Yesterday, I stepped into my safe place frequent lunch destination, Protein Bar, to discover that the store had stopped promoting the summer Baja salad (very good, by the way) and had set up a new poster, this one advertising something called a Pump-Quinoa Treat. Name doesn't exactly roll off the tongue, but, well, it's a blended drink featuring pumpkin and pumpkin spice.

My mind flashed to the weekend's biggest news: Pumpkin spice latté shortage at Starbucks!!! I would taste the Pump-Quinoa Treat and see whether it could possibly be a replacement in case Chicago becomes the next site of the pumpkin-spice latté shortage!!!

One problem: I've never had, nor had the desire to have, a pumpkin spice latté. Another problem: The Protein Bar version is iced, whereas, judging from the WSJ haikus (my main point of reference re: pumpkin-spice lattés, sorry), the appeal of the pumpkin-spice latté at Starbucks is its steaming, warm, gentle entrée into fall. These severe limitations withstanding, I proceeded, today, with the taste test. 

So: the facts. The Pump-Quinoa comes in 12-ounce ($4.79) and 20-ounce ($5.79) sizes. I went with the 12-ounce, which has 210 calories, 18g protein, 3.5g fat, 28g carbohydrates, 20g sugar and 2g fiber. You must also choose a milk (I went with soy), protein (also soy) and free boost (I did multivitamin). As described on the Protein Bar blog, the drink consists of puréed pumpkin blended with pepitas, pumpkin spice and quinoa. 

The Starbucks Pumpkin Spice Latté, per Starbucks's website, is "signature espresso blended with the unmistakable spices of fall—cinnamon, nutmeg and clove—smooth with steamed milk and topped with delectably sweetened whipped cream." A 12-ounce version (made with soy milk and no whipped cream*) cost me $4.15 with tax and contains 240 calories, 9g protein, 4g fat, 41g carbohydrates, 37g sugar and less than 1g fiber. Worse for you than the Protein Bar version, but not by a huge stretch. Also, to be fair to the Pump-Quinoa, I ordered it iced, which apparently is fairly common and, per the barista's approval, "not weird."

Okay, first of all, these both sound terrible. Ordering one at Protein Bar, where there are literally dozens of menu items I love, was pure self-denial. Like most protein-enriched shakes, it's chalky on the tongue. Unlike most protein shakes, it has quinoa and pepitas ground into it, which gives it a chewy thickness. Yet all in all, it wasn't bad. As I sipped it while walking around the corner to Starbucks, I began to enjoy it. 

Then, after learning multiple interesting things about Starbucks—you can pay with your phone?—I had a sip of the iced pumpkin-spiced latte. Compared to the Protein Bar shake, which I was still holding in my left hand, it was thin, watery and—most worrisomely—tasted nothing like pumpkin! Was there, I thought, actually a pumpkin-spice syrup shortage happening in our midst? Had they forgotten to put the mysterious cinnamon/nutmeg/clove gel into my drink? Judging from the drink's bright orange color, they had not. 

I switched back to the Protein Bar shake but—yuck—after the Starbucks pumpkin-spice latté, it tasted less like a surprisingly thick shake and more like dense, liquified food. I strolled through the Loop, Pump-Quinoa in one hand, Pumpkin Spice Latté in another. I was beguiled and ashamed, but I knew that somehow, I had lost, and the pumpkin blended treats had won.

*Out of some weird sense of embarrassment, I was going to pretend that I ordered this drink without whipped cream. When adding the photo to the post, I realized this would be impossible, but in the interest of calorie comparison, I will leave the "facts" as is.

Erling Wu-Bower, 29, was named chef de cuisine of Avec in late August, shortly after Koren Grieveson and One-Off Hospitality parted ways. The chef, who put in years as an executive sous chef at the Publican and Publican Quality Meats, has been keeping his head down—and not talking to the press—ever since. But earlier this week he took an hour to drink some tea, eat some cookies and tell me about the challenges of taking over a well-loved menu. This is a lightly edited but still rambling version of our interview, which was Wu-Bower's first with the press since moving into his new role; a shorter version will run in the magazine in our October 18 issue.

So we’re in week three now?
Week four, to the day.

Has taking on Avec been a career goal for you?
Was it a goal? Avec is my favorite restaurant in the city. And I think that it’s a great honor that they came to me. It’s very rare that a chef gets to come back to where they started, and where I started is literally—I come here to eat more than any restaurant in the city. I mean there’s maybe two or three other restaurants. I love this place. I really care about this place. I’ve cared about this place as a customer. I‘ve cared about this place as a cook. [Wu-Bower worked under Grieveson at Avec in 2005.] The chance to come back is exciting and more than anything, it’s an honor that they would ask me to come.

Were you surprised when they asked you?
Yeah, certainly, I was certainly surprised.

Describe that conversation for me.

This year, [TOC Food Editor] David Tamarkin and I had the opportunity to collaborate with Matti Bunzl, the Artistic Director of the Chicago Humanities Festival, on a food-focused slate of events for this year's fest. We just got word that two of the three events are already sold out, but—don't cry—we have a secret stash of tickets that we saved for TOC readers. Fill out the form below, selecting which program you're interested in attending, and cross your fingers; we'll randomly select 10 names for each program and hook the lucky winners up with a pair of tickets. The three programs are:

Adam Gopnik: The Table Comes First [Sold out]
Sunday, October 21, noon–1pm, at the Reva and David Logan Center for the Arts
New Yorker staff writer Adam Gopnik discusses the evolution of eating with Sun-Times columnist Neil Steinberg.

Grant Achatz and the Culinary Cutting-Edge [Sold out]
Sunday, November 4, 10–11am, at Francis W. Parker School
The mastermind behind Alinea, Next and the Aviary will discuss his culinary and aesthetic vision with Madeleine Grynsztejn, Pritzker Director of the Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago.

The United States of Chocolate
Sunday, November 4, noon–1pm, at Francis W. Paker School
A few years ago, I had the opportunity to visit the Askinosie chocolate factory in Springfield, Missouri, and to meet its founder, Shawn Askinosie, whose committment to chocolate—both in terms of taste and ethics—is extraordinary. He will be speaking along with Katrina Markoff, the founder of Vosges.

Click here to enter!

A funny thing has happened to Chicago Gourmet since it was first put on in Millennium Park a few years ago: The main event—two days of wine, chef demos, wine, restaurant samplings and more wine—has taken a back seat to what is essentially the kick-off party, the Hamburger Hop. Located on the rooftop of the Harris Theater, the Hop takes a handful of chefs (this year Dirk Flanigan, Kevin Hickey and Matt Troost are among them), hands them some beef and a grill, and commands them to start cooking. The result: Enough hamburgers to feed the entire Midwest. Those with tickets to this year's Hop (they sold out almost immediately) were lucky enough to try any burger they wanted. The rest of us will live vicariously through these photos, which comes with its own reward: The absence of heartburn.