The Next Day

Day 2
The next night we dressed up and went out on the town in Champaign, which sounds appropriate. The restaurant was Bacaro, a pleasant and sophisticated little bistro. We started with smoked green olives - yes, they actually did taste smoked - followed by appetizers: a grilled Caesar salad (which apparently was better when they did a whole head of romaine rather than a mound of it) and a tender square of roast suckling pig combined with mounds of peekytoe crabmeat - not an obvious pair, but nice.

As you remember, we like gamebirds, so we had quail al mattone: squashed flat under a brick and fried. Very tasty, too. But even better was the haddock, meltingly tender, with a romesco sauce that was delicious, though if it hadn’t had the menu warning "contains nuts!" we would never have guessed what was in it (almonds, hazelnuts, red pepper, tomato, garlic, and a dash of our old buddy, Pimentón de La Vera).

The wines were Spadafora Alhambra, which sounds like it should be Spanish but is one of those new Sicilian wines using local grapes you've never heard of (Catarratto? Inzolia?), and a nice traditional Gavi di Gavi (Villa Sparina).

The result: we love Champaign! But you knew that.