Delilah's In Chicago

[PhilsFan]

I met fellow SBer, Jono in Chicago for the Cubs/Phils game on Friday.

After the game, on Chuck Cowdery’s recommendation, we visited Delilah’s, a neighborhood bar on Lincoln Avenue off Diversey. Delilah's is one strange place you have to see at least once. The walls are painted totally black, and

hanging on them are giant pictures of Elvis, including a velvet Elvis on the back wall. Punk rock videos are playing on the TV monitors. The darkness of the room only serves to draw your eyes to the light behind the Bar shining on the most massive collection of whiskeys I’ve ever seen in one place.

Foster, the most laid-back bartender you’ll ever see, served us our menu choice, Pappy 20. We both thought that the only difference between the PVW 15 and 20 was a slight tang in the finish of the older bourbon. PVW 20 is a great boubon, but IMO not worth the extra $50-$60 difference.

Next we tried an experiment. We were fascinated as Foster prepared Absinthe to serve to other patrons and had to try it. Foster would put the Absinthe in a glass tank container with a pedestal of a figure of a woman supporting it. The container

had several spouts. One of the spouts was opened to send a stream of Absinthe cascading onto a sugar cube sitting on a grated metal utensil across a glass. When the sugar cube was melted and the glass full, Foster would serve it with the

metal utensil inside. It wasn’t my cup of tea, but for the show alone it was worth trying.

Delilah’s is easy to get to from Wrigley Field. Take the Red Line south (95th/Dan Ryan) From Addison to Belmont, transfer at Belmont to the Brown Line and take it to Diversey.

Exit at Diversey, and walk about 4 blocks down to where Diversey, Racine and Lincoln intersect. Make a hard left onto Lincoln and you'll see Delilah's just a few doors down.

I would highly recommend the trip.

-Joe

[jtwebb56]

Mike and Sally (The owners of Delilah's) are also wonderful people and extreme bourbon enthusiasts, very knowledgable about the products and generally fun to drink with. I live in Bardstown, KY and have often found them at 3 A.M. in my hot tub during KY Bourbon Festival week.

Maxim magazine actually rated the bar one of the top whiskey bars in the country a few years back and I always like knowing that the owners of the bar I'm visiting are really good people. I would highly recommend a trip to Delilah's.

[Jono]

It is indeed a unique combination of music and bourbon...are punk rockers on average whiskey enthusiasts? I am sure like everything...it is hard to make generalizations and categorize people based on one interest. Of course, musicians in general have a long love affair and/or abusive history with whiskey.

Joe...excellent review...the Absinthe was worth a try....not sure it requires a second.