Restaurant week recommendations

I was looking to take advantage of some of the restaurant week specials coming up and was hoping to see what people who have a broader experience with the restaurants participating recommended. I haven't been to many on the list and was looking to use restaurant week as an excuse to get to restaurants outside of my usual sphere. Basically, I was wondering if folks had any thoughts on what restaurants offered the best "value" for the menu provided. Right now, the only one that has jumped out at me is Naha, but I would love to hear from others about recommendations for good places to try (thinking about trying to get to two or three depending on timing/luck with reservations).

I haven't dug into the menus yet so may have other thoughts later but I'd definitely vote for Naha and also Mercat a la Planxa - both offer a very good menu rather than cheapening the offering. Embeya's family style menu is good as well and available sooner if you want to beat the rush.

A friend is very excited to have gotten the Moto offer which is some kind of cocktail and food pairing - worth checking that out for sure.

More thoughts if they occur after I look more closely - it's a fun time but such hard work for the kitchens!

I've already made my reservation for lunch at Naha (something we did last year without regrets).

Others that looked like good values to us were Nightwood (4-course $44 dinner) and GT Fish & Oyster (lunch at $22)

IMHO Restaurant Week can be hit-or-miss. It is essentially a marketing tool to fill restaurants during what is a slow time of the year. As such at many venues there is actually little-to-no savings versus what a normal meal costs, but the menu is greatly restricted. Of the higher end venues that participate sometimes the experience is not as good as normal either due to the better (but more expensive) dishes not being available or servers being grumpy due to generally receiving lower tips than usual. That said some restaurants do offer great experiences and while I've had some misses, I have also enjoyed some wonderful meals. Personally I choose not to try venues for my first time anymore during Restaurant Week due to my aforementioned concerns, but instead visit some favorites that are offering a menu I find appealing and do offer some savings versus what a typical meal there would run. This year I have booked Moto, Boka and Embeya.

Just following up, went with a group of six to Naha last night for restaurant week. I thought their approach was interesting and sensible; most of the dishes could be found in a slightly more fancy form on their regular menu (for example, a duck entree on the restaurant week menu came with foie gras on the regular menu). For our purposes of getting to eat at a restaurant outside of our normal price range, this was a perfectly fine compromise. The food was very good, with standouts including carmelized parsnip soup and lamb boreg amongst the starters, the aforementioned duck dish (which had a great sauce and an interesting interplay of sweet and savory with cranberries, or so I was told by my meat eating companions) and the pork belly entree, and the panna cotta for desert. Our group also appreciated that there were some wines by the bottle to enjoy for only $30.

I am sure that we did not get the full Naha experience. However, I feel like this did what Restaurant Week is supposed to do, introduce a restaurant to a broader audience who might think of it again in the future (and have good feelings about it generally). It was nice to have a very nice meal for about $75 a person, including drinks, tax and tip.

Naha is a favorite of mine. I did book it next week. I generally "stand down" during restaurant week , just like I avoid Costco and dining on the 7th floor of Macy's from the 2nd week of November until the new year, but ended up in Eataly last night, I forgot about restaurant week. But Eataly's menu looked perfectly lovely.

I can admit I was a bit put off in participating in Restaurant week due to an industry friend on FB screaming about the hell that is restaurant week. The servers are surley because the customers don't tip and obviously that can create a self-fulfiling horrible evening for customer and server. I am glad Naha went well.



Pax

I highly recommend Big jones. Between the 4 of us we ordered everything, and there wasn't a miss. Here were my personal favs, descriptions copied from their menu:

First
Cajun Boudin Balls, ca. 1955 crispy pork liver and rice sausage fritter, cayenne mayonnaise, gratons, piccalilli
Gumbo z'Herbes an odyssey of cooking greens simmered in dark roux, with cornmeal dumplings

Bread Service
Jalapeno Cheese Bread a special kind of monkey bread, Cajun-style, baked in a cast iron skillet with Hook's cheddar

Entrée
Fried Chicken our award-winning recipe fried in leaf lard, ham drippings, and butter, with voodoo greens and red beans and rice Choose light meat ($3 supplement) or dark meat
Alligator & Andouille Sauce Piquant Louisiana gator tail and house-made andouille simmered in a piquant red sauce, popcorn rice

Dessert
Rum Bread Pudding Satsuma marmalade, buttered almonds, salted caramel ice cream

We ate at Naha last night and really enjoyed our dinners. It was a great introduction to the restaurant, since we hadn't been there before. My significant other and I really loved the starters - we had the parsnip soup and lamb boreg. The truffled roasted garlic custard in the soup was so delicious. For entrees, we had the duck and pork belly. Both were very good. I thought the sauce and apple butter were nicely sweet and was expecting it to be a good contrast with the cranberries. I love cranberries, but I thought they were a tiny bit too tart to meld at all with the other flavors.

There were a number of dessert options. We had the persimmon pudding and the bombolini. The pudding was so good and came with an interesting amount of things like ice cream, cooked fruit, and honey that all went well together. Service was also pretty good, except for the fact that we got the cheese plate as an extra course (since the persimmon pudding was extra) and our server had no idea which cheeses were which. He had to pull out his notebook, claimed that they had recently changed, and then still gave us misinformation. Oh well.

I have posted detailed reports on two Restaurant Week meals in the LTH topics for the individual restaurants.

Yesterday we ate lunch at Travelle (click here for report). It was absolutely wonderful in every way, with delicious food and impeccable service. I loved everything we had: chestnut soup, grilled octopus, braised short ribs, cod, pistachio cake, and nutella baklava. It's also a gorgeous setting, in the former IBM Building. Their Restaurant Week lunch is also a terrific bargain. I highly recommend it.

A week ago we had dinner at Embeya (click here), which was less successful. A few of the dishes were very good, but others, not so much. And the portions of fish and meat in several of the dishes seemed skimpy. Perhaps that's specific to the Restaurant Week menu, as photos of other dishes in the LTH Embeya topic show more generous portions of meat and fish items than we received. Either way, I doubt that we'll return any time soon.

That shows the two extremes of Restaurant Week that Gonzo alludes to - how it works well, and how it doesn't. In one experience, we tried an "under the radar" place that we otherwise would never have gone, and loved it, and want to return. In the other, we tried a place we would have tried anyway, and found them skimping, possibly for Restaurant Week, and are not likely to go back.

Gonzo70 wrote:IMHO Restaurant Week can be hit-or-miss. It is essentially a marketing tool to fill restaurants during what is a slow time of the year. As such at many venues there is actually little-to-no savings versus what a normal meal costs, but the menu is greatly restricted. Of the higher end venues that participate sometimes the experience is not as good as normal either due to the better (but more expensive) dishes not being available or servers being grumpy due to generally receiving lower tips than usual. That said some restaurants do offer great experiences and while I've had some misses, I have also enjoyed some wonderful meals. Personally I choose not to try venues for my first time anymore during Restaurant Week due to my aforementioned concerns, but instead visit some favorites that are offering a menu I find appealing and do offer some savings versus what a typical meal there would run. This year I have booked Moto, Boka and Embeya.

Recent years have found me finding more misses than hits, and I had pretty much written off Restaurant Week. That is until my wife and I had this conversation recently:

"Yeah I said the [Restaurant Week] menu at Vie looked good."

"Well that's why I showed it to you."

"Well."

"Well what?"

"I said it looked good"

"You mean you wanted to go?"

"Why would I said it looked good."

"Because the menu looked good."

With our signals finally straight, I went and made reservations. Very much worth it. Chef Virant mentioned to us that to meet the price point they notched things down here and there, one less component in a dish or a slightly less luxurious ingredient, but it really did not register on me. I would say I walked away from the meal very full. I'd also say I walked away very satisfied. This was what I wanted from Restaurant Week.

Vital Information wrote:With our signals finally straight, I went and made reservations. Very much worth it. Chef Virant mentioned to us that to meet the price point they notched things down here and there, one less component in a dish or a slightly less luxurious ingredient, but it really did not register on me. I would say I walked away from the meal very full. I'd also say I walked away very satisfied. This was what I wanted from Restaurant Week.

I think a thoughtful, non-corporate place like Vie is your absolute best chance to have success during Restaurant Week. They do just about everything right there.

That said, my default recommendation for Restaurant Week is to stay home. For me personally, it's absolutely the worst time of the year to eat out. Conversely, it's the perfect time of year to take on a few cooking projects . . . learn how to make some dishes you've always wanted to try. Shop at some places you don't visit frequently enough (or ever). Buy a nice bottle of wine with the money you would have spent on that RW meal. Hell, at the very least, carry out from that divey taqueria you've never tried that you drive past 10 times a week.

Navigating this fortnight -- Restaurant Week is actually 2 weeks -- is like walking through an unattended dog park trying not to step in a pile of poop. One has to actively look up places that are participating just to avoid accidentally ending up at them.

Or you can knowingly patronize the overly-crowded, participating restaurants to sample dumbed down menus that are far too often not representative of what these places are all about. Spend 2/3 of what you normally would and leave hungry. Endure the middling, perfunctory service that has become a common aspect of RW. You don't have to talk to too many industry folks to find out how many of them feel about RW -- they really dislike it, as well as the throng of hit-and-run diners it brings to their doors. One veteran GM with whom I spoke candidly told me that he'd worked hard to perfect the fake smile he displays throughout RW.

If you are a fan of the industry; if you genuinely care about trying restaurants at their best; if you are truly curious about what they do -- this is the wrong time to try them. This event is geared toward rookies, amateurs and tourists -- not enthusiasts.

Save your money. Save your time. Do yourself a favor and just say no to Restaurant Week.

=R=

Well, Ronnie, you're certainly welcome to your opinion. But as you can see from the positive reports above, it's possible to find great food and great deals (and even great service) during Restaurant Week, just as it's also possible to find disappointment. And you can use reports such as these to figure out where you might best find the former rather than the latter; after all, that's what LTH is for.

It's also worth noting that, for those who decide they don't want to go to a restaurant with a Restaurant Week menu, there are many noteworthy restaurants that don't participate in Restaurant Week. If you hate Restaurant Week, there's no reason to avoid places not participating; in fact, this may be the very best time to visit them.

Wow Ronnie, that sounded really elitist!

abo.lt wrote:Wow Ronnie, that sounded really elitist!

*sigh* That's the last thing I intended.

I just think RW is more marketing hype than anything else. I don't believe it benefits diners nearly as much as it is reputed to do.

=R=

This is what LTH is for. I had reservations for Embeya that I canceled because of the above. I'll go another time and am glad for all opinions. Going back for some boney claw action @ White Oak Tavern instead.

And for what it's worth, it is mktg hype. Period. Some just embrace it better than others.

We went to Koi for their deal during North Shore Restaurant Month. They offered the same $18 3-course meal that they offer year-round, except that it's usually available only for diners who show up before 6 pm - during restaurant month, the same thing is available all evening. Soup, a maki roll and an entree - a pretty good deal, not dumbed down for restaurant month.

Koi
624 Davis Street
Evanston, IL 60201
847.866.6969

I'm just going to note that the people who seem to complain about RW the most are 1) industry folk and 2) people who eat at high-end restaurants regularly. Go ahead and avoid RW if you have a problem with it, but there are many people out there who are not "tourists" or "hit-and-run diners" who have limited dining out dollars and want to try some of these places without breaking the bank. I don't see the harm.

As far as the industry folk complaining, they need to suck it up or opt out of RW. If I get bad service during RW (which has never happened), I would seriously reconsider trying a restaurant any other time. A patron is a patron, and it is a dangerous misconception that people who dine during restaurant week are not ever coming back and therefore not worth a restaurant's time or effort.

FWIW, the GM type who stopped by our table when we had lunch at Travelle seemed genuinely pleased with the response to the Restaurant Week promotion. And the service we received there was absolutely top notch, better than we've seen at some high-end places even when it's not Restaurant Week.

As you can see from the posts above, Restaurant Week has been very enjoyable for many of us here. I find it odd that anyone would consider the idea of great food at a great price to be just marketing hype. I think of great food at a great price to be, well, just great.

I have had a few meals at participating restaurants, only one was planned because my friend noted it was restaurant week.

I had great service and food at both places I visited so far. One last Thursday night at Eataly and the other last Friday at RPM Italian. In both cases I did not order the Restaurant Week Special.

I was pleasantly surprised by the food, (RPM Italian is not phoning in the last course!) and I will go back again( the gnocchi were little clouds in my mouth). My companion did order the RW offering and I was going to as well but they had a nightly special that jumped out at me and I was done with considering anything else. She seemed pleases by her food and her starter of sweet & hot little peppers with cheese was lovely. Our server was great.

ronnie_suburban wrote:Navigating this fortnight -- Restaurant Week is actually 2 weeks -- is like walking through an unattended dog park trying not to step in a pile of poop. One has to actively look up places that are participating just to avoid accidentally ending up at them.

Or you can knowingly patronize the overly-crowded, participating restaurants to sample dumbed down menus that are far too often not representative of what these places are all about.

There is a "third way" for restaurants during Restaurant Week, exemplified by Shaw's, which we went to a week ago today. A prix fixe three-course (incl. dessert) Restaurant Week special was on the menu--but other than that, the menu was exactly the same as it might be on any given night. None of us ordered the RW special (we didn't even think about it being Restaurant Week when we went there), service and food were just as good as any other night, the restaurant was no more crowded than it might be any other Monday (but maybe this was because it was the day after the blizzard), etc.

ronnie_suburban wrote: Hell, at the very least, carry out from that divey taqueria you've never tried that you drive past 10 times a week.

seconded.

visit that taqueria, pizza joint, shawarma spot, etc instead......

and then perhaps post a few words about it on LTH.

Hubby and I also took advantage of Vie's RW offerings last week. We only get there 2 or 3x a year --mostly for special occasions. The service was spot on, the food was great and the overall experience pleasantly normal with no RW overcrowding. We went primarily because the menu sounded good and I am glad we did.

I had plans to dine at Mercat this weekend, though RW didn't factor into our choice of restaurant. Unfortunately, that meal got postponed and I instead found myself at Japonais with a group and made the mistake of ordering the RW menu. Dessert was the best thing about it. The appetizer (rock shrimp) was boring and my entree (bouillabaisse) tasted as if no one in the kitchen ever tried it to see if it was well seasoned. Overall, the RW meal was a total disappointment.

Restaurant Week Good/Restaurant Week Bad

Did RW menus on two consecutive nights, sort of intentionally. First was Chicago Oyster House with some friends, mostly because it is a 5 minute walk and we had to try it sometime. The Clam Chowder was uninspiring. The fresh oysters were very good. I had some called Chef's Creek from the Northeast. The seared tuna was a frozen chunk that had lost most of what might have, at one time, identified it as tuna. The key lime pie was purchased somewhere, not bad, sort of like the Clam Chowder.

I had not intended to do the RW menu there, but the rest of the table did, so I tagged along. Everyone else went with the grilled lobster tail as their main. Also frozen, also not really worth eating. Strangely C.O.H. does not permit corkage, so we went with some unfiltered Sake that turned out to be very sweet, followed by a Chilean Cab, Los Vascos, that was not the vintage on the list, but was good. Yes, an unusual pairing, but I actually had tried this at the suggestion of a sommelier when in Chile a few years ago, and it worked pretty well then and now.

I will go back for fresh oysters, nothing that the kitchen has to cook.

The next night we took the son out for a birthday dinner. After some thought, I chose Roka Akor because he lives not too far away and he is living the sort of flashy young professional lifestyle that Roka Akor seems to cater to. I thought he would like it. When I planned this out I had not really considered that I was doing two places on consecutive nights whose focus was (partly anyway) fresh seafood with an Asian slant. The similarity ends there. I had been to Roka once before and felt very out of place, understood the place is about seeing and being seen, but also remembered the food as being uniformly very good. This was a quiet Sunday night so I did not feel quite as much like a fat, old uncle. The waiter was very, very good. And the food was even better than I remembered. Still expensive, but delicious.

This time, I was the only one who had the menu. Salmon Tataki was fresh, sweet, and well dressed. It is a full serving (five bite sized pieces) that could easily be shared. The waiter recommended the grilled lamb chops with Korean seasoning. Three (!) large, meaty, cooked perfectly (I asked for medium rare, despite being advised to have the medium), well seasoned with a lovely chile dipping sauce. Finished with a pear tart which was lovely, buttery. We also shared various other dishes and both my companions dined ala carte. I still am a bit put off by the atmosphere, though it is a pretty room, and there are always lots of pretty people to watch as well. And it is expensive for what is a fairly simple cuisine, though they do seem to use excellent ingredients. Still, it is an excellent robata grill and sushi - in addition to the excellent ingredients, there is perfect technique and a very nice touch of creativity coming out of wherever the corporate Chef de cuisine is guiding the chain. And the RW menu is a great deal.

Off to RW at David Burke tomorrow for the Bride's birthday. She wanted steak, and I have never been. I think the RW menu there, with the multitude of upcharge/upgrades offered, does present a decent way to enjoy a dry aged steak at a slight discount. But I am not going for a bargain.

My reading on RW - completely depends on the place. Some, like Roka Akor, offer excellent menus at a good price; others are just repackaging the same old or worse at no savings, and should be avoided. Are any of them better than my favorite taqueria, Chinatown spot, or a place where a great chef is at his/her peak (like Elizabeth, say) - absolutely not. And as at Elizabeth, there are ways to enjoy those places at reasonable prices, too, if you look. Because of all the celebration dinners this past week I had occasion to read through almost every RW menu, and the conclusion is obvious to me. If you want to try a place, do it; otherwise this is no deal. And when you are there, don't get stuck on the RW menu. I knew better at Chicago Oyster House, but still went along.

From a business point of view, I suspect the difference between Roka and C.O.H. is that the former views it as a marketing expense, and is making the effort to assure diners have an excellent experience so they will come back, while the latter views it purely as added business that needs to add to profitability. I am slightly curious as to what the ala carte selections would be like, if they would be better. But I am in no hurry to explore that. Lost opportunity for them, but they did make a good buck on our table of four.

My two cents.

Chicago Oyster House
1933 S. Indiana
Chicago

Roka Akor
456 N Clark St
Chicago

We went to Ceres Table on Jan 30, and had a good time, but didn't think anything we had would have made us go back. We didn't get the Restaurant Week menu, and I wonder if maybe during Restaurant Week you're best advised to stick with those dishes? One thing we did want to get, but they don't let you order them separately.

Service was fine, especially given that we were catching up with friends and more interested in talking than in ordering. But the DH and I felt like everything had one too many ingredient, and was soggy and oversalted to boot. I'm not sure that's the fault of restaurant week, though.

I don't know how crowded they usually are on a Friday. We arrived at around 6:30 and it was pretty empty, but quite full when we left.

So lunch today at GT Oyster is everything that is WRONG with Restaurant Week. Here's a place that I've liked in the past, but who's approach to RW made me a little less likely to return.

One of the problems with RW and it's pre-set price point is how does the restaurant hit the price point. I think the general thinking is that a restaurant will dumb down it's food or use a banquet approach to control costs. What's worse, I've seen often, is throwing a few things together for the sake of a 3 course meal, that when dis-combined, would not amount to the sum of what they've charged*. In other words, the sum is less than it's price or we'll give you three things that cost $7 each but charge you $22 for the privilege of being Restaurant Week. I really did not feel that what I had today @ GT was worth $22 (especially with a cocktail at a mear $12!). The portions were (very) small, my wife's whitefish more like a plate in the middle of a multi-course tasting menu (or an amuse bouche).

If that was bad enough, they were upselling the whole time. How 'bout some oysters. Would you not want the mac n cheese? Another drink? Coffee? No, we came for Restaurant Week. Leave me alone.

*I've seen this happen on Groupon too, where it's only a deal if you get the "meal", but it's like who needs a big cookie from a cheesesteak place anyway?

I had my third and final Restaurant Week meal last night and overall had my best Restaurant Week to date; definitely plan going forward to stick with only hitting restaurants I regularly frequent during Restaurant Week.

Moto: Great opprotunity for sampling their cuisine at a greatly reduced price. They served trays of sample size portions of approximately ten different dishes in a cocktail party type atmosphere (there were seats available, but everybody was served at the same time in one of their dining rooms and the food placed on tables in the center of the room). The $44 price also included a glass of wine from approximately half a dozen selections and then there was a cash bar for additional wine. There was enough samples of the food brought out for everybody to have 2-3 plates of each dish, but as portions were small (one biters) it amounted to more "heavy appetizers" than a "full meal" (my friend and I went to Parachute afterwards for some heartier cuisine). If someone was expecting a seated dinner or a full on Moto experience they would be disappointed, but I think Moto adequately explained in advance what you were receiving. Even though I left a bit hungry and the event was bit too crowded to receive the extremely attentive, individualized service that is customary at Moto I had a fun time, the food was delicious and at $44 it was a nice value (it was pre-paid and the price already included tax).

Embeya: Even though they were packed we received incredibly warm service (we are regular diners here, so that may have had something to do with it - but I was really impressed how friendly and attentive the server was despite a near full house). The menu included nine different dishes served family style in four courses (i.e. two to three different dishes at a time). Portions were a bit smaller than normal for some items than when I have ordered them a-la-carte but the courses added up to be enough food to leave satisfied. Aside from not being crazy about the ribs (I loved the old version of this dish at Embeya, but found the current rendition rather bland) every other dish was well executed and tasted great (I particularly enjoyed the seafood stew and the taro ice cream sundae). There was a nice variety of food. They also offered a wine pairing ($25 for 3 courses, $32 for 4 courses) that my wife enjoyed; I oped for a cocktail and glass of sake. Really nice value, but ended up being an expensive (but amazing) evening because of us extending the night by hitting a few other venues for before and after dinner beverages.

Boka: Last night we had a fantastic dinner at Boka. We arrived early and started with cocktails at the bar (my wife and I love the current person running the bar program - Tomasz - who just recently took over). Fantastic cocktails and he and the Boka staff are among the friendliest people in the industry. After we were seated we again enjoyed flawless service despite a packed venue (as with Embeya, we are regulars at Boka - this actually marked our 50th visit, though many of these were just for cocktails at the bar). The $44 meal consisted of a cold appetizer, hot appetizer, entree and dessert (three to four choices for each course) and were mostly select items from their regular menu. The appetizers appeared to be about half sized portions, but the entrees and desserts full sized and there was also bread service (two different delicious breads, replenished during the meal) - so plenty of food and it was perfectly executed and amazing as always (for entrees I opted for Chef Wolen's new chicken dish - he no longer is doing a version resembling what he did at The Lobby and my wife had the short rib - which is outstanding and a very meaty version of short rib that texture wise is more akin to a ribeye than what I normally associate with short ribs). Some of the more exciting menu items were not offered as part of restaurant week (i.e. the Spanish Octopus, Duck, and Venison) but there was still a good selection and the meal was definitely a nice value and had it been my first time dining here would have inspired me to have wanted to return. As a side note Boka recently hired a top tier new pastry chef (Meg Galus - most recently from Nomi Kitchen) who will be introducing her dessert menu following Restaurant Week - I can't wait to head back and see what she does.

My personal opinion is, a restaurant should not offer smaller portions or inferior dishes for Restaurant Week. This is their opportunity to impress customers who have never dined there before, and the experience ought to be comparable to what they offer at other times, but at a somewhat lower price. Restaurants should accept that they will make less profit on each of these meals, but will benefit by serving a higher volume than usual, as well as by creating (hopefully good) word of mouth that is great marketing for them. That's how Restaurant Week works best. Restaurants who can't accept this, and feel they must skimp on portion size or serve their lowest-cost, least-desirable dishes to meet a price point, might be better off not participating in the RW promotion. (Note, I am not directing these comments specifically at Gonzo's report on Moto, for which they apparently make clear that they offer a very different-from-normal experience for RW.)

Eddie V's is not the type of place I normally go, but some co workers invited me there last Thursday and we all had a good time. The service was seriously some of the best I have ever experienced at a restaurant. This is coming from a guy who is generally indifferent to service good, bad, or ugly. That is to say, even a not-giving-a-shit guy like me took notice of how professional our waiter was. He knew his menu, answered all questions well and struck the perfect balance of being conversational without being annoying.

Food was simple but good. Seared steaks, fish filets, garlic broiled shrimp that kind of thing. One dish came out with a side of mixed greens slaw which was one of the best things I've eaten lately. They really put a lot of effort into what was essentially a garnish and I'm trying to figure out how to recreate it.

One of my co workers ordered the pork pot stickers as their appetizer choice. "Jesus Christ" thinks I. "Pot stickers from a corporate steakhouse? These are gonna be some frozen and deep fried garbage". Well shortly afterward the pot stickers came out and made me look like an asshole because they were actually pretty good, tasting hand-made and properly pan fried.

The $44 cost was a good value considering that's how much an entree normally costs there, and we got a 3-course dinner with normal portions. Everyone at our table also got a $50 gift card which was a nice touch and a really smart marketing move for them considering it was our first time there.

So, a great restaurant week experience at:
Eddie V's
521 N Rush Street
Chicago IL 60611

Our third and last restaurant week meal was at David Burke's. I rarely do steakhouses simply because it is something I can do as well at home with no real effort and at a fraction of the price. How hard is it to roast or mash potatoes, make some creamed spinach, maybe grill a vegetable and sear a good steak? Not hard at all.

But the Bride wanted a steakhouse for her birthday (ageless and lovely as she is, she does have these strange milestones), and I have planned to try one of Burke's dry aged steaks, so RW was the pretext.

The RW menu was good. A choice of Tomato Bisque or an Iceberg Salad (respecting the season, tomatoes in the salad were actually confit - lightly salted and cooked, delivering a darned tasty tomato experience for February). The Bisque, which the Bride ordered but shared, was very buttery, a bit over the top (this being a steakhouse, that is forgivable). The salad was delicious. The main was a choice of a fiilet, salmon, or roast chicken. The filet lacked both a bone and the serious aging that brought me to Primehouse, so it was a non-starter (as were the salmon and chicken for obvious reasons), but for an upcharge one could get pretty much any streak on the menu. Some charges were listed, others negotiable. The Bride even ended up with what I think was an off-menu choice - a bone-in, aged filet. The menu comes with mashed potatoes and sauteed mushrooms served family style.

Since none of us really had the menu, the final price was way more than the $44 each, but it was worth it. My sense is that the menu is perfectly good if you want to get one of the offered mains - quality was goods, portions more than sufficient. In fact, we really did not have any occasion to add anything to the menu, aside from our sinful dry-aged (40 day for me) rib eyes. Large, intense, pieces of meaty perfection.

I would be perfectly happy to go back in five years when the Bride next requests a steakhouse.

As a comparative aside - over the holidays we were at some event next door to Lawry's and popped in there for a lark afterward. A similarly timeless atmosphere and cuisine, though between Lawry's and its predecessor the Kungsholm, I have lots of history there. I half expected the place to look tired, but it was well kept up. The food - roast beef, creamed spinach, mashed potatoes, yorkshire pudding - was just as timeless and solid. But at $70 pp for that meal, another one I can easily make at home any time, it does not make any sense to either of us to ever go back. Not a criticism, because the meal was solid, just not what I want, and what seems like an absurdly high price point for something with no interest or creativity. How things change.

Forgive my digression. The dry aged steaks make Primehouse worth a return visit sometime - that is the point. Though perhaps that is just because I have not looked hard enough to find the butcher who dry ages steaks?

The bottom line on RW was that Roka Akor stood head and shoulders above the other two places we visited. Very good food, nicely chosen menu, full portions. I was also gratified that the son, after our steak dinner, said that RA was much better and he would gladly go back there any time. Always happy to please the offspring.

Adieu Restaurant Week.