Embeya
Chef Thai Dang has a starry past, having cooked at Michelin three-star L20 and two-star RIA, and his new spot might just get some more. Instead of serving up a hodgepodge of Asian ingredients or fried sugary treats as most pan-Asian spots do, Dang is serving up refined but fairly authentic Thai and Vietnamese salads and roast meats. His squid stuffed with bone marrow is a triumph of precision with both proteins cooked to perfection.

Embeya, 564 West Randolph, (312)612-5640, embeya.com

Best of Chicago 2012

L210
Only open for a few months and not open to the public, Nike’s invite-only, ultra-exclusive hang suite in the West Loop was a non-ground level, exposed brick sanctuary that was the city’s best-kept secret that kept the sporting events, videogames competitions, global music and drinks going non-stop. Well, while it was open.

Audience Choice: Scofflaw, 3201 West Armitage, (773)252-9700, scofflawchicago.com

Best of Chicago 2012

Nellcote
The restaurant makes a lot of noise about how they grind double-zero flour in house, sleep with their dough and only allow it to be hand-kneaded by vestal virgins (ok, we made those last two up), but whatever they’re doing, there’s a chew, a puff of yeast, a crackling at the edges that few pizzas anywhere have. Get it with the housemade fennel sausage.

Nellcote, 833 West Randolph, (312)432.0500, nellcoterestaurant.com

Best of Chicago 2012

Duck heart gravy hash browns at Au Cheval
There is no more comfortable and soul-satisfying restaurant in Chicago right now than Au Cheval, and there is no more comforting dish than its lacy crisp hash browns which somehow keep their integrity even when soaked with a viscous rich offal gravy and a fried egg.

Au Cheval, 800 West Randolph, (312)929-4580, aucheval.tumblr.com

Best of Chicago 2012

Publican Quality Meats
Everything Paul Kahan touches usually turns to dripping delicious fatty pork, but here, it’s the lamb meatball sandwich (since replaced with lamb and, yep, pork belly sausage) and the battleship-sized tuna muffaletta that win the day. A hearty honorable mention to JP Graziano for its Italian subs, including the truffle mustard balsamic vinaigrette-soaked Mr. G sub.

Publican Quality Meats, 825 West Fulton Market, (312)445-8977, publicanqualitymeats.com

Audience choice: Bari, 1120 West Grand, (312)666-0730, bariitaliansubs.com

Best of Chicago 2012

Glazed & Infused
With doughnut shops springing up like Republican debate obfuscations, there’s an embarrassment of riches found at Doughnut Vault, Do-Rite, and old-school spots like Old Fashioned Donuts and Dat Donut, but with red-velvet-cake doughnuts dripping in cream cheese and maple-glazed long johns covered in thick sticks of bacon, Glazed & Infused gets the nod.

Glazed & Infused, 813 West Fulton Market, (312)226-5556, goglazed.com

Audience choice: Glazed & Infused, 813 West Fulton Market, (312)226-5556, goglazed.com

Best of Chicago 2012

The Publican
There are lots of honorable mentions here. If you want to get your noodles on, you might stop in at Takashi. If you need a Southern Fix, there’s Big Jones. But, none of them have the pork rinds or the beef and pork-fat-fried frites dripping in runny fried farm egg of the Publican.

The Publican, 837 West Fulton Market, (312)722-9555, thepublicanrestaurant.com

Audience choice: Lula, 2537 North Kedzie, (773)489-9554, lulacafe.com

Best of Chicago 2012

Green/Pink Morgan
Two attractive stations debuted this year, Yellow Oakton in Skokie and Green/Pink Morgan in the West Loop. The latter features sleek green canopies sheltering customers as they wait for their rides, plus a fully enclosed glass skybridge between the platforms, great for photographing the trains and skyline. Downstairs, sidewalks on both Lake and Morgan Streets have been widened to make room for the station houses and artistic, circular bike racks, the product of a design competition. The whole facility is an architect’s delight, and a relative bargain at only $38 million.

Morgan CTA station, 958 West Lake, transitchicago.com

Best of Chicago 2012

“MORE” curated by A. Laurie Palmer at Threewalls
Last May Laurie Palmer curated a magnificent night of readings by artists and writers who were “invited to think about more-ness, in the present context of austerity and debt.” The participants: Matthew Goulish, Chiara Galimberti, Matthias Regan, Anastasia Douka, Sam Davis, Jill Riddell, and Abigail Satinsky performed under the cover of Palmer’s massive installation “Still, yet, else, further, again” on view in the gallery. The readings allowed for a deeper reading of the art, demonstrating at its best how poetics of visual art and literature might serve and support each other.

Best of Chicago 2012

Avec naming Erling Wu-Bower its new chef de cuisine
The end of summer brought a surprising turn of events at one of Chicago’s most-renowned restaurants. Michelin-rated Avec bid adieu to founding chef Koren Grieveson after a memorable nine years, and brought twenty-nine-year-old Erling Wu-Bower over from Publican to take her place as chef de cuisine. Though the roster change created quite a stir in the Chicago foodie sphere, the experienced young chef has already proven himself more than capable, adding fifteen new menu items while steering the restaurant on a steady course true to its origins.

Avec, 615 West Randolph, (312)377-2002, avecrestaurant.com

Best of Chicago 2012