La Sirena Clandestina - A Place to Love

 

La Sirena Clandestina is the closest I will ever come to taking a Latin lover. While that ship has sailed, I'm content settling into the embrace of this little place. Tucked away on Chicago's meat packing street, West Fulton Market, La Sirena Clandestina stands out as one of the best new places I have tried in a long time. Just a cool, low-key place to get some great food and drink served up by bearded bartenders and servers with tatts.

 

Mark and I had just come back from Portland where we had our pick at places like this. So, it was a refreshing find away from Chicago's big restaurant scene.

 

The menu is small, too, so making decisions is really easy. We had the house-made burrata on an also housemade tomato flatbread. Perfect texture and taste all around. For us, dinner was simply the surprisingly large kale salad and the whole fried fish. Don't let the "fried" part scare you. The meat is flakey and light, so the peanut, cilantro spicy sauce on the side make this dish the best kind of hot mess. My Paletas on ice was a cool pair for many reasons. 

 

People around us were ordering the special empanadas, fries, smoked ribs and ceviche. Had we not just pigged out in Portland, we would have too. We sat outside on a warm summer weeknight and got serenaded by classic rock piped out of some guy's open apartment window. With a name I like to say, La Sirena Clandestina is Chicago perfection, which means I now officially have a new Latin love.

 

Write-up by Pam - obviously.