Starting Your Day in Chicago?

My last post was about one of my food stops during a recent visit to Chicago. Here's another food recommendation, courtesy of radio station WBEZ. It's a list of the top 5 breakfasts in the Windy City.

Meli Cafe heads the list, a Greek diner with "organic produce, eggs, fresh-squeezed juices and homemade jams." Sounds good to me.

The Smell of Bacon in a Skillet

There aren't many aromas that are any better than that. I don't know what it is about breakfast that makes it such a pleasant and civilized meal. And, no, I'm not referring to the coffee-in-a-plastic cup version of breakfast.

Sometimes one has to do breakfast on the run, but, every now and then (especially weekends), breakfast deserves some time and attention. So take a deep breath, put down your Blackberry or cell phone, have a seat and get ready to order -- Delish.com presents this unranked list of the 57 best restaurants and diners to enjoy breakfast.

Why 57? Beats me, but just about every one of them looks tempting. I've been to a few of these eateries.

National Pancake Day

Today is National Pancake Day. A weekday is not a great day for enjoying pancakes. Most of us working stiffs don't have the time to sit down to a pancake breakfast. Why didn't they pick a Saturday or Sunday?

I love 'em plain, with blueberries, buttermilk, bananas or pecans. But I must confess that I'm not a fan of chocolate chip pancakes, which are usually on the menu of IHOPs and other pancake houses.

To truly enjoy a stack of pancakes, you need to have the right kind of syrup. Aunt Jemima? No friggin' way. Maple syrup is my one and only choice. Sure, it costs more than cane sugar syrup, but the depth of flavor is so much better than the mass-marketed non-maple varieties. Want to make pancakes from scratch? It's not that hard. Find out by clicking on this article.

Making Great Hash Browns

I love hash brown potatoes. But what restaurants commonly refer to as "home fries"? I generally find them extraordinarily blah. The potatoes they seem to use for home fries are typically second-rate, and they never cook or season them very well.

I agree with this post at MrBreakfast.com, which declares:

Hash browns have the ability to make or break a breakfast. ... the taste of great hash browns can travel right from the mouth to the soul.

The nice thing about hash browns is that you get the outside nice and crispy. The thin shreds of potato make it much easier to get that crispiness.

I made some hash browns on this snowy weekend, and they turned out pretty well. According to this post at Simply Recipes, one of the keys is to get all the moisture you can out of the potatoes before throwing them into a skillet.

One thing I didn't do this weekend that also seems helpful (to make them nice and crispy) is to spread a think layer of potatoes in the skillet. If you drop a thick pile of hash browns in the pan, some of them will not make steady contact with the heating surface of the skillet.