Vie Maintains Michelin Star In Chicago Guide's Second Year

, the Western Springs restaurant boasting famed chef Paul Virant, has maintained its single-star rating in the Michelin Guide Chicago 2012, the second printing of the upscale guide's Chicago edition, which announced its stars on Tuesday.

The star denotes "a very good restaurant in its category, offering cuisine prepared to a consistently high standard," according to the Michelin website.

In the inaugural 2011 edition of the Guide, Vie was named as its only starred Chicago-area restaurant located in the suburbs. This year, it is joined by a second: the close-by Courtright's in Willow Springs.

The Guide also listed one three-star restaurant (chef Grant Achatz's Alinea), two two-star restaurants and sixteen other one-star restaurants, all in the City of Chicago.

Virant is the winner of several distinctions, including Food and Wine magazine's Best New Chef in 2007 and an appearance on the Food Network show Iron Chef.

He is also well-known locally for his support of the Western Springs community, including the annual ; over the summer, he gave a culinary seminar to students in the Field Park garden program.

The Michelin star has been a boon for Virant, he told the Chicago Tribune. "It gave us a solid level of credibility both nationally and a steady increase in the number of foreign visitors and business overall," he told the paper.

He also has joked to the Tribune that he should consider running for mayor of Western Springs, a feat in and of itself given that no such positon exists. (President Bill Rodeghier will serve through April 2013.)

Then again, Virant is a local hero. Maybe Western Springs would vote him mayor anyway.