Ok. So you’re working downtown. You haven’t gotten a raise in what seems like years. You hate brown bagging it and you have to eat. But you can’t spend all your money on lunch. Do you starve or do you eat downtown on less than $6 a day? Is that possible?

Yes it is. And I’m here to tell you how.

If you like pizza, Baccino’s on Clinton and Adams has a carryout only lunch deal of a slice of pizza and a beverage for $3.30 (thin) or $3.50 (thick). If you’re worried about where you’re going to eat your lunch, don’t. Beginning each spring, they set up a sidewalk cafe. If you’d rather eat somewhere where diesel particles from CTA buses don’t drop on your food, you can walk two blocks to the Chicago River where you will find a myriad of places with outdoor seating and a river view. Union Station Plaza would be the closest one and my personal favorite.

For more Italian food, go to Venice Cafe on Wacker and Jackson. Not only is it great food but there is plenty of it. I usually have a hard time finishing. At the height of lunch hour the line is long, but the wait is worth it. You order your food, move down the line and by the time it’s ready, you’ve paid for it. They actually make the pasta fresh for each customer, cafeteria style service with a sit down restaurant atmosphere.

The Alonte Deli on Wacker and Jackson serves pasta with marinara sauce and French bread for $4. It also has a self service steam tray section with daily specials and soups, as well as a made to order deli section. A salad bar is alsoavailable but watch out the daily specials and the salad bars are charged by weight.

Presidential Towers is a little known jewel. Located on Monroe and Clinton,
walk past the restaurants and go directly to the grocery store. There you will find
not only groceries, but also the best selection of homemade soups made
daily. For less than $5 you can get a large soup, fresh roll (from sourdough
to rye) and a beverage (wander the grocery store for this). They also
offer an executive meal which is a hefty sandwich, a medium soup and a bag of
chips. There is a salad bar and a hot meals section where there are daily
specials from pot roast to catfish. You can order side dishes a’ la carte or
buy an entree with two sides. Though more than $6 (if you get the whole meal) and a beverage, still a bargain with generous, tasty portions.

If you like sub sandwiches, Charley’s on Clinton and Monroe frequently has
people passing out 2 for 1 coupon on the sidewalk. Team up with a buddy and you get your sandwich half price.

Are you yearning for a quiet, refined and authentic Italian lunch buffet which will not blow your budget?  I have found just the place.  Pescatore Palace Restaurant and Banquets is tucked away in an industrial area of Schiller Park on River Road (between Irving Park and Belmont Avenues) just minutes away from Rosemont’s Donald E. Stephens Convention Center, Rosemont Theatre and O’Hare Airport. 

From the moment you walk up the stairs into this haven, you are surrounded by the sensual tastes and sounds of SouthCentral Italy.  The main dining room has a quiet sophistication which welcomes you with calming shades of blue and reminders of the ocean.  You find fishing nets hung from the walls filled with crab and starfish.  You admire the various paintings depicting dreamy seaside scenes under a border of hand-painted grapevines.  You hear Andrea Bocelli’s melodic voice seranade you as you are seated by one of the courteous male waiters.  If you are lucky, you may even be seated in the bright Bocelli room which is enveloped in afternoon sun from it’s wall of floor-to-ceiling windows.  Yes, Andrea himself has visited here on a few occasions to enjoy the outstanding and authentic food. 

Master Chef, Vito Barbanente, will probably greet you himself as he ensures the buffet table is amply stocked with his day’s delicious entress.  Vito brings to his restaurant his culinary passion, hard work and dedication from his native Bari, Italy seaside town.  His fish dishes are the freshest and most flavorful available.  His mouthwatering soups fill your senses with warmth and his chicken, beef and vegetable dishes offer a subtle medley of spices and seasonings. 

The lunch buffet is offered from 11am until 2pm Monday through Friday at a price of $9.99 per person.  It includes both a hot and a cold buffet.  Pizza and bruschetta is always available as well as fruit salad and delicious desserts. 

Pescatore Palace offers an extensive and rich wine list and a full menu for those who would like to sample one of Chef Vito’s personalized creations.  The coffee is always fresh-brewed and full-bodied and the service is impeccable. 

The lunchtime crowd is mostly comprised of businessmen from the neighboring light-manufacturing establishments.  The buffet selections change every day and include fish, pasta, potatoes, vegetables, caprese and assorted salads and rich desserts.   What keeps me coming back every week is the personal service I receive and the unparalleled food I find in this quiet getaway. 

If you too are yearning to eat your lunch in smoke-free, pleasant place where you can have a quiet conversation with your friend and where you know the food will always be fresh and good, I highly recommend Pescatore Palace to you.  By the way, ‘Pescatore’ means ‘Fisherman’ in Italian.   And, if the finest fish is what you seek, Chef Vito will please your every wish. 

Food is my drug of choice, and considering Chicago has over 9,000 restaurants, I’ve fallen off the wagon more times than Courtney Love. But sometimes we fall into routine, and if you’ve had your fair share of Chicago-style everything like I have, you start to crave the foreign, the exotic, any that is different.

Well, take a seat in first class and sip your complimentary mimosa, because it is time to take a trip around the world with out leaving the city limits. Sorry, motion sickness bags not included. And if they were, would you really want to be here?
We start our tour off in Central America, specifically, Oaxaca, Mexico. Located at 6113 W. Diversey, La Taqueria Oaxaquena provides Chicago with a much needed dose of great Latin American food. Don’t be fooled by the common interior, brightly colored with Mexican art and plastic wrapped tables. The food here is cheap, but it also spicy and amazingly flavorful. They start you off with a tasty trio of salsas, each one spicier than the next. I never cried so much while eating, but I also never knew salsa could hurt so good. The entire menu is great, from the mole-rubbed chicken to the traditional Oaxacan appetizer of grilled cactus with onions and jalapenos. You’ll leave mourning the fact that you were not born Oaxacan.

Next we head on over to Ethiopia. We’ve all heard our fair share of Ethiopian jokes, and before you ask, yes, they do eat. Very well, I might add. After my first experience at Ethiopian Diamond (6120 N. Broadway), I new exactly why Sally Struthers gained all that weight while filming the “Save the Children” commercials over there. Just the smell upon entering the restaurant was enough to make me weak in the knees, and I had to be stopped from eating off of other people’s tables. All food is served on a large, thin piece of injera bread, which is also used as an edible utensil to scoop up all the stew-like concoctions served there. Favorites include atkilt wot, a stew of potatoes and carrots, a spicy lentil stew, and beef sambusas, little fried pastries filled with ground meat. The bread is tangy, almost sourdough-like, and with a glass of sweet honey wine, life doesn’t get much better than that.

As we travel back towards the Middle East, we can make a quick stop at Old Jerusalem (1411 N. Wells), a no frills restaurant that serves, in my opinion, the best falafel to ever grace the planet. They have all the usual goodies, like schwarma, pita, and hummus so good, you may never eat anything else again, just so you could savor the flavor a little bit longer. And for those with a sweet tooth, it doesn’t get much better than their baklava. A full meal for under $10 and the best falafel in the entire world? You don’t have to tell me twice!

Finally, we land on Devon Ave., the famous strip of stores and restaurants in Chicago that boast Indian (and Pakistani and Mexican) food and goods. Just walking down the street is enough to soak up another culture completely different from ours. You could try one of the fancy restaurants, but I found the best bets to be the snack shops, which are like the fast food places we have, only much better. I love Sukhadia’s Sweets & Snacks (2559 W. Devon Ave.). Not only can you get exactly what you want to eat, but it is three times cheaper than eating at any of the restaurants, and the quality is just as good. I love getting a frosty mango lassi to drink and a big plate of spicy channa masala served with crispy warm naan. If you have room left, try out some of their sweets, which are known to be a little bit decadent, to say the least. My favorite is called dudi hulva, a bright green sweet made of sugar, milk, cardamom and shredded squash.. And once again, all these good eats for under a 10 spot.

Who says you have eat to deep dish pizza when you are in the city? With so many good, affordable food choices, you can easily tour the world without leaving the city limits. And when you dream about falafels all day long like I do, it’s nice to know that my fantasy is not so far away after all.