Venice Cafe: Intimations...

This business just opened in the long empty space once occupied by an Au Bon Pain at the base of my office building (500 W. Monroe.)

Now, despite the name, I do not entertain visions of seafood risotti, fegato a la veneziana and single vinyard Soave and Valpolicella. Just something on the plane of say, Blackie's or La Cocina, but with an Italian accent, however faint, to add one option to the very short list decent local lunches. (My definition of local is pretty severe-- more or less a 2 block radius. Greektown counts as a whole excursion.)

Sadly, based on the menu a colleague just handed me, a sudden frost of doubt threatens the vinyard of my hopes. I offer the following excerpts for contemplation and for odds-making:

Sauces: "Majestic" - A combination of our tomato-basil and Alfredo sauces.

Pizza Slices: "Calabrase" (sic.) (Hot Peppers)

Salads: "Pollo ala Oregano"---Colored rotini, fresh chicken, celery & red peppers in our creamy oregano/lime dressing (italics mine)

Cajun Chicken Pasta Salad (a la veneziana?) ---Colored rotini, fresh chicken, celery & red peppers in our creamy cajun dressing

"Create your own Omelette (Frittata)"

And yet, there is an ingenuousness and convincing (if confused) sincerity to declarations like:

"Whenever possible we use locally grown and/or organic produce. We also prepare our salads with extra virgin olive oil. This allows us to use smaller quantities in our dressing thus greatly reducing fat and cholesterol content."

"We also use only fresh (never frozen) meat and poultry, delivered to us daily. The VENICE CAFE believes in the traditional Italians (sic) concepts of freshness and quality."

At this point, my hope is that out of this vast array---if one avoids the Cajun Cassoulet Alfredo (or whatever) ---one may find a simple, well executed sauce, a fresh, tasty sandwich, and maybe even an acceptable slice of pizza. If their meat isn't pre-cooked/frozen stuff, if they get in some decent bread....maybe...

I plan to explore sometime next week. (Anyone want to come along?)[/i]

It sounds to me like another branch of the Venice Cafe across Wacker from the Sears Tower.

If it is, avoid it like the plague.

Venice Cafe
250 S. Wacker Dr.
312-382-0300

Well, I didn't avoid it ... I went today and sampled a slice of cheese ("New York Style" -- they also serve slices of Chicago "thick crust," as they refer to it on the board). I also got a pepperoni calzone, to get an idea of their fast-food range. I figured, what the heck, how far wrong can they go? Well, the pizza was bearable; about the same as Sbarro on a bad day, with too much oregano in the sauce and a crust that lacked any distinctive flavor and was, I thought, undercooked (although that arguably is just a matter of style). The calzone, however, was a big mistake. Not inedible or noxious, just BAD. As in, just a big, old fatty cannonball of warm, flavorless cheese and dough (but VERY CHEWY ... mrgh, mrgh, mrgh). About a pound of each ingredient, or so it seemed. Actually, for five bucks, I suppose it was a lot of food ... but then I made the fateful decision to have them apply sauce to it. Naturally, in the wink of an eye and before I could open my mouth to say, "Light on the sauce," the calzone was completely submerged in two enormous ladles of bright red, sugary-sweet tomato sauce. I guess I went with the sauce against my better judgment because I wanted to judge Venice Cafe as it would choose to be judged -- i.e., let them do it "their way," not mine, and that experiment was highly revealing. "Their way" not only created a very messy take-out lunch, the superabundance of sauce also soaked into the calzone crust and turned it to mush, making the crust indistinguishable from the quivering mass of underlying cheese and turning the whole thing into a steaming sea of glop -- or perhaps the monster in one of the earlier scenes from The Blob, before it puffs up to movie-theater size. Naturally, and as usual, I ate every bite anyway. But that's my own fault; I don't plan to go back, unless I'm desparate for a slice of pizza.

JiLS

P.S. mrbarolo, I know your pain regarding food in that area; I've worked at 525 W. Monroe for 12 years now, and when they closed the Ranalli's, I pretty much gave up on anything other than Bombacigno's or Lou Mitchell's. Venice Cafe didn't raise my hopes too high, so they weren't exactly dashed by the experience, either.

gleam wrote:It sounds to me like another branch of the Venice Cafe across Wacker from the Sears Tower.

If it is, avoid it like the plague.

Venice Cafe
250 S. Wacker Dr.
312-382-0300

I was assuming the same. I was always surprised at how they continued to pack people in at the Wacker location as the few times I was forced to eat there via peer pressure I found the best thing I could say about the food was that it didn't make me ill.

FYI...

The location at 250 S. Wacker has closed. They are reopening in the Lower Level of Sears Tower across the street. (The old Sbarro)

http://www.venicecafe-online.com/250Wacker/


Does anyone have any idea when?

Considering the extremely limited options in the Loop (I'm in the Sears Tower), the Venice Cafe is not all that bad. Now don't get me wrong, I would not seek this place out...... but since there is really nothing great around here - the Venice Cafe has become another lunch option for me.

bombacignos--558 west van buren

http://www.lthforum.com/bb/viewtopic.ph ... ombacignos

above link and many others on this site

rmtraut, you should seek out the fast food loop thread on this board if you haven't already. The area around Van Buren/Wells is pretty good, for Loop standards.

And I'm not sure if it's in that thread, but you should check out Pazzo's Express in the basement of 311 S. Wacker. Pazzo's is a sitdown Italian place, but they have an express area that is a nice change of pace for sandwiches, salads, and pastas. It's on the higher end of the everyday lunch price scale ~$5.00-6.00 for a sandwich + soup/fries. A large pasta is $5.00.