Est. MMXXVI · One chef weekly · Three dishes always
Your account · 7 credits

A standing reservation with the people who cook

One chef. Three dishes.
In their own words.

Each week we take one chef away from the pass for an hour and ask what three dishes we should order at their restaurant — then publish the answer: the dishes, the stories behind them, and the recipes as they tell them.

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This week at table one

Diana Dávila of Mi Tocaya

Logan Square · Chicago, Illinois · Interview № 47

First — The Sleeper

Burrito Suizo

"One day a week. Wednesday. That is the point."

The recipe, in her words1 credit

Second — The Signature

Peanut Butter y Lengua

"Braised tongue, salsa de cacahuate. It eats like a Thai curry."

The recipe, in her words1 credit

Third — The Last Meal

Flan de Queso

"Cheesecake and flan in an argument. Nobody loses."

The recipe, in her words1 credit
Read the interview The pack · ten dollars

The house arrangement

Eighty cents on the dollar
goes to the chef

A recipe costs one credit; a credit costs one dollar. The chef's full pack of three — with the interview recording and the economics of the signature dish — is ten dollars.

80¢ · the chef20¢

Our twenty cents pays the test kitchen, so every recipe works on a home stove before it is ever sold.

From this week's letter

What a $19 plate of lengua actually costs

Diana opened her books. The tongue is $4.20. The person at the plancha is $5.60. What remains for the house is thinner than you think.

The full accounting

The weekly letter · Thursdays · gratis

Recently at table one

№ 46

Tim Flores · Kasama

A Michelin star that still makes a breakfast sandwich.

№ 45

Erick Williams · Virtue

Southern food in Hyde Park, and the real cost of hospitality.

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Interview № 47 · Recorded at the bar, three o'clock, before service

Diana Dávila

Chef & owner, Mi Tocaya · twenty years in kitchens, nine as owner

"You want three dishes? Fine. But one of them is not a suggestion."
— D. Dávila, before the recorder was on
burrito
suizo

First · The Sleeper

Burrito Suizo

"Everyone comes for the lengua because it is on every list. Fine. But the burrito suizo is where we keep a secret: one day a week, Wednesday. Steak, salsa ranchera, Swiss cheese aged in a cave. I will not explain the cheese. Come on a Wednesday."
At Mi Tocaya · eighteen dollars · Wednesdays only — that is the point
Cook it at home — her recipe, tested1 credit
Unlock the recipe
peanut butter
y lengua

Second · The Signature

Peanut Butter y Lengua

"It is an homage to my uncle in San Luis Potosí, the most food-obsessed man I have ever known. Tongue braised until it surrenders, seared hard, drowned in salsa de cacahuate. If tongue frightens you, order it anyway — it is the whole reason this place exists."
At Mi Tocaya · nineteen dollars · ask for extra tortillas

She opened the books

The accounting of a $19 lengua

The dollar's journeyCost
Beef tongue, braised + trimmed$4.20
Salsa de cacahuate, produce, tortillas$2.10
Labor — braise and sear$5.60
Rent, power, the walk-in$4.80
What the house keeps$2.30

"Nineteen-dollar lengua means I make two-thirty if nothing goes wrong."

Cook it at home — her recipe, tested1 credit
flan de
queso

Third · The Last Meal

Flan de Queso

"People treat flan as an afterthought. Flan de queso is a cheesecake and a flan having an argument, and nobody loses. Converting it for the test kitchen took longer than any dish on my menu ever has. It is the last thing I would want to taste."
At Mi Tocaya · nine dollars · save room; it is not optional
Cook it at home — her recipe, tested1 credit

Or take the table d'hôte

Diana's Three — The Pack

All three tested recipes · the interview, twenty-four minutes · the lengua's full accounting

Ten dollarseight to Diana
Take the pack

The pack · Interview № 47

Diana's Three

Mi Tocaya · Chicago, Illinois

✦
Burrito suizo — recipe & her notesincluded
Peanut butter y lengua — recipe & accountingincluded
Flan de queso — cheesecake-flan hybrid, convertedincluded
The interview — 24 minutes, uneditedincluded
The pack$10.00

Where your ten dollars dines:

$8 · Diana$2

The kitchen guarantee: if a recipe fails in your kitchen and you followed it, your credits return. No interrogation.

À la carte

The credit ledger

Single recipes cost one credit. Credits rest in your account so a dollar's purchase never asks for a card.

Ten credits$10
Twenty-five credits, with three more as our gift$25

On testing

A restaurant recipe is written for a brigade and a nine-hundred-degree plancha. Every recipe sold here was rescaled, cooked on an ordinary home stove, and signed by the chef before the first copy was sold.

This pack: four test-kitchen passes · signed D. Dávila

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The guide · Chicago, Illinois

What to order, according
to the people cooking it

Every dish below was named by a chef at our table — from their own menu, or in answer to "where do you eat on your night off?" No stars. No reviews. The kitchen's own order.

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Mi Tocaya · Logan Square

Peanut Butter y Lengua

Named by Diana Dávila, her own № 1 — braised tongue, salsa de cacahuate.

Interview № 47$19

Kasama · East Ukrainian Village

Longanisa, Egg & Cheese

Named by Tim Flores, seconded by Diana Dávila on her day off: "I get in line like everybody else."

Interview № 46$12

Virtue · Hyde Park

Blackened Catfish

Named by Erick Williams — "the gumbo pays the rent; the catfish is the thesis."

Interview № 45$28

Lula Cafe · Logan Square

Pasta Yiayia

Named by three chefs unprompted. Brown butter, cinnamon, feta — on the menu since 1999.

Named in №№ 44–46$16

More cities as more chefs sit down. Next: Milwaukee, № 52 · Detroit, № 58.