On the road – Chicago Day 4

 

 

Our final full day in Chicago happened to be on Father’s Day.  The girls excitedly gave their dads the T-shirts that we bought from Target, and it was nice to see both my husband and brother wear them for our day in the city.  However, before leaving there was a little time for some stories.  What can I say, but they LURVE each other!

 

 

 

 

There are so many things that I love about Chicago.  One of the cool things is the bike friendliness of the city.  Just look at the traffic light!  I’ve never seen this before! 

 

This day was all about introducing the children to public transportation.  After parking our cars in a garage, we walked several blocks to catch a water taxi to Chinatown.  This was a first for me, and I was so excited to do this.  We bought our tickets on the boat, but if you plan ahead by purchasing them during the week you can buy a 10 ride pass for around $15.  Otherwise, it’s $5 per person.  That is a good thing to know! 

 

 

2140 S. Archer Ave

Chicago, IL 60616

(312) 808-9538 

 

Our first destination was Hing Kee for lunch.  I love eating in Chinatown.  It brings back memories of my childhood.  Growing up, my parents would take my brother and me to Chinatown, and we would always eat at Three Happiness.  I’m not sure why we stopped.  Maybe the food changed, or maybe my family just started branching out to new restaurants, but I’ve been happy with all of the new places that we’ve gone. 

 

I have a confession.  Although I love going to Chinatown… I have a hard time being there.  Walking around you will see whole roasted ducks in the windows and if you go into the grocery stores, they often have live animals such as fish or frogs to buy that they will butcher for you.  There’s no hiding anything.  Everything is out in the open.  Admittedly, it’s not as bad as an outdoor market in Taiwan (I kept my eyes closed a lot), but it’s still hard to see.  Also, being in this environment makes me wonder if the food that we eat is truly vegan.  Although Chinese dishes don’t generally have huge portions of meat, it is often used to flavor the food.  So, even though we request no meat, there is always this doubt in the back of my mind that the food isn’t safe.  Do you ever feel like this?  

 

 

For our appetizer, we ordered the scallion pancakes and veggie dumplings.  We asked about lard to make sure the pancakes weren’t prepared or fried with it.  I also asked if there were any eggs in the dumplings, and those dishes were both SAFE!!!  The pancakes were yummy, but the dumplings were outstanding!  The dumpling skin was made from homemade dough and the filling was a nice combination of veggies.  There were 15 dumplings in one order, and we saved most of them for our girls.  Our daughters love dumplings, and I knew there was no guarantee that they would eat the rest of our meal. 

 

 

 

 

For our main dish, we ordered the braised bean curd with black mushrooms.  The tofu was perfectly fried, and garnished with baby bok choy, black mushrooms, and pea pods.  So delish!  The sauce was sweet, savory, and perfectly balanced.  I highly recommend this dish (to vegans and non vegans) if you ever go here.  It got my meat loving brother’s approval.  

Braised Bean Curd with Black Mushrooms 

 

Whenever we order Chinese food, we always order noodles for Laney.  There didn’t really seem to be any noodles with veggies on the menu (again… everything had meat!), so we asked them if they could make a veggie noodle dish.  What they came back with was a veggie chow mein.  My only experience that I can remember of chow mein were those La Choy noodles in a can.  This dish blew my mind!  I think it was my favorite dish.  The noodles were dried and crispy, but the sauce that was on top softened all of the center noodles.  So, you would have creamy bites mixed with a few crunch bites.  Fantastic!  The veggies on top were broccoli, bean sprouts, bok choy, and something that looked but didn’t taste like celery.  My brother ordered ong choy, I think it’s also called water spinach.  It’s a nice green vegetable to complement the rest of your meal.  We ordered one other vegetable dish to complement our meal which was schezuan string beans.  This is one of my favorite dishes.  The flavor from Hing Kee’s version was different than any other that I’ve had, but it was still good. 

Veggie Chow Mein

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

After shopping, we headed over to Joy Yee for desserts.  There is more than one location in the Chinatown square area, and I don’t know the address of the one we went to.  There is one location that is strictly for ordering at the window (which always has a long line), but I believe they only make smoothies.  The one we went to was a restaurant, with a smoothie window at the entrance.  Okay, so the reason why we chose the restaurant location is that it never has a line, and they also make Bao Bean!!!!  Bao Bean is one of my favorite desserts, its such a simple yet delicious dessert perfect for hot weather!  It consists of shaved ice topped with fruit and different types of beans…. Yes… beans!..  I mentioned in my quinoa and adzuki bean breakfast post, about a dessert with pineapple and adzuki beans… well, this that dessert!!! 

 

The menu at Joy Yee was a bit overwhelming.  There was lots of standing around trying to figure out what to order.  The girls wanted some type of smoothie, and they ended up sharing a Raspberry Freeze.  I ordered the Taiwanese shaved ice with red beans (adzuki), pineapples, mango, and tapioca pearls.  Also, I had them hold the condensed milk… Yuck!

 

 

 

 

 

 

After dessert, we headed to the bus stop to catch the bus that would drop us off near the train that would drop bring us to a stop a few blocks from Millennium Park.  Normally, you could just take the train right to the park, but the Chinatown stop was under construction.  Luckily, the shuttle was free.  It was a nice little bus trip. 

 

 

 

 

201 E. Randolph St.,

between Michigan Ave. & Columbus Ave.

Chicago, IL 60602

 

This was my first time visiting Millennium Park.  It was a really fun place to bring the kids.  My sister-in-law suggested that all of the girls wear their swim suits under their clothes so that they could play in the Crown Fountain.  It was a perfect day for this.  It was just hot enough in the sun to enjoy a little splashing while it wasn’t too hot if you sat and watched… which is exactly what I did!   

 

 

Leaving the park, we ran into the Jun Kaneko Exhibition.  I had the girls pose next to their favorite statue.  My girls were really tired, so I’m not sure if they had the energy to find their favorite one.  

 

This was such an action packed day.  There was plenty of walking, and we were all tired by the end of our expedition.  My sister-in-law promised the girls Slurpees from 7-11 for being so good, and that was okay by me!  I had one too!  My husband found a bag of chips that aren’t sold near us, and admittedly they were pretty tasty.  They were little chili-lime flavored taquitos. A lot of sugar and salt every now and then is okay by me. 

 

 

There are so many fun things to do in Chicago, and so many things to explore!  Overall, we had a great visit with the family, and I’m thankful for having such wonderful people in my life.  I hope you enjoyed reading about our adventure!