks, and atmospheres from the Chicagoland food scene. Have you had a recent food or drink experience that you can’t stop thinking about? Share it with us at [email protected].

3 weeks ago | chicagoreader.com | Mike Sula

Anthony Pascual loved to rock a 20-gallon tilt skillet of zuppa toscana. “I really gotta give OG props,” he says. “I started there having only worked at a taco spot prior. The training is built so that anyone without experience could learn. It helped me learn the importance of following a recipe so that you have consistency.”That was well before he rose up from line cook to corporate trainer, and helped open three Olive Gardens.

1 month ago | chicagoreader.com | Mike Sula

Jazmin Flores was born of taco royalty, but the king didn’t always make it easy. “My dad would have us clean tables,” she says. “We gave out food, washed dishes. He would have us remove the stems from the jalapeños. He’d be like, ‘Be careful. Don’t touch your face. Wash your hands.’ Now, when I see the employees do it, they have gloves. I’m like, man, I remember doing that with my little bare hands.”But the cause was noble.