Good Taste is the Worst Vice

My NRA adventure

The NRA came to Chicago this weekend – no, not that NRA.  It was the annual National Restaurant Association show, and thanks to D’s brother-in-law, we got to check it out.



When we walked into the immense exhibition room, I had no idea what to do or where to go first.  After all, I’m not in the market for industrial-sized dishwashers, wholesale cheese, or a custom food truck.


So we picked an aisle at random and started walking, and looking.  It’s fascinating to see the displays of equipment, tableware, and ingredients all jumbled together.   


I particularly liked the sous vide machines and chamber vacuum sealers galore, a stand mixer almost as tall as I am (with a bowl like a small bathtub), super-fancy espresso makers, and a six ton Idaho potato loaded up on the back of a semi-truck.  


Ultimately, for non-industry folk like us, the best part of the NRA show is the samples. They’re everywhere, any kind of food or drink you can imagine, like a display of molecular gastronomy ingredients that looked like a science experiment.  We tried some “meringues”, freshly frozen in liquid nitrogen, that looked like orange packing peanuts.

Around the corner there was a British wholesale importer booth, where we indulged in some Royal Family gossip along with bangers and HP sauce, and washed it all down with a rather tasty cup of “lemon barley water” that tasted like less-sweet lemonade.



The Japanese food area was even bigger, a whole collection of exhibitors under a giant “Umami” banner.  We watched noodles being made on a giant noodle machine and ate freshly cooked yakisoba, sampled plum wine (my mother’s favorite) and an elegant plum liqueur infused with French brandy, and tried a variety of vinegar-based products, like sushi vinegar potato chips.




Of course, there are also lots and lots of desserts – cupcakes and cheesecakes and chocolates and more.


We arrived hungry, at lunchtime, and left rather full a few hours later.  Here’s a full list of the samples we consumed, at least as best as D and I can recollect:

  • Australian wagyu beef from Greg Norman’s ranch
  • Turtle brownie
  • Tabasco Buffalo hummus
  • Yakisoba
  • Japanese pickles and pickled seaweed
  • Japanese “brown rice vinegar drink”
  • Choya plum wine and plum liqueur 
  • Jura espresso
  • Waffle
  • Ghost pepper salami (very hot!)
  • Fancy butter (conveniently located next to the salami, to soothe the burning)
  • Turtle cheesecake
  • Lemon barley water 
  • Bangers and HP sauce
  • Very strong fennel and caraway seed infused liqueur (Kümmel) made in a Sous Vide Supreme
  • Liquid nitrogen frozen meringue
  • Biscuit with sausage gravy
  • Vegetables simmered in tikka masala sauce
  • Bowl of Japanese beef and onions over rice
  • Sushi from a conveyor belt display 


I also left with a pretty awesome, elephant-emblazoned Zojirushi bag and some random goodies, like a mini Buffalo Tabasco, a recipe for sushi rice, some tikka masala cooking sauce, and a “Chork“, a fork-chopstick combo.  


All in all, a very fun afternoon!


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