We wound up meeting up at De Jred, a new Jamaican restaurant in Skokie that her friends had been telling her about. Because my friend is Jamaican, and clearly I'm not, nor do I have any experience with Jamaican food, I let her do the ordering.
We both wound up getting the Jerk Chicken plate (which you can get as half chicken, or breast only, I believe we wound up with half chickens), which, at only $7.00, came with A LOT of food:
In addition to the chicken, the plate also came with fried plantains, a bowl of rice and red peas (which are kidney beans), and steamed cabbage (I cannot express enough my love for steamed cabbage of any sort. I love that stuff, and was super excited about it).
I am not normally a big fan of chicken on the bone, but in this case, it didn't really matter. This was by far the most tender chicken I have ever eaten in my entire life. We were given knives, but honestly did not need them. The chicken was just falling off of the bone. I never understood how people could describe meat as 'melting in your mouth', but I do now.
As far as the seasoning on the chicken went, it had a nice heat to it. I love hot food, but I also love being able to enjoy food. This chicken had the right balance of being both hot and enjoyable.
One other thing I loved? My bottle of "Kola Champagne". It's like cream soda, which I normally don't like. But, the reason I don't normally like it is because it's too syrupy and heavy. Not Kola Champagne. This stuff was amazing; although it was still pretty sweet, it didn't leave me feeling the need to drink 5 gallons of water and cleanse it out of my system.
The service at De Jred was always very fast and friendly. I'm planning on going back for more jerk chicken, and possibly even going out on a limb and trying the goat stew.
And for those interested:
De Jred
4901 W. Oakton (corner of Oakton and Lamon)
Skokie, IL 60077
That food was pretty awesome. I haven't been back yet but maybe a trip is in order this weekend.
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