Piñatta kicks off a new Monday Night Foodball venue

Slinging Indigenously inspired taqueria classics! [View this email in your browser]( [READER Logo]( [Food & Drink]( | April 12, 2024 Sometimes Tony Mata messes with the regulars and tells them the bar is going vegan. In the two and half years that Mata’s managed Frank and Mary’s Tavern, it hasn’t come close. The daytime lunch specials remain as meaty as they were in the near half century that the late Mary Stark cooked them.  No one, so far, has dared to attempt an overwhelmingly plant-based party, particularly one designed with respect to the way the Mayans, the Aztecs, or even the Great Lakes Myaamiaki threw pop-ups.  History comes full flat circle this April 15 when Piñatta slings its Indigenously inspired taqueria classics at [Monday Night Foodball]( the Reader’s weekly chef pop-up, kicking off a new spring schedule [at Frank and Mary’s Tavern.](  And they’ll be easing carnivores into this one with a citrusy tuna tostada built on a crunchy foundation of Masienda heirloom yellow corn masa, with guac, jicama, and their proprietary [pepita salsa macha]( (aka Mexican chili crisp).  Is it really spring in Shikaakwa if there aren’t “stinking onions” on the menu? Piñatta’s signature blue corn quesadilla with molten scratch-made cashew cheese is coming in like the first garlicky breeze of the season with Nichols Farm ramps, peppery radishes, and avocado salsa.  The guac, served with [El Popo]( chips, is smashed and folded with preserved cherry tomatoes, and showered with their fermented habanero-hibiscus hot sauce that’s been dehydrated and buzzed into powder. For dessert, that yellow masa gives structure and corny depth to a coconut and oat milk flan draped in guajillo-spiked caramel with crunchy cinnamon allspice-kissed pepitas.  That habanero hot sauce? It’s like a coronal ejection trapped in a bottle. The brothers kick off its fermented adolescence with their own inoculated koji rice. Same goes for their scorpion pepper–pineapple hot sauce, both of which they’ll be selling, along with the salsa macha, in case your endorphins aren’t already flooded with blazes of pleasure. There’s more: Pete Huels, aka [Evil Nerd Pete]( aka [Pete the Barber]( who cuts heads just down the street, will be laying down a soundtrack to this madness that spans the genres and decades, but never fails to flow.   Walk-in orders start at 5 PM, this Monday, April 15, at 2905 N. Elston in ancient Avondale. I guarantee the patio asphalt will not crack asunder. If it does, shots of Kabanes are on me.  Meanwhile, fix your eye on who else is playing Foodball this spring at Frank and Mary’s Tavern. There’s not a Beyond Burger in sight: [Piñatta kicks off patio season at the next Monday Night Foodball—now at Frank and Mary’s Tavern]( Check out the Guerrero brothers’ pre-Colonial taqueria classics at the Reader’s weekly chef pop-up in fresh, new—yet landmark—digs. by [Mike Sula]( | [Read more]( → [the outside of a restaurant with wooden tables and barrels]( [Monday Night Foodball kicks off patio season at Frank and Mary’s Tavern]( The Reader’s weekly chef pop-up finds a new home at the venerable 52-year-old Avondale dive. by [Mike Sula]( | [Read more]( → [Life is full of disappointments, but the shawafel wrap at Middle East Bakery & Grocery is never one of them]( August 2019 | Here is the sandwich to help you withstand heartbreak. by [Rachel Hawley]( | [Read more]( → [a cup of saffron ice cream on a table]( [Lynn House, the mixologist]( December 2011 | ‘All of a sudden the world of the bar had expanded from Long Island iced teas and gin and tonics’. by [Chicago Reader]( (Julia Thiel) | [Read more]( → Get the latest issue of the Chicago Reader Thursday, April 4, 2024 [READ ONLINE: VOL. 53, NO. 13]( [VIEW/DOWNLOAD ISSUE (PDF)]( [Become a member of the Chicago Reader.]( [Facebook icon]( [Instagram icon]( [Twitter icon]( [Website icon]( [YouTube icon]( [LinkedIn icon]( [Logo] You received this email because you signed up for newsletters from the Chicago Reader. Want fewer emails from us? [Click here to choose what you want us to send you](. Or, [unsubscribe from all Reader emails](. We’ll miss you! [Sign up for emails from the Chicago Reader]( | [Forward this e-mail to a friend]( © 2024 Chicago Reader. All rights reserved. Chicago Reader, 2930 S. Michigan Ave., Suite 102, Chicago, IL 60616