Reminds Me of the Time...

Today I was at Maggiano's Little Italy shooting a 50th wedding anniversary for my friend, Jason over at Illume Photography. And while the experience was great, I couldn't help snapping a couple frames as I left the restaurant. And here's a semi-funny story as to why:

When I was 17, I went on my first road trip of sorts with a friend of mine and his family. The city was Chicago the day after New Years 1997, and a record high temperature of something like 61 degrees had been reached that afternoon. Discarding our winter jackets, my buddy and I borrowed (stole) his parents' rental car, threw underage caution to the wind, and drove to the mall in Oak Brook.

Between parking garage burn-outs and neutral drops in a car that would undoubtedly be needing a new transmission, we stopped at what appeared to be a hole-in-the-wall Italian joint next to Saks Fifth Avenue (this should have been our first clue, by the way, as you'll soon find out).

The name of the restaurant? Maggiano's Little Italy.



Now, the combination of being both a naive teenager alone in Chicago for the first time, and the fact my friend and I were knowingly ascribing to the commonly accepted cliche of there being an Italian restaurant on every Chicago street corner, no doubt contributed to our eventual short-sightedness.

Eight years would pass before I'd finally realize in 2005 that Maggiano's Little Italy was in fact a CHAIN RESTAURANT. Blasphemy, I cried. The eatery my friend and I enjoyed in Chicago was obviously a one-off. The ambiance, food and drink too difficult to replicate on a national scale... or was it?

Enter Southdale Shopping Mall just south of Downtown Minneapolis (where I lived at the time) where, lo and behold, resides a Maggiano's Little Italy. And while it was larger and more suburbanized than its Chicago counterpart, it nevertheless confirmed the fact that the best Gnocchi I'd ever tasted was simultaneously being served in Maggiano's locations in more than 20 states.

Talk about a mindjob.

Some may find this unacceptable, and others may even go so far as to boycott this restaurant altogether due to its corporate dark side. But not me. I don't hold a grudge; they have great food. I still eat at Olive Garden and there's like a bazillion of those.

Anyway, that's my Maggiano's story.