Become a Local Champion in Chicago

A Local Champion in Chicago has rated five different Chicago places, answered three Top 3 questions about the city and made a list with a Chicago place on it in the Mosey app. Chicago is a city that argues about food for sport, and the title lets you put your answers on record without anyone checking whether you agree with them.

How do you become a Local Champion in Chicago?

The steps are rate five places, answer three Top 3 questions and make one list, all in Chicago. A card on Home shows each step with counters, such as "3 of 5 rated". Because the city is large, your five may come from different neighborhoods, and that suits the title: five ratings of one corner count as a single place.

Pick a few errands. A sandwich at lunch, a dinner out of the neighborhood and a weekend pizza night can cover three on their own.

Deep dish and tavern style: which pie gets your rating?

Deep dish has a caramelized crust and can take about 45 minutes to bake, and one is usually enough for a table. Tavern-style pizza is the thin, square-cut version that, by some accounts, locals eat more often. The deep dish versus tavern guide lays out the argument.

Whichever you choose, rate the pie by name and say which style it was. The title never reads your words, so you can say the crust was too thick and it counts exactly like a rave.

Which Chicago neighborhoods suit your five ratings?

Itineraries from the city's tourism office point to Chinatown, reached by the Red Line at Cermak-Chinatown and known for Hong Kong-style dim sum, and to Pilsen, a creative neighborhood of murals, galleries and Mexican food. The Pilsen guide goes deeper. Bridgeport, home of the White Sox, and Humboldt Park, where the jibarito was born, add two more. A jibarito is a sandwich that uses garlicky fried plantains in place of bread. Chinatown also has the oldest Chinese bakery in the city, and Pilsen has a free museum of Mexican art, which makes a good pause between ratings.

What is Italian beef, and can you rate it?

Italian beef is thin-sliced seasoned roast beef served dipped in its jus on an Italian roll and topped with hot giardiniera or sweet peppers. It is a Chicago original, and it is a natural dish to rate by name, with a note on whether you took it dipped. The tourism office also credits a stand in River North as the inspiration for a television series about the city's kitchens, which helps explain the lines. Chicago-born foods are a theme here: the jibarito and the beef sandwich started in the city, and deep dish is commonly credited to a downtown pizzeria founded in 1943, though the origin is told in more than one way.

What does a first Chicago week of ratings look like?

Lunch on Monday is an Italian beef, rated dipped or dry. Wednesday is a jibarito near Humboldt Park, or the nearest plantain sandwich you can reach. On the weekend, a pizza night settles the deep dish question for your household, and a Sunday dim sum lunch by the Red Line adds a fourth place. A taco stop in Pilsen makes five. None of it needs a long review: the dish and a star are enough, and even those are optional for the title.

What are the Chicago Top 3 questions about?

Every Top 3 visit gives you a single question to answer, and the next one waits at least four hours. The questions are about kinds of food such as pizza, burgers, Italian, Mexican, Chinese and coffee. In Chicago, those are fighting words. You name up to three places, ranked, and you need three different questions answered in the city.

If you skip, the title count stays put; if you name even one place, it moves.

What belongs on a Chicago list that counts?

A list of your own with a Chicago place on it. Try "Out-of-towners get a beef", "Pizza night rotation" or "Chinatown on a Sunday". A brand-new list with a name of your choice works; the two built-in lists do not.

Add a place, jot a note and share the list. A friend who swears by a Pilsen taqueria you have not tried can add it.

Which details help the next Chicago diner?

Rating by the dish pays off here: the pizza style, the beef dipped or dry, the plantain sandwich. Add tags to show what stood out, tag whoever you ate with and follow friends, whose ratings appear on Home. The title counts only that you did the activity. The earned, not bought guide explains the rule.

What changes once you hold the title?

A thank-you reads "You are a Local Champion of Chicago", and the words then sit on your profile and next to your name on a rating of a Chicago place. A share button builds a picture card out of three plain numbers. There is no prize, no discount and no payment. The how-to guide holds the full rules and the Local Champion page the screens.

Mosey is free for a place to list, with no hidden fees and affordable tools, so supporting local in Chicago can mean telling people which corner earned your return visit. More cities are in the US food guides, and the Philadelphia page is next along.

Get the Mosey app, rate tonight's dinner by the dish and begin the Chicago list that finishes your title.