Alinea is a restaurant in

Chicago (''City in a Garden''); I Will , image_map = , map_caption = Interactive Map of Chicago , coordinates = , coordinates_footnotes = , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name ...

Illinois Illinois ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Midwestern United States, Midwestern United States. Its largest metropolitan areas include the Chicago metropolitan area, and the Metro East section, of Greater St. Louis. Other smaller metropolita ...

, United States. In 2010, Alinea was awarded three stars by the

Michelin Guide The Michelin Guides ( ) are a series of guide books that have been published by the French tyre company Michelin since 1900. The Guide awards up to three Michelin star (classification), stars for excellence to a select few establishments. The ac ...

. As of April 2021, Alinea is the only Chicago restaurant to retain a three-star status, Michelin's highest accolade.

History

The restaurant opened on May 4, 2005, and takes its name from the symbol

alinea Alinea may refer to: * Alinea (restaurant) in Chicago * In several languages : an indenting or a pilcrow The pilcrow, ¶, is a handwritten or typographical character used to identify a paragraph. It is also called the paragraph ma ...

, which is featured as a logo. Co-owner Nick Kokonas wrote of the restaurant's name, Alinea literally means "off the line." The restaurant's symbol, more commonly known as the pilcrow, indicates the beginning of a new train of thought, or a new paragraph. There's a double meaning: on one hand, Alinea claims to represent a new train of thought about food, but as a restaurant, everything still has to come "off the line." In October 2008, chef and owner Grant Achatz and co-author Kokonas published ''Alinea'', a hardcover

coffee-table book A coffee table book, also known as a cocktail table book, is an oversized, usually hard-covered book whose purpose is for display on a table intended for use in an area in which one entertains guests and from which it can serve to inspire convers ...

featuring more than 100 of the restaurant's

recipe A recipe is a set of instructions that describes how to prepare or make something, especially a dish of prepared food. A sub-recipe or subrecipe is a recipe for an ingredient that will be called for in the instructions for the main recipe. His ...

s. In January 2016, the Alinea Group, the owner of Alinea, bought Moto restaurant in Chicago. On January 1, 2016, Alinea closed temporarily for renovations. The restaurant planned to operate

pop-up restaurants A pop-up restaurant is a temporary restaurant. These restaurants often operate from a private home, former factory, existing restaurants or similar space, and during festivals. Various other names have been used to describe the concept of settin ...

worldwide before reopening on May 20, 2016 after an extensive remodel and overhaul of the menu. In May 2016, Alinea and its chef and owner Grant Achatz were featured in the Netflix show

Chef's Table ''Chef's Table'' is an American documentary series created by David Gelb' which premiered on video streaming service Netflix on April 26, 2015. The series takes viewers inside both the lives and kitchens of a variety acclaimed and successful inter ...

. The innovative food of Alinea and the journey of Achatz to renowned chef were highlighted

Awards

Alinea received the

AAA Five Diamond Award American Automobile Association (AAA – commonly pronounced as "Triple A") is a federation of motor clubs throughout North America. AAA is a privately held not-for-profit national member association and service organization with over 60 mi ...

, the highest level of recognition given by the AAA, from 2007 to 2017. It ranked ninth on the S. Pellegrino World's 50 Best Restaurants List, second only to

Eleven Madison Park __NOTOC__ Eleven Madison Park is a New American fine dining restaurant located inside the Metropolitan Life North Building at 11 Madison Avenue in the Flatiron District of Manhattan, New York City. It has retained 3 Michelin stars since 2012 ...

in the US. As of 2017, Alinea is the only

3-star restaurant in Chicago. Alinea received the 2016

James Beard Foundation Award The James Beard Foundation Awards are annual awards presented by the James Beard Foundation to recognize chefs, restaurateurs, authors and journalists in the United States. They are scheduled around James Beard's May 5 birthday. The media award ...

for Outstanding Restaurant. On June 14, 2016, Alinea was ranked 15th among the

World's 50 Best Restaurants The World's Best 50 Restaurants is a list produced by UK media company William Reed, which originally appeared in the British magazine ''Restaurant'' in 2002. The list and awards however are no longer directly related to ''Restaurant'' magazine ...

, an increase of 11 spots from 2015. In October 2016, TripAdvisor named it the number one

fine dining Fine may refer to: Characters * Sylvia Fine (''The Nanny''), Fran's mother on ''The Nanny'' * Officer Fine, a character in ''Tales from the Crypt'', played by Vincent Spano Legal terms * Fine (penalty), money to be paid as punishment for an offe ...

restaurant in the United States, and one of the 10 best restaurants in the world. In the 2017 list of

the World's 50 Best Restaurants The World's Best 50 Restaurants is a list produced by UK media company William Reed, which originally appeared in the British magazine ''Restaurant'' in 2002. The list and awards however are no longer directly related to ''Restaurant'' magazine ...

, Alinea was ranked 21st in the world. In th
most recent (2019) list
of the World's 50 Best Restaurants, Alinea was ranked 37th in the world, dropped from 34th in th
2018 list

Controversy

In 2020, Alinea served diners from a rooftop when all indoor dining was closed in Illinois during the

coronavirus pandemic The COVID-19 pandemic, also known as the coronavirus pandemic, is an ongoing global pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The novel virus was first identified ...

. The menu included a

canapé A canapé () is a type of hors d'oeuvre, a small, prepared, and often decorative food, consisting of a small piece of bread (sometimes toasted) wrapped or topped with some savoury food, held in the fingers and often eaten in one bite. Name Th ...

shaped like the

SARS‑CoV‑2 Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS‑CoV‑2) is a strain of coronavirus that causes COVID-19 (coronavirus disease 2019), the respiratory illness responsible for the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. The virus previously had a p ...

virus. Alinea Group co-owner Nick Kokonas stated the appetizer was "meant to provoke discomfort, conversation, and awareness" but some diners described it as "tacky," "disrespectful," and "insensitive."''Chicago Tribune''
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References

External links

* *

youtube.com YouTube is a global online video sharing and social media platform headquartered in San Bruno, California. It was launched on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim. It is owned by Google, and is the second most vis ...

br>24 Hours at Alinea

''Spinning Plates''
2012 documentary features three unique restaurants and their respective owners including those of Alinea {{DEFAULTSORT:Alinea Restaurants in Chicago Michelin Guide starred restaurants in Illinois Molecular gastronomy Restaurants established in 2005 James Beard Foundation Award winners Fine dining 2005 establishments in the United States

History

Awards

Controversy

See also

References

External links