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Beverly and Johnny own and operate two restaurants. They launched their first, Parachute—whose building they also own—a block and a half away in May 2014; the à la carte menu there refracts American- born Beverly's Korean heritage through the prism of her and Johnny's classical Western (read: French) culinary training. Five years later, they opened Wherewithall, where the cuisine is more expansively modern American, which is to say that it draws on a panoply of cultures and cuisines, sometimes riffing on traditional preparations or dishes. The couple are also prolific in other ways, with three young children ages three, four, and eleven, and a dog—a Bordeaux mastiff named François who wears a permanent jowly expression of ennui. Occasionally, in the hours before dinner service, the six of them come romping into the restaurant like a modern Family Circus reboot, and the kids color at the bar or chase each other around the courtyard while their parents grapple with the vast, never-ending miscellany of chefdom and proprietorship.

Both Parachute and Wherewithall occupy the category of restaurants shorthanded as chef-driven, destination, or even—despite their relative casualness—fine-dining. They are independent, but not mom-and-pop. Instead of standards available in thousands of other restaurants, most of the dishes here are unique, conceived as much for the expression of the chefs—including the restaurant's chef de cuisine,* Tayler Ploshehanski—as for the nourishment, satisfaction, and entertainment of the guests. Years before they met, Beverly and Johnny both tournéed their way through prestigious cooking schools, then sharpened their skills and palates in heralded kitchens—she at, among others, the landmark American dining temple Charlie Trotter's in Chicago; he at the historic La Côte Basque and others in New York City. They retain a publicist who hawks them to the media, and are represented by an agent who ferrets out television opportunities.

* Chef de cuisine is the day-to-day chef of a restaurant. When used, the title usually describes a chef who manages the kitchen and creates the menu in consultation or collaboration with the chef-owner(s) whose vision dictates the restaurant's culinary style.
 
They are frequently written about; Parachute holds a Michelin star; and Beverly and Johnny jointly received a James Beard Foundation Award (foodlandia's Oscar) as Best Chef of the Great Lakes region. Beverly also has been a cheftestant on the long-running Bravo TV cooking competition series Top Chef. In their industry, they are one-percenters.

And yet Wherewithall is, in its way, egalitarian, down to the dress code, which doesn't exist. Were you to report for dinner in shorts and flip-flops, not an eye would bat, unless perhaps it was winter. Moreover, the restaurant serves a comparatively inexpensive set (or tasting) menu—meaning that guests of wildly varying backgrounds and means consume the same sequence of seven courses, five savory and two sweet, with an optional cheese selection bridging those realms. Each week's menu features two snacks (the quotidian English word currently overtaking the French amuses as the preferred designation for one-or two-bite welcome treats from the kitchen); broth, bread, and butter; a grains course; a fish course; a meat course; an inter-mezzo (pre-dessert); and dessert. Except for the bread and butter, the lineup changes weekly, with tweaks made day to day as ingredient availability and the chefs' contentment with the dishes dictate, and with modifications at the ready to accommodate allergies and the animal averse.

WHEREWITHALL DINNER MENU
July 24, 2021

snacks
(not featured on printed menu)

broth, bread, and butter
(not featured on printed menu)

oats, button chanterelles, baby corn
mari vineyards 2016 riesling, mi

hake, wax beans, vin jaune
holger koch, 2020 grauburgunder + others, de

dry-aged strip loin, tomato, sorrel
wyncroft 2017 cabernet sauvignon + others, mi

intermezzo
(not featured on printed menu)

roasted peaches, lemon custard, chamomile
rare wine co. madeira, pt

nightly menu $85

wine pairing $45

today's cheese $15

(johan 2014 visdom chardonnay) $15
...

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