Mango-Banana Green Smoothie + TETE Charcuterie.

Good morning! I hope you had a wonderful weekend. Ours was bright and sunny and we spent as much time as possible outdoors. I started both mornings with a new smoothie – a green smoothie using frozen mango chunks instead of ice.

I think this is going to become a much more frequent breakfast in our house! Even K liked it, and he is not usually on the green smoothie train. I think the mango won him over in this one.

Mango-Banana Green Smoothie
1 cup frozen mango chunks
1 banana
1 cup original {unsweetened} almond milk
2 handfuls spinach
1/4 cup plain greek yogurt {I used 2%}

We spent time indoors this weekend too – on Saturday night, K and I had an opportunity to attend the private opening party of TETE Charcuterie, a new restaurant in West Loop. I received an invitation from Chicago Food Bloggers. There were a number of other bloggers in attendance experiencing TETE for the first time as well. TETE uses local and sustainable ingredients from Midwest farmers and vendors, and plans to feature seasonal menu items throughout the year. If you are in the city and love house-made meats, I recommend checking it out! Today is the restaurant’s grand opening to the public.

The interior of TETE is lovely and open, with a kitchen behind glass and a ceiling of wooden timber beams and beautiful glass light fixtures. The space was formerly a meatpacking facility.

You can even watch sausage-making a few feet from your dining table, though the space was sparkling clean on Saturday night. I’m in love with the red subway tiles.

The chefs were out preparing, interacting with diners, and passing around tastings from the menu during the event. I was definitely reminded that the word charcuterie means the art of meat curing and sausage making. TETE features European-style fare, but there is a house-made Chicago hot dog on the menu {of course}!

The house-made sausage was my favorite taste – a German-style preparation with pickled mustard seed. Other meat combinations we tasted included a pate mix of pistachio, coriander, and white wine. Another included cherries and walnuts. In everything that was passed, we could easily pick out different flavors and it was clear that great care was taken with everything created on the menu.