Time Magazine – May 24, 2004

Care for Syringe of Crab?

by Kristin Kloberdanz

Even by the ambitious standards of American four-star dining, moto, the madcap Chicago experiment of chef Homaro Cantu, is a different restaurant. Eating there is like dropping into the up scale restaurant with the Jetsons. Crab chowder consists of a tiny but menacing soft-shell crab perched atop a lump of chilled crabmeat and black caviar. On the side, four plastic syringes are stacked between slender silver barbell magnets. Each syringe is filled with a tasty soup: Peruvian potato, cream, carrot, garlic leek. Squeezed one into your mouth, crunch into the crab and move on to the next. This is but a single dish of the 5, 7, 10, and 19 course tasting menus, which range in price from $50 to $160 a person…