Chicago: Girl & The Goat

So I didn't get to catch up on all my posts before I left for the East Coast like I wanted to.  But that's no surprise.  

It's my second day in Boston and I'm waiting for my sister to get ready, so why not take another stab at it?  Better late than never, right?

Anyway, The night before my last final, CK invited me to crash her cousin's reservation at Girl & The Goat:

As everyone knows, thanks to Chef Stephanie Izard's Top Chef winner status, reservations at Girl & The Goat are hard to come by.  CK's cousin made this one three months in advance.  As CK's sister unexpectedly had to work that night, I scored her precious spot at the table.  At the last minute, CK's cousin got sick and couldn't come either, so his wife brought her brother instead.

The interior design paired with the awesome music made for a really fun dining atmosphere:

There were six of us in the party and we decided to each choose two dishes.  Mine came out first.  There was the aMAIZing bread:

It came with the most addictive romesco mole and avocado yogurt.  The bread itself was stuffed with some kind of cheese.

I also picked the crispy duck tongues:

How can anyone go wrong with duck tongues?  Especially those served with cara cara, roasted shiitakes, thai basil, and crispy wontons.

CK's boyfriend wisely chose the grilled malaspina:

These beautiful oysters came doused in a smoked uni vinaigrette.  A little bitter, but still delicious.

I don't remember who chose the hen of the woods mushroom ragout (maybe CK's cousin's wife?), but it was one of my favorites of the night:

There's just something about the sweet potato agnolotti together with the shroom creme fraiche and capers that made this dish AWESOME.  It tasted very Thai to me.

I think the escargot ravioli was CK's boyfriend's second pick:

The ravioli came in a tamarind-miso sauce with bacon.

CK wanted the sauteed green beans:

Can anyone say crack sauce?  The fish sauce vinaigrette mixed with the sweet cashews?  Brilliant.  (Though a bit salty.)

CK also wanted to try the grilled baby octopus, which came with guanciale, wax beans, radish, and a pistachio-lemon vinaigrette:

The pistachio was what really won me over.

CK's cousin's wife's brother (what a mouthful) did us all a favor by ordering the crisp braised pork shank:

The pork itself was fabulous, but together with the pita, the kimchi sauce, the buttermilk dressing, and the butternut-shiitake kimchi, it was heavenly.

As CK's cousin's wife said, we couldn't leave without trying some goat.  So she ordered the confit goat belly:

I didn't actually taste the goat belly because I was too busy being overwhelmed by the lobster and crab chunks swimming among the fennel in bourbon butter.  Super decadent.  Wow.

CK's cousin's wife's brother (hahaha...it cracks me up every time I type that out) also ordered the wood grilled broccoli, but because it came out last, we got it on the house:

I never really care about the order in which food comes out, but apparently Girl & The Goat does.  Yay!  Free food for us!  The broccoli itself was very smokey, but it also came in a rogue smokey bleu sauce and was topped with spice crispies (whatever that means).  I'm not a blue cheese fan, so I was careful to pick an untainted broccoli.

We were all incredibly stuffed, but nobody even considered not getting dessert.  At our server's recommendation, we went with the chocolate-thai chili gelato:

It came with a really dark and fudge-y chocolate cake, peanut fluff, pomegranate, and left hand milk stout.

Then just for fun, we threw in the butternut malasadas:

These donut holes were stuffed with hook's cheddar and topped with bourbon gelato and brown butter apples.

While I'm not usually one for Asian fusion, I had a great time moaning over each Asian-themed dish with the others.  Every dish was well-executed and damn delicious.  The meal as a whole was on the expensive side, but it really was worth it.

But while it was an amazing experience, I don't think I would be able to do it again later the same week as CK's cousin and his wife planned on doing.  I need my recovery time.

Girl & The Goat

809 W Randolph St

Chicago, IL 60607

(312) 492-6262

http://www.girlandthegoat.com/