Pork & Mindy's Opening Friday, January 8th in Bucktown

Pork & Mindy’s, the first restaurant from Food Network star and lifelong Chicagoan, Jeff Mauro, will officially open on Friday, January 8, 2016, in Bucktown. With a strong emphasis on slow-smoked, hand-pulled meats, Pork & Mindy’s menu is shaped by combining simple ingredients and prominently features the brand’s line of all-natural dipping, marinating and grilling sauces currently sold online and at retailers, including Mariano’s.

Featuring a menu created by Mauro and founder and company CEO, Kevin Corsello, Pork & Mindy’s Bucktown location will highlight the brand’s slow-smoked sandwiches, including options like their Bao to the Pork, featuring hickory-smoked, hand-pulled pork shoulder, pickled daikon and carrot, fresh cucumber and jalapeño relish, topped with Pork & Mindy’s Asian Plum sauce; as well as the Chicken and Waffle, made with brined, mulberry-smoked, hand-pulled chicken and topped with green apple slaw, pickled red onions, served on a maple bourbon “waffle” bun. The menu will also include the Pig Candy B.L.T., featuring the brand’s Pig Candy bacon (dusted with brown sugar and slow-smoked until brittle), lettuce, Roma tomato, dry rub mayo and balsamic caramelized onions on a buttered and griddled brioche bun.

Expect to find a variety of salads, such as the Chopped Candy Cobb, as well as a host of sides, including Tot’tine – a spin on poutine that includes crispy tater tots and Wisconsin cheddar cheese curds, smothered in a house-made smoked gravy and topped with picked red onions – as well as a Sweet Potato Salad and PNM Baked Beans, made with mixed vegetables and slow-smoked in the brand’s Chicago Smokehouse sauce. Dessert-lovers can indulge in Pork & Mindy’s signature ‘Nado’s, including the Memphis ‘Nado (premium vanilla ice cream, peanut butter, banana and Pig Candy) or the Cannoli ‘Nado (premium vanilla ice cream, whipped ricotta, chocolate chips, pistachios and broken cannoli shells).