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“The Bear” is the story of a workaday Chicago switching gears to become a establishment. But restaurant kitchens of all types are an ecosystem where class issues play out. It’s a hierarchy that inevitably says something about social status.

How well — or not — does tackle these themes? Tribune TV critic Nina Metz talks with the Tribune’s dining team; the following has been edited for length and clarity. Food Louisa Kung Liu Chu grew up in her family’s restaurant on Chicago’s Northwest Side and is a graduate of Le Cordon Bleu Paris. While in Paris, she worked at the restaurant Les Ambassadeurs.



She has also spent time in the kitchens of Alinea and El Bulli, among others, and was nominated twice for a James Beard Award for her restaurant criticism at the Tribune. (In an earlier life, she was a fixer for Anthony Bourdain’s “No Reservations” TV series.) Food reporter Ahmed Ali Akbar joined the Tribune this year with a wide range of experience in audio, culture and food writing.

He began covering American Muslim food culture at BuzzFeed and BuzzFeed News a decade ago and has written mostly about halal and immigrant-owned businesses. He won a James Beard Award for feature reporting in 2022. Much more complicated! It depends on where, as in what country, but generally speaking it should come as no surprise that I was one of the few women cooking in world-class kitchens, and one of the fewer people of color.

And even now as a critic, where I carefully consider q.

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