Alinea

As one of only two Chicago restaurants with three Michelin stars when we visited in 2024, Chef Grant Achatz’s pioneering Alinea earned its reputation for modernist culinary excellence by combining theatricality and avant garde techniques with attention to every detail from dishes to wire suspensions of items within the dining space. Though Michelin subsequently dropped Alinea to two stars, leading Achatz to reimagine the experience in 2026, the general premise remains the same.

Our meal began and ended with dramatic flourishes – a dining surface set on fire for a candle-lit soup, salad, and champagne course, contrasting with servers climbing ladders to remove giant black plates from the ceiling before plating cosmically deconstructed, liquid nitrogen-frozen pies. The rest of the meal took place at more conventional small tables, apart from a brief visit to Alinea’s famous kitchen for a drink and snack.