Senza: The First Gluten-Free Restaurant to Receive the Michelin Star

By Maggie Geraci

Maggie Geraci is a Dietetic Intern at Ingalls Memorial Hospital. This post is the tenth installment of the new student series here on the CAND blog which features Chicago-area dietetic interns every Thursday. Maggie is passionate about a wide scope of dietetics including corporate dietetics and wellness.

The First Gluten-Free Restaurant to Receive the Michelin Star

On November 12, 2013, Michelin announced its annual starred restaurants. The Michelin guide is a prestigious annual book series published by the French company Michelin. Over one hundred years ago this guide was established for car enthusiasts, originally with the intent to boost vehicle sales in France. Over time, the Michelin brothers saw growing interest in the restaurant recommendations section of the guide and choose to re-center the guide’s focus. The guide has spread internationally and currently includes 90 countries. The book rating system is now a hierarchy of one, two, and three stars that guide the restaurant critique team. One star denotes “a very good restaurant in its category,” two stars means “excellent cooking, worth a detour,” and three stars reflects an “exceptional cuisine, worth a special journey.”

For 2014, twenty restaurants in Chicago were assigned a Michelin star. Five new restaurants were named first-star status including EL Ideas and Senza.

Senza

Senza is a New American restaurant at 873 N. Broadway, just between Surf Street and Diversey Parkway. This is the first gluten-free dining restaurant to ever be starred by Michelin. The morning menu consists of gluten-free baked goods and coffee from Bridgetpot Coffee Company. As the day progresses, the menu changes and focuses on fresh local ingredients and modern recipes. Menu items are composed of familiar ingredients that are tweaked to compose unusual flavors and textures. Four or nine course tasting menus draw in customers that enjoy a small bit of a wide array of tastes and foods. Each tasting menu is paired with a wine or cocktail that compliments the meal.

EL Ideas

EL Ideas is located at 2419 W. 14th Street in a back alleyway. The meaning behind the name reflects the elevated train system of the Chicago-land area and is an abbreviation for Elevated Ideas in Cuisine and Dining. The restaurant motto is “redefining fine dining” in terms of both cuisine and environment. The dining room itself is placed inside the kitchen and interaction with the chefs is constant. Dinners are set at a specific time and all guests are served concurrently. After the meal is served, the chef reveals the inspiration behind the course to the customers. Most items are classic dishes with a modern twist. Today’s menu items include fries and frosty (potato, leek, vanilla), geoduck (yuzu, radish, tamarind), monkfish (fennel, tomato, saffron), sunchoke (greyson , pear, honey), nantucket bay (salsify, concord, almond), and lamb (pigeon peas, hops, konbucha).

Maggie Geraci is current dietetic intern at Ingalls Memorial Hospital. Kristen completed her BS in Family and Consumer Sciences with a concentration in dietetics at Eastern Illinois University in 2013.  Maggie was born and raised on the Southside of Chicago but loves to travel. She is very interested in pursing a career in wellness or corporate nutrition and looks forward to the endless possibilities the dietetics field can offer. Maggie can be contacted at mgeraci@ingalls.org.