2009: The King of Pop mysteriously dies, Captain Sullenberger magically lands U.S. Airways Flight #1549 on the Hudson, and the general Chicago public first encounters Enoch's doughnuts.
It happened at brunch at Nightwood, which launched brunch that fall. Before long, these puffy, glorious doughnuts took on a life of their own, winning a 2010 Time Out Chicago Critics' Pick Eat Out Award ("Best French Toast": The French Toast doughnut at Nightwood). The man behind the doughnuts, Enoch Simpson, left Nightwood the following summer for Girl & the Goat, but he took his seriousness about doughnuts with him, pledging to open a fried-dough shop sometime soon.
Entire years passed.
Tomorrow, June 4, 2013, the doughnuts (which have made one-off appearances in the interim) officially return. This time it happens at Endgrain, the Roscoe Village restaurant Enoch is opening with his brother, Caleb. Caleb worked with designer Kevin Heisner to give the former Terragusto space a new look. That look: wood. A wood bin, industrial-workshop stools, a 25-seat bar hand-bulit by the brothers from 3,000 pieces of hand-cut old-growth lumber...that kind of thing.
The menu spans from brunch (smoked lake-trout sandwich with a marbled-rye biscuit), to all-day items (fried-chicken biscuit sandwich, kimchi–braised pork pie), then dinner specials (hanger steak with fingerling potatoes, duck-confit pierogi, crispy pork belly, etc). Last, but actually first, doughnuts (bacon butterscotch, Nutella milkstout, lemon bars, bourbon vanilla) start at 7am.
Endgrain (1851 W Addison St, 773-687-8191, endgrainrestaurant.com) opens tomorrow (June 4) at 7am.