Nico Osteria

My father likes to cook on holidays but his house isn't really set up for it and something always goes wrong. This year I got a call Thanksgiving morning that Thanksgiving had simply been "cancelled." So I suggested we simply stop having these kind of issues and eat out for Christmas. Unfortunately my father waited until the last minute to confirm that we would be allowed to eat out, so I didn't think our options would be good. Lo and behold, a gift appeared on Opentable. Nico had an open table for 6 on Christmas day. I had forgotten they are a hotel restaurant and hotel restaurants are typically open on Christmas.

Everything was delicious. We had a selection of fresh and invigorating crudos followed by the eagerly-devoured fritto misto that had a variety of crispy seafood punctuated by a bright aioli. I had one of their open face sandwiches, which had meaty perfectly-cooked octopus and these little parmesan flecked cracked fingerling potatoes that were a revelation. The pork belly salad is also very much worth getting.

The swordfish had an incredible nduja vinaigrette that I was very impressed by. I think the food here can be defined by its deft use of acidic flavors from the lemon vinegar in my kampachi crudo to the shrimp-‘nduja vinaigrette on my swordfish.

The only thing I didn't love was my drink, but I only had one so I'll have to come back for another and to try the dinner menu.


Nico Osteria
Address: 1015 N Rush St, Chicago, IL 60611
Phone:(312) 994-7100
Hours: Friday 6:00 am – 12:00 am

I also happened to go on Xmas day.

My main beef with Nico is that either portions are too small or prices are disproportionately high. The crudi are, as Melissa says, pretty darn good. "Deft use of acid[]" defines a lot of the Kahan empire and that's why I love avec and Publican so much. But I never feel cheated when I go to those places. And yes: Nico has fish I've never heard of and perhaps will never see again. But I feel these prices eclipsed even the best sushi places in town, and then some, relative to portion sizes.

Bill came to $250+ with one cocktail and one glass of (radically overpriced once I googled the info later) wine for 2 people and we left hungry.

Maybe we ordered wrong.

Seafood stew and pasta portions also seemed downright stingy -- if not "get up and walk out ... throwing the dishes on the floor for effect" it was downright close.

I say this as someone who counts avec as one of my favorite places in the entire universe (and someone who's happy to pay superpremium prices for sushi at places that merit it, like Katsu). And I know this is a Viagra Triangle restaurant + a hotel restaurant so there is the real estate / tourist inflation at work.

All that aside, even as much as I "liked" the food, I still felt the sum of the parts was lacking with many of the dishes.

For what it's worth, the best two dishes of the night were the $6 veggie sides: roasted turnips with their greens w/ pickled mustard seeds, and black trumpet mushrooms w/ some sort of fonduta. That shows that there are really smart and talented people in the kitchen. And I would expect nothing less.

I just wish they could find some better way to sort out the rich suckers from those of us who just want that great Italian seafood place we were promised and that I'm sure Kahan and co. have worked so hard to deliver.

Because I guarantee the tourists aren't flocking to the obscure oily mackerel crudos they're selling for $18 for three tiny pieces ...

I think our bill was a lot less per person because a few of us ordered the sandwiches as our mains.

But yeah, the portions are a bit strange and inconsistent. It was hard to know how much to order.

I dined at Nico recently with a friend and absolutely loved the food and experience. We too however had confusion about how much to order. The structure of the menu is well thought out and segmented, but the portion sizes are very unclear. Our server gave us some direction in ordering which helped. Overall though it was an awesome experience and I look forward to repeat visits.

I was immediately drawn to the crudo section (really should be a pesce crudo section) because I love raw seafood, and in specific, crudo preps. It just so happened we were seated at the counter right near the crudo station, so I was able to see the portion sizes which were in fact small for the price. Very beautiful clean plating however. I'll probably go back and order some just because I'm a total sucker for crudo. Oysters are three bucks with a bump of caviar for ten, which I thought was reasonable. We did not have any that evening however.

Highlights of the evening were chicken liver (a bargain and killer giardiniera to boot), grilled quail, roast chicken (more mediterranean flavors than Italian flavors), and the hen of the woods mushroom side dish. Those mushrooms have flat out umami...just absolutely delicious.

Paul Kahan's sensibilities, as always, really shine through here with ingredients. Everything we had was absolutely fresh and delicious. His team can source some incredible seafood in addition to incredible meat (Publican/PQM), and this is the place he's showing that off at. I don't mind.

I would argue that this is his most thought out restaurant, and his most detail oriented restaurant yet. That is not to say that his other places are not well thought out, but to say that some of his other joints focus on doing single things really well (Publican is fish and meat, Big Star is a taco spot, Violet Hour a Cocktail joint, etc) and this kind of aims to do everything well, and it definitely doesn't miss. It is definitely a multi-faceted restaurant with a well thought out, expansive interior lending itself to an assortment of party sizes and dining/drinking desires. It is a 180 degree turn from the clean, modernist and almost ethereal feel of the Blackbird dining room.

My only regret is that due to being unsure of how much to order, we ended up ordering too much and did not have room or time for dessert, and that disappointed me because Amanda Rockman is such an awesomely talented pastry chef. I think that I'm going to repent and go back for a dessert tasting because I've never eaten something of hers that I did not enjoy. That's okay, just a reason to go back.

Paul Kahan is in the running for the best middle luxury restaurateur in the city. Absolutely awesome places...I'm excited to see what other ideas are bouncing around inside his head.

Mrs. EdB60035 and I had the chance to dine at Nico Osteria for lunch the day after Christmas, part of our ongoing "give Paul Kahan all our money" efforts. For being one of the hottest new restaurants in town, we were surprised the place was empty, even considering the holiday and the weather. The Original Pancake House across the street, visible from our street-side table that will be to die for in the summer, was far busier

At lunch we likewise had trouble figuring out how much to order, and it was certainly one of the priciest lunches we've had in a long time. But oh so good. The service, unsurprisingly, was impeccable. I love a restaurant where the staff are as into the place as the diners, and our server was willing to go fanboi with us. We each ordered a glass of wine and proceeded to get busy.

Sorry about the Instagram links - I haven't figured out how to embed an Instagram photo here.

We started with soup and salad. The minestrone soup, as you would expect in a Kahan place, was punched up quite a bit - with a poached egg and fried artichokes. Not usually a fan but this was rich and deep, and every bite had perfect combos of ingredients. The gem salad, similar to Publican's little gem salad, had no crispy pig ears, but mushrooms and some cheese and maybe grapefruit segments? It was dressed perfectly and we fought over every last leaf.

From there it was on to the crudos. As the other three posts indicate, this is one of the stars of the show. The waiter explained they were fish swimming yesterday, air freighted to the restaurant. Thus the priciness. Very very good, but they hurt in the wallet a bit. The scallop crudo was fine. We are so used to eating wonderful crust pan-cooked scallops that going raw was a bit of an adjustment, very briny. The cauliflower was a nice offset. I preferred the kampachi crudo, with simple olive oil and leaves. More sublime.

It was time to move on to mains, and I think we did very well. First we had an artichoke and burrata autostrada sandwich; the pesto was strong on this sandwich, but the artichokes were wonderful, I so wish more places prepared their own. The bread was crusty and yet soft, so the sandwich had a nice firm bite but didn't fall apart. Roasted potatoes were fine as an accompaniment. Our other main was the roasted chicken. Now understand that we consider the Publican roasted chicken among the finest chicken we've ever eaten, so much so that we occasionally buy it at PQM and cook it at home. So this Nico chicken had some standards to live up to. It was beautiful on the plate, perfectly, cooked, and very tasty. Except the polenta. The polenta had no flavor at all. I'm not even sure how you make polenta without flavor. It was our only real disappointment.

Now we haven't been eating dessert very often, but this was the holidays and we were without a need to rush home to a babysitter, so what the heck, caution to the wind, let's just take a look. We ended up with two absolutely amazing choices: I ordered the tiramisu, cleverly parfaited (is that a word) in a glass that was visually striking, though as the server approached the table my initial impression was "is that it?" Well yeah baby, that was it. But the real winner was the chocolate budino, a beautiful plate of ridiculousness. The budino is like an inside out molten chocolate lava cake, with banana gelato, hazelnut nougat, house made marshmallow type things, and some chocolate crisps. Respect, and two extra days at the gym, were doled out upon receipt of this amazing dish. It was worth every calorie.

No pastas were harmed during this lunch, so I would like to go back and give those a try. I also have been drooling at online photos of the porchetta sandwich and the sausage.

At the end of the day, we don't end up going out for Italian very often. Given a choice I think we would probably hit Avec or Publican. But I think every so often, especially if we have guests along, it would be nice to head back to Nico, especially when the summer comes and they can open up those doors to the outside.

Swung by and had the porchetta sandwich for lunch yesterday. Super good and perfect for the weather!

My drink was pretty meh.

We ate at Nico Osteria last night. My thoughts are summarized nicely by this sentence:

queequeg's_steak wrote:All that aside, even as much as I "liked" the food, I still felt the sum of the parts was lacking with many of the dishes.

In a nutshell, I felt that the savory preparations obscured the main ingredient, rather than highlighting or augmenting it. There was too much else going on in each dish. So the two fettuntas (flatbreads, bruschetta) we got were tasty, but didn't have all that much taste of octopus or beef tongue. The sweetbreads wrapped in pancetta didn't have much sweetbread taste to them; the mussels were good, albeit on the small side. The seafood items in the guazzetto (stew) tasted more like the chickpea broth than like shrimp, calamari, or clams. The lobster spaghetti tasted primarily like its spicy tomato sauce rather than like lobster. The combined/obscured tastes that resulted were generally good and pleasing, but not amazing in any way. I can see how folks who liked those combined/obscured tastes - and especially those who are not all that fond of the taste of fresh seafood - might praise Nico, but I would have preferred more seafood taste in my seafood dishes.

We split a dessert, the Nico torte, and that was the most successful item of the evening. It was a nice-sized buttery cake with a nicely crispy outer crust, served warm, topped with freeze dried pumpkin seeds (nicely crunchy without overwhelming the cake), a few dollops of plum jam, and a small scoop of excellent housemade ice cream for which they were happy to substitute a different flavor (cardamom sweet cream) for the honey flavor that normally comes with the dish.

The bread was ordinary (and room temperature), and the service experienced some minor flaws - nothing major, but I expected better.

One other comment. When you walk in, you're confronted with the bar area; the host stand and the dining room are off to the side. The bar area is extremely loud, and that volume is the first impression you get. Fortunately, the dining room is slightly quieter - still somewhat loud, but not so loud that you have to shout for your companions to hear you. And it's all accompanied by the unrelenting, obnoxious beat of what Phil Vettel calls "thumpa thumpa music" in the background. Other than that, the dining room is pleasant and modern, with glass windows alongside the sidewalk and its passersby.

There are comments above regarding uncertainty about how much to order, along with the adequacy of the portion sizes and their relationship to the prices. I thought the amount of the main ingredient in most of the dishes could have been larger without being considered overly generous (and this probably would have improved the overall balance of flavors in each of the dishes, as noted previously). The two of us had two fettuntas, two antipasti (appetizers), two mains, and split a dessert; we left comfortably satisfied, albeit not overstuffed, and I would think that would be about the right amount of food for most folks. Along with two glasses of wine and coffee service for two, the total for two was $178 plus tax and tip, so $115-120 per person inclusive. I think that's somewhat on the high side; by comparison, I've typically paid around $80/pp at Piccolo Sogno and Piccolo Sogno Due. (I've also typically paid around $50/pp at Anteprima, my go-to place for Italian, but that's with their $29 weekday special and of course they don't have to charge for a location in the heart of the Gold Coast.)

All in all, I thought it was good, but not great. When I really enjoy a restaurant, I go home with a strong desire to return in the near future. I didn't get that feeling last night.

My wife and I had a really nice lunch at Nico Osteria today. We split a raw kanpachi dish from the crudo menu, a beet salad, and an open faced (Fett'unta) sandwich with grilled octopus. Each was excellent. Nico will definitely enter the rotation of places to eat when shopping or otherwise stuck in the Mag Mile area.

Darren, what was the crowd like at lunch during the week? With as great as nico is I fear it gets slammed or is trending that way? When I last went a couple months ago it was half empty on a Thursday at lunch.

Didn't look inside, but adequate amount of outdoor seating as I went by just now Saturday on a rare warm summer day in Chicago.

We sat outside and most of the outdoor tables were full. The inside had a lot of open seats. We didn't know what to expect and so we had a reservation.

The Lovely Dining Companion decided on Nico Osteria for my birthday, a place we hadn't been before. “Authentic Italian Seafood” says the website. “Rustic Italian” with an emphasis on seafood, says the server. A little of both would be my reaction. What follows are brief impressions only (mostly mine, except as noted),


Long leg of the ell
Atmosphere: an ell-shaped room and an open kitchen. Along both arms of the ell, a row of seats at the kitchen, then a row of two and four-tops and then, on the outside, along the floor-to-ceiling windows, another row of two and four-tops (most of the latter are booths). Downsides: an awful lot of hard surfaces. We were there on a Monday night and by 6:30 the place was about two-thirds full, somewhat to our surprise. We were fortunate enough to get a two-top in the outer ring; the middle ring of tables are inches apart, a la Next. That said, I was pleasantly surprised that the noise was never too much; we never had any trouble whatsoever hearing each other. The décor was a little, uh, spartan to my taste (it’s worth noting that LDC was completely turned off by the interior) and so it’s not a quiet, comfortable place but then, that’s not its aim. It’s supposed to be a busy, noisy-ish, exciting place to be and while that may not suit every taste, the décor didn’t bother me much.

As others have noted, there are several different categories, for lack of a better word, from which to order. First, crudo, or raw. Then, fett’unta (essentially different varieties of bruschetta, to the extent that they share grilled bread base). Then antipasti. Then pasta followed by fresh fish and piatti (the two together comprise what we might call entrees), many of which are designed to be shared. While I can understand a little confusion, I have to say I don’t entirely understand the complaint that it’s hard to know how much to order. We didn’t ask the size of a single item we ordered and still found that we ordered exactly enough for us. Treat the appetizers, the fett’unta, and the antipasti as straightforward apps, both in terms of function and in terms of size. Pasta is just like a first course in a classic Italian meal, the primi. Piatti (and the fish) are the secondi. A little like a third course (in Italy). If your appetites are heartier than ours—entirely possible, if not downright likely—then add a fett'unta to your crudo. Or a heartier piatto. And dessert, of course. (Although we didn’t avail ourselves, there is also a contorni section, veggie sides.)


Breads (l to r): plain focaccia; plain ciabatta; focaccia with olives and parmesan
Breads were quite good. I was a little disappointed that none of them were remotely warm and that the breads were replaced automatically. And given the quality, I wish there had been another offering of a completely different kind (or two). Finally, I am not a fan of being presented with a small saucer of olive oil for the bread. Would someone please explain to whoever is in charge of making these decisions (I’m not just talking about Nico here) that this is not how the Italians eat their bread. Since various indications suggest that the Italian influence here is primarily Northern, not Southern, butter is a perfectly acceptable, “authentic” accompaniment. There’s a Mason-Dixon line in Italy with butter on the northern side and olive oil on the southern side. But that’s for cooking, not bread service in a restaurant. I have yet to be offered a saucer of olive oil with my bread when in Italy. (I guess I should be grateful that there wasn’t a swirl of balsamico in the oil.)

And speaking of the water: we opted for “still,” which meant tap, which is fine with us. But it wasn’t even remotely cool. Room temperature water in what seemed for all the world like disposable plastic cups. They weren’t (I don’t think) but they (and the lukewarm water) sat undisturbed for the entire evening.


Baccala Mantecato


Baccala, my portion
The Baccala Mantecato—in Italy it’s salt cod only, the Italian take on what the French call brandade—is Nico’s amped up peasant dish. They add Dungeness crab and doubters desist: it’s fabulous. Crab and baccala topped with a thinly sliced celery and radish “salad.” I’ll confess I wasn’t expecting much of the topping except that it would be in the way. But not only did it make an otherwise colorless dish pop, it was the perfect foil to the rich crab and the salt cod. The veggies have a light and lightly acidic dressing…can’t tell you what it was because we were so entranced with the course. A distinct “best bite of the year” candidate.


Monkfish gemelli
Next, pasta. Though a wonderful dish, we think that it would be better offered in a fall or a winter menu. This is a very hearty dish, rich and just shy of what we might call heavy and it’s worth noting that the portion was more than sufficient. The pasta was lovely (it’s made in-house) and, if a shade past al dente, it was still quite enjoyable. What caught us both a bit off guard was the unexpected heaviness of the dish. We are neither of us accustomed to fish with our pasta but thought it an intriguing dish to try. Speaking solely for me, I guess my prejudices are such that I’m not quite sure what I think on that score, though there is absolutely no denying the quality of the dish. Considering that summer squash was another ingredient, we had expected a dish on the lighter side. We were wrong. While it would be inaccurate to call it heavy, when considering the guanciale and the generous portion of grated cheese (parmesan, not pecorino, I would guess), and the tomato conserva (a concentrated essence of tomatoes, not a light sauce), it turned out to be a very enjoyable dish, just not something for late summer.


Salt crusted Branzino


Branzino, my portion
Finally, the branzino. Branzino (what the northern Italians call it, there are other names in southern Italy and the French call it loup de mer if you’re near the Mediterranean) is still relatively rare on restaurant menus, so we were intrigued. (I last had it at RM Seafood [as in Rick Moonen] in Las Vegas where it was a pretty hefty chunk of fish, as opposed to the filets we got here.) As presented (with the complete “shell” of the head and the tail, but otherwise completely deboned and filleted), it was quite the spectacle. We were offered a choice between a fish coming in at just over a pound or one about a quarter pound heavier (the entrée is priced by weight); we chose the smaller portion. Branzino is a lovely, delicate fish—here presented with scattered torn basil leaves, roasted red peppers (carrying a noticeable, but hardly assertive, heat, and small chunks of almond. For all its delicacy, it has reasonably rich flesh, rich enough to complement the basil and spicy peppers with the almonds adding a little textural interest to an otherwise straightforward dish. If I had just ordered one app and the fish, I would have thought the portion small. In the context of the entire meal, the portion was just about perfect for me, though heartier eaters might still want to choose a bigger fish. (Or add a side.)


Monte Bianco from the front


Monte Bianco from the back


Nico Torte
Desserts were terrific but LDC made a perceptive observation: the desserts are beautiful from concept to execution to presentation. There are unexpected (from us, anyway) layers in what appear at first to be relatively straightforward dishes. For that reason, we were very impressed. But from another perspective, the desserts seem not to be such a great fit: there is little that is particularly “rustic” about them. Italian, yes. Rustic, not so much. In fact, not at all. That’s not a knock on the quality, just an observation on how the meal cohered as a whole.

(FWIW, you can see the affogato in the background of the middle picture: cardamom sweet cream gelato with espresso. In retrospect, I think I would have enjoyed them more if I had ordered them separately. Then, too, I wish to hell I had seen the digestivo list. Some two dozen, including hard-to-find amari on offer. Damn! The gelato, which I didn’t think to ask about, was excellent. LDC informed me that it is made in-house. Someone really knows what they’re doing. This was top-notch stuff in both our respective opinions.)


Mignardises
The little pyramid-shaped thingies are chocolate/lemon (an interesting combination but not one I’m certain I’d look for again) and the red squares, a fruit-flavored doodad. (Please excuse the highfalutin’ culinary terms for these items; actually, I think the proper term for the doodads is pâtes de fruits.)

Service, by the way, was excellent. We’d highly recommend Dustin. Over the past decade, it seems like there has been a slow, inexorable decline in the number of servers who (1) know what they’re doing, (2) know their menu, and (3) have an engaging personality. To be sure, we have had some exceptions, including some notable exceptions. But more and more, it seems to be a successful night if we can find a server who satisfies just one of those criteria. To have a server who satisfies all three, as did ours, is increasingly rare. So the evening was a pleasure on this count as well.

We both liked it a lot. Though we had our quibbles, we both enjoyed the evening and are eager to return and sample more things.

I'll throw in a note about Nico as well.

I took my wife for her birthday, and they crushed it.

Great food, amazing service.

Certainly a great spot for a "special" night out.

Started 2015 with a bang. Brunch at Nico Osteria without a single complaint.

Bloody Mary


Stracciatella Fett’unta brussels sprouts, lemon honey, trufflebert hazelnuts


Hama Hama Oysters


Ham Chop & Eggs creamy polenta, roasted tomato vinaigrette


N’djua & Shrimp Hash red fingerling potatoes, fried egg, breadcrumbs


Another home run for One Off Hospitality.

I tried all the pastries available for breakfast recently. The lemon pound cake and the cornettis were both quite good, but the other two items were the clear winners for me.




The kouign amann was a real treat. Flaky and crisp on the outside, loaded with butter on the surprisingly moist interior. I wouldn't put it on par with Bad Wolf only because I prefer the crisper texture of the thinner kouign amann there, but this version was excellent.


The absolute highlight was the chestnut coffee cake. It had the advantage of being something I'd never had before and the chestnut flavor hit home on a very cold late December morning. Great texture and the earthy flavors made for a real treat. A piece of this cake and the bottomless cup of coffee (not sure of the brand but I thought it was very good) is a breakfast I can definitely see myself going back for.

Everything wasn't great. I got the savory polenta, which comes with parmesan, a second cheese, and a disturbing amount of butter, was disappointing. That it was served lukewarm made it tough for me to get through half of it.

My wife and I had a great meal at Nico Osteria the other day. We started with a pumpkin and porcini soup with lobster that was outstanding, especially the intensely flavorful broth. We also had a pasta dish with clams and a octopus open-faced sandwich. Excellent cocktails made it an all-around great lunch.

Another fantastic brunch at Nico Osteria.

Began the meal with a few pastries

Kouign-Amann

Compared to my gold standard (Bad Wolf Coffee), not quite as flaky but delicious nonetheless

Chestnut Coffee Cake

Perhaps a bit dry, but when slathered with any of their delicious pairings...
Ricotta, Honey Vanilla, Black Currant Jam

...it works perfectly.

I had my customary brunch cocktail
Old Worlds Cinnamon and Roasted Fig-Infused Peloton Mezcal, Punt e Mes Vermouth and Cappelletti Aperitivo. Stirred until chilled


And then we began our proper meal.

Beef Tongue in Brodo grilled squid, hen of the woods mushrooms, poached egg

Beautifully runny egg, tender beef tongue...probably our favorite dish of the meal.

The Nico Burger lobster salad, avocado, pickled fresno chile, gem lettuce


My buddy's entree. I had a little bite of this burger and, though I enjoyed it, I was much happier with my dish.

Bistecca al’ Nico braised beans, arugula, pecorino, fried egg

Damn. I wish I got a picture of just how perfectly this steak was cooked.

Though I'm not a huge fan of desserts, I'm a sucker for affogato (I blame Purple Pig)
Affogatto Espresso & Cardamom Sweet Cream


Fantastic affogato here, and the cardamom really comes through. Is it worth spending $11.00? That I'm not so sure.

Gelato Cinnamon Donut

Had a small bite, tasted like cinnamon, yadda yadda. If you're going to order dessert at a restaurant, do you really want to spend money on a scoop of ice cream?

Nico Osteria, you complete me.

I am remiss. I have not posted.

This place has gone into my rotation for business lunches, brunches, and when the weather is right, al fresco dining.

The focaccia with castelvetrano olives, the pasta, the eggs, and the budino as well as the casual, and attentive service makes this a favorite.

The focaccia and budino are making my top 10 list for the year.

And yes, I am a new convert to hotel restaurants in our fair city.

I don't have much to add to the photo. Nico Osteria makes one hell of an egg sandwich. Diners get their choice of egg style, bacon or sausage, and biscuit or croissant. Cheddar comes no matter the combination as does a side of really excellent garlicky roasted potatoes.

Gabrielle Hamilton of NYC's Prune to 'take over' Nico Osteria on May 2
http://www.chicagotribune.com/dining/re ... story.html

We were able to get in on a Saturday night, without a reservation, a couple of weeks ago for my birthday as walk-ins.

Fantastic meal with outstanding “Team Temperance”/mocktails, all the way through to the bonus dessert of a gorgeously white pavlova.

We sat at the counter. We got to watch them work. Lots of crudo prep this evening including my DH’s plate that he adored and wanted another couple of rounds.

He had the lobster spaghetti. It was indulgent and he regretted it simply because it was indulgent. He happily finished it thr next day with toast and a farm egg. It looked glorious.

I had pasta with truffles.

We split a lovely market salad.

Nico is a favorite of mine.