Oakbrook Center

Summer's here, and the time is right for eating in the street. Or near the street. Or in a bottle-service cabana high above the street. Chicagoans love outdoor-dining season, all the more so because of its short duration. There are precious few days in...

I don't know if teachers still do this, but at the end of each school year, I was handed a summer reading list, a sheet of required and optional books that would prepare students for the coming school year. (I still owe a measure of revenge to the teacher...

Mother's Day is a little more than a week away, so if you haven't made brunch/dinner plans, it's time to get cracking. Here are a few suggestions to get you started. Allium. Mother's Day brunch seatings from 10 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. Expansive buffet with...

This began, as stories sometimes do, with a reader request. A gentleman asked for recommendations for prime rib. Not steaks, not beef in general, but specifically prime rib. The only condition he imposed was that he didn't want to wait until the weekend...

I have this problem. I made more New Year's Eve reservations than I can use. More than 100 of them, actually. Which is why, for the 12th straight year (and the 17th time in the past 19 years), I'll be giving them away to nimble-fingered readers who ask....

The annual release of Beaujolais nouveau, the light and fruity red made from the gamay grape, is a triumph of marketing and tradition. The wine itself, young, fresh and easy to drink, is no big deal (though it pairs nicely with roast turkey), but...

You can't count on snow for Christmas. You can't count on a 7-3 Bears team making the playoffs. But you can count on my annual save-the-tables list, which provides dozens of last-minute, primo New Year's Eve reservations for procrastinating readers....

Note to movie location scouts: La Grange Park offers the perennially Normal Rockwell-ish streetscapes you want for movies set in the 20th century. Its dog-walking, baseball-playing, flag-waving residents would make congenial extras as they come and go...

Named for the polo club that its founder, Paul Butler, had organized in 1922, Oak Brook is one of Chicago's youngest suburbs, although it doesn't fit most people's definition of a suburb. It does not have a downtown, Main Street or high school. It does...

A suburban man was killed and another injured this morning when the car they were in crashed on Interstate 88 near Oak Brook, authorities said. A spokeswoman for the DuPage County coroner’s office said the 29-year-old man’s name was not being...

Holiday shipping deadlines are receding in the rear view mirror and all the sale ads scream “last minute,” but you haven't even begun to shop. Still, there's no need to pout, because the shops are pulling out the stops for last minute...

Here's a mini tradition that I wish would catch on in a big way: New Year's Day pajama brunch. There's nothing quite so entertaining as sitting down to brunch in a room full of nominal adults wearing brightly colored flannel. Factor in the condition in...