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August 14, 2025

Jim & Nancy Eggers

From Asian to Cajun

Just to give you a heads up, this article is going to be very strange. Try to follow along and we will explain it as best as we can.

Eat where the locals go

Our son and his family were coming to visit us from Florida for the Fourth of July holiday. This traditionally is a day of parades, fireworks, and barbeques. In anticipation of this, we travelled to that well known sausage and butcher shop in Elburn. Now to stock up on hot dogs, bratwursts, and thuringers. The trick is to stop Jim from buying a shopping cart full of beef jerky and salami sticks. I have to admit, they have the best pre-cooked pork schnitzel you have ever tasted and we usually buy out the display. This shopping spree worked up quite an appetite for us. We decided to check out a nearby breakfast/lunch café that we heard about on social media that was only ten minutes away. Off we went to the Sugar Grove Café in, where else, Sugar Grove.

A loser’s lunch

Jim is not known for his athletic ability. He is equally horrible at all sports. This includes the relatively simple game of bocce ball. In his defense, he is improving. Now he is keeping the ball in the court and not throwing it into the bushes. He is so bad, that as of this writing, we have not won a single game. It has gotten to the point that our teammates drive past him when he is walking Rosie, they roll down the car window, and laughingly yell, “YOU SUCK”!!! To soften the pain of our losing streak, we decided to try a new restaurant in Algonquin. With our heads bowed in shame, we ventured off to Casa Tequilas Mexican Grill.

CAUTION: MAY BE HABIT FORMING

Nancy has been experiencing a slow leak for months now. No, it is not what you think. We have one of those “numbers” beds that is pumped up with air to the firmness of your liking. Every few days it must be pumped up, and since Nancy is not known for suffering in silence, it’s time for a new mattress after 16 years. On to the nearest store where we were treated to more videos than a timeshare sales meeting. This mattress even has an app to tell you how well you are sleeping. Seriously??? You need an app for that?

DIY dining

Most weeks Nancy cooks six out of seven days. I’m very lucky to be married to a great cook. She can be fancy (beef bourguignon), comforting (homemade chicken noodle soup), and old school (German rouladens). What better way to show my appreciation for all of her hard work than to take her to a restaurant where you have to cook your own food. This DIY restaurant is the Melting Pot in Schaumburg.

Never assume

When we pulled into the strip mall parking lot and we finally located the restaurant, Jim seemed less than excited. It looked like a very small venue and Jim pooh-poohed it and didn’t want to go in. I, not being a pompous moron, dragged him in kicking and screaming. When I opened the door, we were surprised to see a restaurant that seemed to go on forever with no less than 22 tables. Now his attitude changed and like I always told him, never assume because we all know what happens when we assume…

Livia and learn

There comes a time in every married man’s life when he has to endure the most diabolical torture ever devised. I am referring to the dreaded time when his wife asks him to accompany her to a quaint suburban town and wander aimlessly through old homes that have been transformed into stores filled with useless dust collecting tchotchke. Such was the case recently when Nancy asked me to go to downtown Geneva for an afternoon of fun-filled shopping. After several hours of my grumbling and pouting, Nancy decided to ease my suffering and take me to an Italian restaurant nearby. This oasis in the sea of shopping was Livia Italian Eatery in Geneva.

The early bird gets the deal

They say “the early bird gets the worm” and Rosie has been getting a lot of choice worms since, like clockwork, she wakes us up every morning at 6:15. Seriously, you can set your watch by her. This is followed by her early morning nap at 7:15.

A burger round-up

Ah, the wild west!!! A time in American history of lawlessness, cattle rustlers, and gun slingers. This was immortalized by such historically accurate TV shows (NOT) such as Have Gun Will Travel, Bonanza, and our personal favorite, Gunsmoke. This show had memorable characters such as the 6’7” Marshall Dillon, the vivacious Miss Kitty (who we always suspected of running a promiscuous business on the side), and comic relief provided by Chester who was desperately in need of orthopedic work. With this in mind, Jim put on his chaps and spurs, which for reasons we won’t go into, he just happened to have lying around the house, jumped on our faithful steed “Mini,” and blazed a trail to Cattlemen’s Burger and Brew in Algonquin.

A corned-beef bonanza

Let’s be honest, St. Patrick’s Day is not really known as a culinary holiday. Most people prefer Guiness and Jamesons over boiled potatoes. A perfect example of this is Nancy. If there’s Guiness on tap, she’s there in a heartbeat. She actually survived in Ireland on Guiness and flights of Irish whiskey rather than eating such delicacies as Piggy Cheeks and the delicious blend of oatmeal, pork, bread, and suet known as White Pudding. However, we digress. We found an Irish pub in Downers Grove with an interesting menu with lots of creative and authentic Irish dishes. We jumped into the Mini-Mobile, followed the rainbow hoping to find a pot of gold at Ballydoyle Irish Pub.

Scrumptious spaetzle

It’s so much fun living in the Midwest. You can experience every type of weather known to man all in one day. It can start off as a bright sunny day followed by fog and finally snow. The same is true with dining out. Almost every cuisine in the world is available only a hop, skip, and jump away. You can enjoy Italian, Asian, Mexican, and just about anything else you can think of. One day I said to myself, “self, let’s get some German food.” After a quick search on the Dining Duo computer, we hopped into our German car and took the autobahn, otherwise known as I-90, to Renate’s German Restaurant in Hanover Park.

EL DIABLO DELICIOSO

Jim is rapidly becoming the Six Million Dollar Bionic Man. Actually, that price is not too far off after looking at our Medicare bills. He’s had a knee and hip replaced and is now having the other hip replaced. The good news is, this is now considered outpatient surgery and you are in and out in three hours. What can possibly go wrong?

Blast from the past

Did you ever wake up in the middle of the night and suddenly remember something from the past? Such was the case when we were looking for restaurants to review and Nancy woke up screaming about a Baker’s Square her and her girlfriend Sharon used to frequent when she was a travel agent. This brought back memories of the best pie in the world, the chemically enhanced, sugar laden, 790 calories per slice bomb known as the Caramel Pecan Silk Supreme. Never fear loyal readers, there are some Baker’s Square restaurants still around. We hopped into the “way back machine” and sped off to Village Inn/Baker’s Square in Palatine.

Jabba the Hut-suey

We are proud to say we have survived another round of holidays and things are returning to normal. Our stomachs are also returning to normal size after being stretched out to the point of no return due to all the holiday goodies. We have successfully rung in the New Year, and we hate to brag, but we actually stayed awake until 9:30 on New Year’s Eve. Truth be told, Rosie, aka the party animal, only made it up till 8:20 before falling in a heap in the middle of the living room floor.

2024 B.E.L.C.H.

Another year bites the dust. It is a time for reflecting on old times and fond memories. Being the foodies that we are, our thoughts go to past tasty dishes. We remember the good old days, when breakfast cereals didn’t try to hide the sugar, such as Sugar Pops and Sugar Smacks. We remember past food fads, such as when anything and everything could be encased in a Jell-O mold. We reminisce about food favorites from our childhood such as fried baloney on Wonder Bread. Since Wonder bread is no longer available here, our neighbors Mary and Bruce on their trips back to the East coast bring us a loaf. And if that’s not enough, even our son sends us loaves by Fed Ex from Florida.

Sunrise special

Jim is the king of all procrastinators. We have a fluorescent light fixture in our closet that has been flickering and probably sending out Morse Code from some alien civilization. The messages finally stopped when the last bulb burned out. Time to get Jim’s lazy butt up on the ladder to replace it. First step is to go to a big box store on Randall Road to buy light bulbs.

Mixed emotions

It was a beautiful fall afternoon. The leaves on the trees were changing colors and the air was fresh and crisp. We just finished taking down our Halloween decorations and our stomachs started to grumble. Our friends told us about a restaurant in Sycamore. We sped off to Nat’s on Maple to have lunch and check out the fall colors.

On the right track

Huntley has been selected as a stop on the new Chicago to Rockford train line. Since our “station” in life is to be your timely restaurant critics, we “engineer” our articles and try to keep them “on track” even if we have to “blow the whistle” on some of the restaurants. Our “next stop” will be near the Cary “depot” and dining at the Tracks Bar and Grill.

Unhappy Anniversary

The following story, sadly to say, is absolutely true. It is not exaggerated or fabricated. Please read on.

Our 50th wedding anniversary was almost upon us. We decided to go “all out” in celebrating this momentous occasion. After much reflection, we chose to book a river cruise, mainly because we fit their passenger demographics and there is an abundance of beautiful scenery to view while sailing. The location for this dream cruise was to be in Europe and start in Prague with a two-day hotel stay, and then bussed to Nuremburg to set sail down the beautiful Danube River all the way to Budapest, stopping in Regensburg, Passau, Engelhartszell, Krems, Vienna and Budapest. We reserved the cruise, booked our flights, (we were even able to use our mileage points on our flights) and visions of Medieval Castles and old European architecture danced in our heads.

Tropical breezes

Every year we spend two glorious weeks with our best friends, who live in California, on the tropical island paradise known as Aruba. Right around now we start to get afflicted with island fever. What better way to temporarily cure this “fever” than by going to the Bahama Breeze Island Grill in Schaumburg.

Cruisin’ for food

Everyone needs medications at some point in their life. Our little puppy, Rosie, is no exception. Her medications are necessary to keep away those nasty fleas and ticks when she goes outside. We have tried everything, like putting her pill into liver sausage, peanut butter, or her (and Jim’s) favorite, the aerosol squirt cheese in a can. In the end, she will succeed in spitting the pill out on the floor while staring defiantly at us. The irony of this is, when she does go outside, her main diet consists of ants, spiders, and the occasional lightning bug. On our way to the vet to pick up her pills, we passed by a restaurant in Gilberts named Cruisin’ and decided to try it.

A sticky situation

It’s been a while since Jim and I had Chinese food and sometimes our bodies start craving MSG. Anyone can find a Chinese takeout restaurant, but it is much more difficult to find a good Chinese dine in restaurant. While driving through Crystal Lake to buy some donuts, we spotted the Kirin King-Asian Cuisine and decided to drop in and check it out.

The site is an older building and has housed several different restaurants during the past years. When walking in, there was a gigantic fish tank with lots of salt water fish swimming around (their sushi must be really fresh). There are a lot of steps to get into the restaurant and also into their dining area, so obviously this restaurant is not handicap accessible.

Steakhouse in disguise… with onions

Now that beef prices are at an all-time high, of course, Nancy has a recurring taste for steak. To stop her incessant whining, I cleverly suggested that we go check out a steakhouse. We have passed by this restaurant a number of times, but never gave it a second thought until today. “To the Mini-Mobile Nancy,” and we headed out to Addison’s Steakhouse in McHenry.

When we arrived in the strip mall, we were surprised that the restaurant had outdoor seating by the shopping center’s fountain. We decided to dine indoors due to the Florida like weather we’ve been experiencing.

ABBONDANZA!

Social media is a wonderful thing. Where else can you learn about a household “hack” that will wind-up taking you twice as long to do a chore. You can read a post from someone trying to convince you that the earth is flat, complete with Photoshopped pictures. Also, you are able to engage in a rousing argument about which is the best toe nail clipper. We have to admit, sometimes social media does come in handy, like when we heard the buzz about a new Italian restaurant in Marengo. It piqued our curiosity, so we locked up little Rosie in her crate, armed our GPS, and dashed off to Abbondanza Cucina.

Granite City here we come

It’s a wonderful age we now live in. There are hundreds of cable channels and dozens of streaming services, all for the low introductory price of $4.99 a month. Nancy cringes when I turn on the TV. She is fed up with me watching Hoarders, American Pickers, and Dr. Pimple Popper. As a result, we find ourselves tuning into the old standards, such as the prime-time cartoon show, The Flintstones. We love their creative solutions to everyday items such as the Pterodactyl Airlines, the dinosaur garbage disposal, and the baby elephant vacuum cleaner. Interesting, isn’t it, they all had TV. With this in mind, we jumped into our prehistoric “Mini”-mobile and decided to go to Granite City Food and Brewery in Schaumburg. Jim got his size 14 clod-hoppers all revved up, his feet hit the pavement, and off we went.

I want more parmesan

Nancy doesn’t ask for very many things in life (okay, let’s wait for the lightning bolt to subside after hitting this newspaper). One day she had a taste for a pizza in a dine in restaurant. I would never pass up a good Italian dinner and remember, happy wife, happy life. She remembered a place in Elgin that coincidentally is in the same shopping center as our favorite donut shop. Looking forward to a “win-win” that evening, off we went to Maciano’s Pizza and Pastaria.

The big bang bang

Nancy has saved the Eggers’ household countless millions of dollars by being on every restaurant rewards club mailing list. Most of the time these rewards consist of getting a free small cheese pizza after you purchase 62 large pizzas with all the toppings. However, every once in a while, an email does strike a chord and actually is a good deal. Such was the case when Nancy received an email telling us about “Lobster Weekends” at Bonefish Grill in Algonquin.

Cantina zone

You are about to enter another dimension. A dimension not only of sight and sound, but of taste. You are about to enter… the “Cantina Zone.”

We wanted to shake up our restaurant reviews and not go to the same old places that have liver and onions as one of their daily specials. Boy did we find it!!! This very eclectic venue is in the downtown Crystal Lake area with a menu that would stump Rod Serling. We are referring to Cantina 52.

Flying broccoli

We have been having a rough couple of months (health wise), and both of us needed a fun date night with dinner and a show. What better way to combine both of these than at a Japanese hibachi restaurant. We literally have to lock Rosie in her crate since she is an escape artist and opened the latches and got out twice!!! Feeling confident that she was secured, we jumped into the Mini-Mobile and headed out to Arlington Heights to dine at Rokbonki Japanese Steakhouse.