Next, if you somehow haven’t heard, is the new Chicago restaurant from Chef Grant Achatz and Restaurateur Nick Kokonas, both of Alinea fame. The premise is short-lived, but exquisitely executed menus with the food, silverware and focus changing every three months. The opening choice of “Paris 1906: Escoffier at the Ritz” pulls recipes from the French haute cuisine bible Le Guide Culinaire by Auguste Escoffier, but future menus may, for example, present Sicily 1949, Napa Valley 1996 or Hong Kong 2030. Instead of reservations, Next sells tickets for a dinner slot with the price sliding from $65 for a Wednesday at 10pm to $110 for Saturday at 7:30. These tickets are the hottest in town with over 19,000 people signed up to get access on opening day. The night we dined, President Obama was in town, but eating at nearby N9Ne. One is left suspecting it was because even he couldn’t get tickets to Next.

A few things need to be said up front. The duck is as good as you’ve heard. The service, too, lived up to they hype, to the extent that we swore they had a hidden microphone at our table. And the wine pairings… well, they are even better than you can imagine. Next has been the talk of the town, hyped up more than any restaurant opening we’ve seen. But in the end, it was simply the absurdity of such good food and such a good time that left us with our overwhelmingly positive impressions. 

After entering through a small foyer, the main dining space is modest holding only a dozen or so tables, but with high loft ceilings common to the West Loop, converted warehouse style. A curved decorative beam snuck along the ceiling and behind the tables along the walls were wide mirrors. Both of us had seen the videos online of people measuring the distances between tables with tape measures and when we were finally inside, we indeed got the feeling that nothing in the design was left to chance. We were greeted with sparkling wine and a playbill (yes, a playbill) laying the scene for “Paris 1906” and describing our evening’s Belle Époque entertainment.

Our meal began with an apéritif of Château d’Orshwir Crémant d’Alsace Brut, a sparkling white wine, which set a great tone and brought the lady back to her Italian family dinners kicked off with Prosecco. The Hors d’Oeuvres followed; five little snacks arrived in symmetric duplicate on a silver tray. The first bite was a leek wrap with an exciting, flavorful mushroom filling. Next, the pork rillette served as a simple nosh and was decorated with a chive sprout which was reminiscent of a baby sea urchin. The soft boiled quail egg followed and was topped with an anchovy, the saltiness of which complimented the burst of liquid when we took it in one bite. (Be prepared for a huge mouthful!). We then tackled one of the more buzzed about bites, the brioche with a foie gras center and apricot mustard seed jam. This was, unfortunately, the biggest gripe of the course. While the foie gras was delicious, there was too much of it and we couldn’t really find any synergy between the three very different parts of the dish. We finally settled into the beautifully-presented egg custard. A three-level affair, this bite included a thick custard bottom, a salted cod mouse, and a beschemel-like cream topped with shaved black truffles, all built inside an egg shell. Taking a spoonful of all three layers at once, we both agreed we had saved the best for last.

Our second course was Potage à la Tortue Claire, a light turtle consommé with fennel, carrots and leeks. This was a simple, but refreshing soup, and was paired with the Domaine de Montbourgeau Savagnin ‘Etolie’ Jura 2005. It was here that we realized how ridiculously perfect the wine pairings were; a challenging wine, this Savagnin was aged in open barrels giving it an incredibly complex sherry nose, but a shockingly light and fresh taste. It was here, too, that we realized how ridiculously perfect the service was. A server came over to refill our glasses, saying only “I heard you really liked this one.”

**AT THIS POINT, ONE OF THE TIPSY COMMENTERS HAS SENT HERSELF TO BED AND IS DICTATING FROM A RECLINING POSITION**

Next came our crawfish friend adorning the Filet de Sole Daumont, which was paired perfectly with a the Macon Milly-Lamartine ‘Clos du Four’ 2006 Chardonnay who’s bitterness tempered the fish amazingly. While it was not our favorite dish since neither of us is very much a fan of seafood, we approached it with an open mind and found several very good moments. Our favorite of the plate was the little fried “donut” of sole roe which popped with flavor and was not too strong. The itty-bitty crustacean head held a crawfish mousse which we spooned out through a little slit in the back. We were given carte blanche by the staff to suck the mousse right out of the head if we wanted (we both declined), but they did discourage Louisiana-style whole head eating. Everything swam in a delicious saffron sauce, but the sole with crawfish spiral at the core of the dish and the mushroom cap with crawfish filling were both ultimately underwhelming.

Then came the Suprêmes de Poussin paired with a flowery red, Château de la Liquière ‘Les Amandiers’ Faugères 2009. The chicken was immaculately cut and draped in a thin foie gras sheen then paired with a surprising little chicken mousseline stuffed cucumber number wrapped in house-cured pork belly. The cucumber was poached AND sous-vide, which we figured out all on our own, prompting the server to ask us if we were “FRIENDS OF THE INSTITUTE.” We giggled and responded, “No… just nerds,” but our display of food chops nonetheless gained us an invite to tour the kitchen at the end of the evening. Score!

And then came the star of the evening, the Caneton rouennais à la Presse, a duck confit with pressed duck and cognac jus. Everything about this dish was perfect, from the breasts to the slight char on the skin to the jus which we could eat forever. This came with the side of potatoes, Gratin de Pommes de Terre à la Dauphinoise, or, as our server put it, “potatoes, with cream… and cheese… and more cream… and more cheese!” All this was paired with a French version of a G.S.M., Domaine Brusset ‘Les Travers’ Cairanne 2006, a perfectly drinkable wine for such a hearty course; we probably had 3/4 of the bottle at the table! YUM. 

Salad normally comes at the end of the meal in France; we’d heard reports of the Salade Irma being underwhelming, but we very much enjoyed the light and refreshing peppery bit. There were blanched asparagus and bits of cauliflower below radishes, frisee, and edible flowers. It had a perplexing mystery ingredient that the lady swore was fennel, but the search for said fennel on the plate turned up empty. Our waiter commended our palates and rewarded us with the answer: it was the watercress flowers that gave the slight fennel flavor. 

Dessert was a highlight mostly because of the Smith Woodhouse 10 year Tawny Port. Our first dessert plate was Bombe Ceylan, an ice cream with a hint of coffee and micro-mint served with a chocolate graham cracker base and rummed cherries. For the second plate, a truly impressive La Colombe Single Origin Haitian french press coffee (the best coffee either of us has had in a long time) was presented along side the Mignardises, a collection of fabulous little bites. There were candied beet “dots” topped with light sugar, caramels with a briny salt harvested from a coastal French village and pistachio nougats topped with chocolate shavings. We actually held off on eating the last, partly since we didn’t want the meal to end and and partly so that we could get our server to refill our port glasses one more time! What a great way to end the meal!

As hinted at before, we were lucky enough to end the evening with a kitchen tour. Around back we saw the famed kitchen table overlooking the action (which, when service there begins, will feature what was described by Chef Achatz as “an insane menu”) and we got a run down of how they keep their immaculate lines. Like the devil who seems to appear whenever you say his name, we mentioned something about partner Nick Kokonas, when who should appear but the man himself behind us to shake our hands and humbly accept our thanks and congratulations on such a fine meal. (Jokes about the devil aside, Nick was a very pleasant and approachable host.) Finally, we witnessed with our own eyes Head Chef David Beran plating the duck like it was his child and chefs tweezing individual pieces of dill. The relative calm composure of the kitchen was what struck both of us most. 

We can’t afford to dine out like this too often and with the competition for tickets we probably wouldn’t be able to even if we could, but really it is the specialness and uniqueness of experiences like this that make them so memorable. For a few hours we were indeed transported to an evening out at the Ritz, treated well and wined and dined to the max. 

View photos of (almost) all the courses on flickr.