NOLA will not be missed by me. When they first opened they claimed that they went to Cafe du Monde to learn how to make beignets and that theirs were exactly the same. Not sure what planet their parallel New Orleans was on but it wasn't ours. Below average at best. Did have a barely acceptable muffaletta there once, wayyyyy to much oil.
Oh well, maybe someday someone will get it right...

teatpuller wrote:it appears Red Hen Bakery is opening an outpost in Oak Park at the old Great Harvest at Oak Park and Lake. Should be a vast improvement!

I'll miss Great Harvest not that I went all that much.

It was a nice neighborhood place.

teatpuller wrote:it appears Red Hen Bakery is opening an outpost in Oak Park at the old Great Harvest at Oak Park and Lake. Should be a vast improvement!

I never visited the Great Harvest in Oak Park but the one we have here in Naperville is fabulous. I've never had a bad bread. I understand that these shops all operate pretty much independently and can develop their own recipes, so they're all different bakeries.

Panther in the Den wrote:

ucjames wrote:Haven't been by there myself lately, but my parents tell me Nola's on Oak Park Ave in Oak Park will be closing on the 13th.

Yup! My Bride read about it in the local Wednesday Journal. No comment as to why.

I visited a few times and the owner seemed to have somewhat of an attitude. Not very friendly.

I had noticed, a year or so ago, that they were moving into the food arena (not tried it) and they might of been better off keeping it simple.

The location should of been able to do well as it is the only coffee shop (other than Taste of Brazil) near the popular Oak Park stop of the Blue Line. The few times I visited was when I did not have my trusty mug-o-joe from home heading to the EL or maybe a Sunday morning pastry and coffee for My Bride.

Coulda, woulda, shoulda.

I believe Nola's is having a blowout celebration at the end of the month so folks can enjoy one last time and say goodbye. If memory servers me correctly, it's the week of July 27.

John Danza wrote:

teatpuller wrote:it appears Red Hen Bakery is opening an outpost in Oak Park at the old Great Harvest at Oak Park and Lake. Should be a vast improvement!

I never visited the Great Harvest in Oak Park but the one we have here in Naperville is fabulous. I've never had a bad bread. I understand that these shops all operate pretty much independently and can develop their own recipes, so they're all different bakeries.

One thing that will be better with Red Hen is that they're actually going to have tables so people can sit down and eat. It will be nice to have a local sandwich shop where takeout isn't the only option. I'll miss the cookies from Great Harvest. I hope Red Hen can satisfy my sweet tooth!

Good as they were with kids, I won't miss Great Harvest, not least because they were the ones that aggressively lobbied to keep Red Hen out of the farmer's market (even though that was Oak Park's sole option for crusty bread, save Whole Foods). That Red Hen is opening a store is awesome news, and beats buying their imported loaves from the Cheese Market. Now all Oak Park needs is a quality cake bakery and we're golden on the carb front.

Opening down the street, just half a block south from Nola's Cup: a sushi bar (!?). In south Oak Park, in a cursed strip of vacant storefronts. They've spent a lot of time spiffing up the exterior, and it's great that something like this is coming to south Oak Park, so I have my fingers crossed if not my hopes up that this will spark some renewed activity (I know Pan's is finally adding a parking lot, too, and they've made a small effort to expand their selection). Still, how funny will it be to have both a Brazilian place and a sushi (or perhaps pan-Asian? we'll see) place in the no man's land that is my immediate 'hood?

d4v3 wrote:I am not sure what this means exactly, but interestingly, I was driving past East of Edens, and noticed they were putting up yellow Vienna Beef awnings that said Harry's Hotdogs.

100-year-old Harry Heftman is now working at East of Edens and Fulton's Chicken. The signs probably went up at the welcome event.

Oakparkerr wrote:

ucjames wrote:Haven't been by there myself lately, but my parents tell me Nola's on Oak Park Ave in Oak Park will be closing on the 13th.

I believe Nola's is having a blowout celebration at the end of the month so folks can enjoy one last time and say goodbye. If memory servers me correctly, it's the week of July 27.

That's odd. Closing on Monday only to reopen 2 weeks later for the blowout on the week of the 27th?

Apparently it didn't stay open long enough to make the forum, but Alexa Cafe (4942 N Pulaski), a cuban sandwich and coffee shop, has closed. I think it may have been around maybe six months.

Panther in the Den wrote:

Oakparkerr wrote:

ucjames wrote:Haven't been by there myself lately, but my parents tell me Nola's on Oak Park Ave in Oak Park will be closing on the 13th.

I believe Nola's is having a blowout celebration at the end of the month so folks can enjoy one last time and say goodbye. If memory servers me correctly, it's the week of July 27.

That's odd. Closing on Monday only to reopen 2 weeks later for the blowout on the week of the 27th?

My bad, I heard the last hurrah was this weekend. Too bad I missed it!

The windows of the space where La Palma was on Kedzie have been papered over with a liquor license application in one for some weeks now. Lately the papers say Coming Soon Dolce A Fusion Experience, whatever that may mean. The corporation name on the liquor license application is different from the one that city food inspection records show for La Palma. That La Palma closed was not a surprise given the rather erratic hours noted buried in this thread. It seems unlikely that the new restaurant will be Romanian.

The two threads with mentions of street numbers for La Palma differ internally as well as relative to the address the city inspection site has.

Dolce
4114 North Kedzie

majorlance wrote:

Suzy Creamcheese wrote:There's a Five Guys going in on the corner of Arthur and Sheridan.

ETA: Well, it's better than Chipotle.

Yep, about a hundred feet from the Loyola CTA station. I went in this morning and asked what looked liked the lead guy overseeing the interior construction when they planned to open, and he said they're hoping for July 6th.

Now open.

http://chicagoist.com/2009/07/14/bill_k ... _grows.php

The Chicagoist website is reporting that Cafe Vella is closing on August 23rd.

It will be replaced by "Belly Shack", run by Urban Belly's Bill Kim. The article says the food will be "Asian and Latin-inspired" and like Urban Belly it will be BYOB w/ counter service.

The address is 1912 N. Western Ave.

cilantro wrote:

majorlance wrote:

Suzy Creamcheese wrote:There's a Five Guys going in on the corner of Arthur and Sheridan.

ETA: Well, it's better than Chipotle.

Yep, about a hundred feet from the Loyola CTA station. I went in this morning and asked what looked liked the lead guy overseeing the interior construction when they planned to open, and he said they're hoping for July 6th.

Now open.

My best friend LOVES Five Guys. Went there with him the other night. The fries were really great. The burgers were standard, nothing special really but definitely not bad. I'd probably go there to get an order of spicy fries to go next time.

Panther in the Den wrote:

Santander wrote:

montwyn wrote:Another new restaurant is currently under construction in Oak Park at the old S3 spot at 814 S. Oak Park Ave.

Word on the street (from a self-proclaimed owner) is that it will be a sushi bar.


It's close, so I wish it success, but along with Indian, Starbucks, ice cream parlors, and popcorn (yes, there are multiple popcorn shops within ten blocks, none getting close to even the worst Garrett location), sushi is somewhat oversaturated in the area. As Hammond always says, we need more auteur-driven, creative spots - the landscape in Oak Park proper should be better than it is.

Like S3.

I was out walking around in Oak Park last night and walked past the location for SEN Sushi Bar. I decided to tap on the door and ask the owner when they'd be open and it's sooner than all of us expected. I just wrote a blog post about it and added some pictures of what I could see of the interior. Most of us in Oak Park are excited when ANY new restaurant opens!

http://www.livehereoakpark.com/profiles ... e-breaking

Oakparkerr wrote:I was out walking around in Oak Park last night and walked past the location for SEN Sushi Bar. I decided to tap on the door and ask the owner when they'd be open and it's sooner than all of us expected. I just wrote a blog post about it and added some pictures of what I could see of the interior. Most of us in Oak Park are excited when ANY new restaurant opens!

http://www.livehereoakpark.com/profiles ... e-breaking

I usually don't click on links.

When will they be opening?

Thanks for checking!

Oakparkerr's blog post wrote:What do you guys think? Does it look too chic for Oak Park? The decor will certainly attract some of those elusive, rich single folks!

As a public, middle-class married folk, I'm running, screaming, in the opposite direction, scared by its utter chicness.

Jam, the new breakfast/lunch/brunch place from the owners of Chickpea, has opened.

Jam
935 N. Damen Ave
(btwn August and Iowa)
Chicago, IL 60622
773-489-0302

I saw a small sign that said "D'Agostinos Pizza and Pub. Coming Soon" on a new building going up 1/2 block east of Higgins and Cumberland this afternoon. It's the one the northside of the street across from the Bank of America/LaSalle building.

Definitely the same color and logo as the one on Addison/Southport.

Castel Gandolfo open at 800 N. Dearborn (corner of Chicago and Dearborn). Serves brick oven pizza. Cash only, no deliveries. It's a pretty small space, and about half the tables were filled tonight when I drove by.

Also, the windows have been papered up at the ill-fated De Angelos deli and sushi just north of Chicago and State next to Quang Noodle, and a sign is advertising El Souk: hummus, falafel and kabobs. Hoping, hoping, hoping it'll be good.

Sen Sushi in Oak Park is now open. They're closed on Mondays. BYOB for now. The chicken teriyaki was good and my husband enjoyed his red dragon maki and shrimp maki. We'd certainly go back and they're better than Sushi House. I'd post a few pics ... but I couldn't figure out how!

Papillon, on 5111 Brown St. in Skokie, once featured on Check Please, is no more.

I drove by today, and saw signs indicating that Yolo Mexican Grill was to "open soon" in the space.

No other details are available.

Received an email that Vella Cafe will be closing its door on 8/23. They have chosen not to renew their lease. They will be serving pizza one last time Friday, August 14th from 6-10pm. Reservations are now being accepted.

From Chicago Magazine:

>Satko Ibrahimovic (Pizza Bubamara) plans to open Sprout (1417 W. Fullerton Ave.), an organic French-Italian restaurant, near DePaul next month. . .

So the man who told me in a characteristic bit of deadpan that he had killed his best friend that afternoon because the guy had gone to Brazil and "seen many beautiful women", speaking in a voice that wouldn't quite allow me to dismiss the possibility (and this to me, someone he had never met, who had innocently wandered into his pizza counter) is now opening a restaurant called "Sprout"? In Lincoln Park? Satko was interesting, edgy and eccentric even for Ravenswood/Uptown. It'll be interesting to see how he approaches this.

The erstwhile Taylor Street resto on Central St. in Evanston now has papered-over windows, and a sign announcing the imminent arrival of the "Bonsai Cafe," which will feature sushi/pan-Asian dishes. I believe that this marks the opening of the 1,021st place of this type in Evanston. . . .and a very similar place just a couple of blocks away opened and closed within a year, leaving no trace (former Daruma space, now a gluten-free bakery).

For the LOVE of GOD, can we please get a Korean place, or a really good Thai or Vietnamese place, or even a reasonably authentic Chinese place of ANY kind up here? ARRRGH! (I get like this every time I come back from a couple of days in Madison - had a wonderful dinner Monday with the Customary Dining Companion at Lao Laan-Xang, which is so successful that they now have two locations. Sadly, an Evanston branch is not in the long-range plan. . . *sigh*)

In a related side note, I recently saw Judith Dunbar Hines, from the Chicago Office of all things Culinary, and she said that, while normally, the number of closures and openings are pretty equal, in the last year in Chicago, more restaurants opened than closed, which they saw as a very good sign.

From Chicago Magazine's Dish, more info on Bad Apple:

Craig Fass and Mandy Franklin, the folks who brought you Menagerie a few years back, plan to literally put two icons together at The Bad Apple (4300 N. Lincoln Ave.; 773-360-8406), a gourmet burger joint in the old Feed the Beast space. “We have a blackened burger with Bitter End pale ale and a Roquefort blue cheese sauce,” says Fass. “And another with Honey Weiss–crusted ham on the burger. And a Belgian ale–braised pork shoulder with a rarebit sauce.” Beef comes from Pat LaFrieda, New York’s legendary butcher, and Fass says he’s going to try to keep the entire menu under $10 an item. The space will be outfitted with communal benches, a fireplace, a shuffleboard table, and an old-school pinball machine. Target opening: August 7th.

Cynthia wrote:In a related side note, I recently saw Judith Dunbar Hines, from the Chicago Office of all things Culinary, .

Judith is a great person and truley an asset to the culinary scene and to our city.

So do you think I like the lady??

In the former Schlegl's space at 3334 W. Foster, there is now a place called Beijo de Chocolat, apparently opened by a former journalist, then French pastry school graduate (who I assume was the very friendly woman who served me). The place is essentially a bakery selling cupcakes, donuts and muffins and Lavazza coffee, but there's also a large selection of house made chocolates. Some of the truffles looked very interesting - several flavors, many of which you would expect to find at Vosges. Toffee looked more like the matzoh type as I thought I detected the candy lying on a cracker.

But today, I only tried a croissant, a muffin and a donut. The croissant was of the type you would expect to find at an airport so I would strongly urge you to avoid it at all costs. The raspberry streusel muffin was tasty, although the raspberry was more in the form of a puree and the muffin was just a tad too sweet for me. A bacon cheddar muffin looked interesting. The chocolate coated cake donut was a little heavy and uninspiring. If I return, it will be to try some of the chocolates.

Panther in the Den wrote:There is a new sushi and noodles place opening up on the SW corner of Des Plaines and Madison in Forest Park...

Another doomed corner.

Coral Sushi and Thai

Now open. Boy! People must love Sushi in the tri-suburb area (Oak Park, River Forest and Forest Park).