Certain things remain constant, the venerable Chicago institution, Gene & Georgetti, is one such place.
Alex Witchel writes:YOU always remember your first time, but what about your last?
The last time you sat at a restaurant table, swaddled in warmth, just inches from the bread basket, a drink in one hand, a cigarette in the other. You took a good long swallow of bourbon, which soothed the raw edge of smoke in your throat. You looked at a menu that listed every cut of beef known to man, watched platters of golden cottage fries go by and raised your glass to 20th-century ecstasy, American style.
The date? Oct. 29, 2007. The place? Gene & Georgetti, a family-owned steakhouse nestled under the El in Chicago, in business since 1941. Chicago, God bless its retro heart, is the rough-and-tumble big city that has somehow managed to elude the smoking police. But on Jan. 1, it’s over. Out on the street with you, just like New York.
[From To the Things That Remain - New York Times]
We actually won't miss the smoking as part of the Gene & Georgetti mise en scéne, in fact, we'll probably visit more often now. They do make a good drink, and the same waiters have worked there for decades, another sign of a quality establishment.
I grew up watching all the movies of the ’40s and ’50s, in black and white, filled with danger and Barbara Stanwyck — for whom my mother was named — and I imagined myself in each locale, whether glamorous or lowdown.500 N Franklin St Chicago, IL 60610
Gene & Georgetti captures the ethos of both. On one hectic weekend night I watched a desperate man try to slip the unflappable captain, Tommy, a $100 bill for a table. He waved it away like a fly. No table. Cut. Print. I would pay $100 myself to know the reason.
I never will, of course. I concentrate on my drink instead. They pour a good one, Maker’s Mark and soda in a tall glass, not too strong and not too weak.
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