Pastry Market at Logan Square Kitchen
After an early breakfast at Lula’s, Liz and I headed down Milwaukee to visit the Logan Square Kitchen. Though I’ve been in Logan Square a while, I hadn’t actually heard of LSK until fairly recently: it’s a commercial kitchen, available for rent on an hourly basis. But it also is a space for hosting events as well.
Today was a “Pastry Market,” and we headed down to check out both the space and the pastries.
Folks gathered outside, milling by the door and sitting at small tables. The Pastry Market opened its doors at 10:00 AM, and we got here maybe closer to 10:30 AM. On walking up, we could already tell that there were a lot of folks inside.
Logan Square Kitchen, signage.
We’re at the right place!
A brief look inside. The room is actually much larger/wider than this. Not pictured is the small crowd, gathering at the tables (to the right).
A very gorgeous looking table spread by Flour.
Closeup of some tarts and cupcakes.
A lovely looking cake.
I had recently learned of Macaron Chicago after seeing a small package of macarons on sale at Provenance. Are macarons the new cupcakes?
A delicious looking line of macarons.
A smaller set of macarons. We ended up buying a small box, featuring one of each flavor.
An assortment of Truffles from Katherine Anne Confections.
Chocolates and caramels.
Two big platters of monkey bread from City Provisions. I was introduced to monkey bread when celebrating Christmas with the Holders. I can’t help but think of coffee, warmth and Christmas presents.
A nice little nod to Gapers Block. If you’re interested, the full article is here.
Some pretty ginormous chocolate chip cookies.
A quick look back at the room. More and more people began filing in, and the place started to get pretty crowded.
Past a small water/waiter station area, we made our way in to the actual kitchen proper. There were a few additional vendors set up back here, which made for a pretty great backdrop.
A view in to the Logan Square Kitchen kitchen.
It’s like there’s nothing you can do about that joke. It’s coming, and you just have to stand there.
Some mouth-watering danishes from Fritz Pastry. I didn’t buy or sample much, as I went around the market… but I did end up buying a blueberry danish here. If the photo here looks a little blurry, it’s because you’ve been licking your computer monitor.
Danish close up.
Brown butter apple cakes.
Some doughnuts (complete with missing holes).
Metropolis Coffee had coffee brewing in back. I’ve only recently tasted their coffee via New Wave Coffee, and I have to say I really like it. We ended up buying a pound of coffee for home.
A really interesting percolator.
Guy checking on the grounds. I asked, but didn’t quite get how, exactly, the thing works. My understanding is that there’s a filtered area underneath the grounds, where the water enters the top chamber. When heated, the water goes up a small tube and then steeps the grounds (a bit like an inverted French Press).
Closeup of the contraption. Mostly, there was a slow gathering of water at the base of the top chamber. I was expecting there to be some kind of mini explosion or geyser, but I think the water just slowly forms up top. Still, with all the shiny chrome and the tiny Bunsen burner… this was a really cool thing to watch (and a small crowd did gather while we were there).
Logan Square Kitchen, practicing what it preaches about sustainability.
Back in the main dining room area, even more folks have packed in.
I got a quick shot of some bread from Crumb. It was getting hard to take photos at this point, given all the folks who were either shopping or trying to get through to the back.
More recycled materials.
The “Wall of Doors,” as viewed by the front entrance.
A quick glance back at the crowd. If things were busy when we showed up early in the AM, I’m betting there were even more folks who came later in the day.
Liz and I walked back to our place, and camped outside at a nearby public garden. She’s eating a few madeleines from tinycakes.
A view of Sacramento from the garden.
A lovely, hand drawn map of the grounds.
The Neighbors Garden.
Looking East (the sign is to my right here).
Liz, hanging out with our pastries and baked goods.
Sampling a few of the macarons.
A few of the flavors we had.
As a follow up to a breakfast at Lula’s, the Pastry Market was a lot of fun. While I was taking photos at the event, I happened to run into one of the owners, Zina Murray. She spotted me taking photos, and we began chatting a bit about this blog. We found out we both live relatively close to one another, and I look forward to talking with her more at some future point. I’m definitely interested in learning more about the whole kitchen rental aspect of LSK, and what all that entails.
Related:
Liz Makes Macarons (Which Are NOT the Same as Macaroons)
Macarons, Revisited
Felix, It was great meeting you on Saturday! As a new little business trying to help other little businesses grow, your attention is another example of what a wonderful community we live in. The next night, LSK had a totally different look as Stephanie Izard of Top Chef fame cooked one of her Wandering Goat dinners.
Zina Murray (April 12, 2010 at 10:33 am)YUM! That looks a whole lot of fun. I think Liz was totally in the macaron vanguard. What a trailblazer!
Allison (April 12, 2010 at 10:38 am)I was searching for more images of the LSK Pastry Market and came upon your blog! I love that Im actually in the shot of the front of LSK sitting chatting on the phone. If you would like to check out the photos I took stop by my FaceBook….http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=164521&id=66574128633
Barbara Medina (Just Say Yes Events) (April 12, 2010 at 9:41 pm)Guy checking the grounds reminds me a little of … well, me.Creepy.
Kent Bell (April 14, 2010 at 3:10 pm)How do you and Liz find out about these sorts of things? This was one of the elements of Chicago that always mystified me. People my age seemed to be discovering all these cool things to do, and a ton of them would show up for it, but I never heard anything about it until long afterward.
juliet (April 19, 2010 at 12:47 am)This event involved a bit of luck. We had seen fliers around the neighborhood, but had forgotten about it until the day of. My coworker Letty knows one of the owners, and she sent out a company-wide announcement about the event… which helped me to remember it, when the weekend rolled around.I’m looking forward to doing more out and about stuff. I’m a huge homebody, and the winter does little to dissuade that lifestyle. Now that it’s warmer out, I look forward to finding other stuff to explore.I tend to look at Gapers Block for events, and also pick up the occassional copy of the Chicago Reader from time to time.
avoision (April 19, 2010 at 10:20 am)