thanksgiving dinner dining-out suggestions

This is the REAL reason I decided to join lth, after 1-2 years of lurking on this site, unregistered(sad, I know, why it took me ages to finally register here).

Anyway, I'm having a dilemma of trying to come up with a better alternative than eating at Old Country Buffet for Thanksgiving dinner, and am unfortunately having difficulty coming up with any alternatives. Especially if anyone here also is registered on yelp, since I am that same person who infamously ranted against a certain OCB Chicagoland location, I won't name here. And that y'all can obviously tell how much I HATE OCB, yet that I'm always amazed how much my parents tolerate that crappy buffet chain(and that I'm a much bigger fan of Golden Corral and Ryan's(with a slight preference for the former), over OCB).

It's sad that one non-OCB restaurant I recall had a decent Thanksgiving dinner at so many years back(possibly when I was in high school), is no longer around. It was either on the NW corner of Lincoln Ave. and Newport, or Lincoln and Cornelia(don't ask me to remember which of those 2 corners it was off of, as that's as close as I can specifically recall where it was located). Before that, I once had a decent buffet at the revolving restaurant on the rooftop of the former Days Inn on Lake Shore Drive, which has since become the W Motel(Hotel?), 10-12 years ago(and possibly before I started high school).

With that background aside, I hope y'all can come up with some decent thanksgiving meal restaurant suggestions. Thanks to everyone on lth for reading my post, and who can help me out!

Every year, the Tribune and Metromix do an article featuring a few of their top picks for Thanksgiving dinner. For this year's article, click here. For more complete listings of places doing something special for Thanksgiving, click here. Some restaurants offer specials in addition to their regular menus (as indicated in the listings), while others only have a special menu. Some are buffets, others aren't.

Personally, I've found that if you want to go out for Thanksgiving dinner, Thanksgiving Day is a great time to go to one of the nicer restaurants in downtown Chicago that do a special dinner that day (as noted in the links above). Along with Christmas, it's one of only two days all year that you can count on there being very little traffic (getting downtown as well as once you're there), no crowds, lots of on-street parking available, etc.

In recent years, we've had Thanksgiving dinner out several times, at: Chef's Station in Evanston (last year - excellent), Mity Nice Grill in Water Tower Place (good), Lawry's downtown (good), and at the Hotel Nikko (very good).

We go to the Country Squire in Grayslake. It's really nice. You'll need reservations.

The Country Squire Restaurant
19133 E Belvidere Rd
Grayslake, IL 60030
(847) 223-0121

nsxtasy wrote:Every year, the Tribune and Metromix do an article featuring a few of their top picks for Thanksgiving dinner. For this year's article, click here. For more complete listings of places doing something special for Thanksgiving, click here. Some restaurants offer specials in addition to their regular menus (as indicated in the listings), while others only have a special menu. Some are buffets, others aren't.

Personally, I've found that if you want to go out for Thanksgiving dinner, Thanksgiving Day is a great time to go to one of the nicer restaurants in downtown Chicago that do a special dinner that day (as noted in the links above). Along with Christmas, it's one of only two days all year that you can count on there being very little traffic (getting downtown as well as once you're there), no crowds, lots of on-street parking available, etc.

In recent years, we've had Thanksgiving dinner out several times, at: Chef's Station in Evanston (last year - excellent), Mity Nice Grill in Water Tower Place (good), Lawry's downtown (good), and at the Hotel Nikko (very good).

Could you describe more about Chef's Station? That might be a good possibly, especially since I've tended to enjoy restaurants in Evanston in the past(and've had many years too, lol, of dining up in Evanston, as someone who was born and raised in the Edgewater neighborhood).

I'm sure Country Squire is decent, except that I know that's further away than my parents would tolerate driving to.

And as for the metromix article that one posted, those restaurants all sound very interesting! It's too bad that the only restaurant I can imagine that might REMOTELY be in the budget that my parents would be open to considering would be Lawry's. Especially since Signature Room on the 95th sounds like a quality option, and that would've been a good parallel(and I'm sure would've had decent food) to a past Thanksgiving Day meal I had, as a kid, in the revolving restaurant on the rooftop level of the ex-Days Inn on Lake Shore Drive(now today the W Hotel).

I just know after where I ate earlier tonight w/my parents(Hamburger Mary's, where I only reluctantly went to and was yet again proven on how bad that place is, despite the fact that I tried heavily in vain to persuade them to go to Fireside Inn(on Ravenswood Ave.) instead), I'm even more damned determined to pressure them into going to a non-OCB alternative. At least they did take me to Kopi, and got a really good bean and cheese dip w/torilla chips, which did a lot to soothe me over after going to god-awful Scamburger Mary's(I will definately call them that, from now on!).

Planning to personally call up some restaurants I have in mind tomorrow(and over the next few weekdays), to see if I can ask some about if they're serving Thanksgiving dinner or not. And will welcome any additional Thanksgiving suggestions that LTHers can come up with!

dumpstermcnuggets wrote:And as for the metromix article that one posted, those restaurants all sound very interesting! It's too bad that the only restaurant I can imagine that might REMOTELY be in the budget that my parents would be open to considering would be Lawry's.

You know, I had not been to Lawry's for years and recently enjoyed their lunch sandwich bar. I had a beautifully rare prime rib sandwich (sliced in front of my eyes), and the creamed spinach was better than I remember -- in fact, it was excellent and better than Berghoff's in my opinion, and that used to be my favorite. Now I know I'm just talking about the lunch sandwich bar, but there's something about the old school charm of Lawry's that just seems appealing to me, and now I'm looking forward to revisiting Lawry's for a dinner. So maybe you shouldn't be so quick to dismiss it for Thanksgiving . . . they might serve a very nice, traditional, Thanksgiving dinner. Also, here's a link to Opentable's Thanksgiving details page, which might provide you with some more ideas.

BR wrote: Now I know I'm just talking about the lunch sandwich bar, but there's something about the old school charm of Lawry's that just seems appealing to me, and now I'm looking forward to revisiting Lawry's for a dinner. So maybe you shouldn't be so quick to dismiss it for Thanksgiving . . . they might serve a very nice, traditional, Thanksgiving dinner.

BR,

I recently had a very enjoyable holiday meal at Lawry's, which I posted about here. I'd suggest Lawry's would be a very nice option for Thanksgiving diner.

Enjoy,
Gary

Lawry's the Prime Rib
100 E Ontario St
Chicago, IL 60611
312-787-5000

dumpstermcnuggets wrote:Could you describe more about Chef's Station? That might be a good possibly, especially since I've tended to enjoy restaurants in Evanston in the past(and've had many years too, lol, of dining up in Evanston, as someone who was born and raised in the Edgewater neighborhood).

Sure, I'll be happy to!

Chef's Station is a contemporary American restaurant in downtown Evanston. It is located downstairs in the Metra train station at the Davis Street stop. You can access it from Maple Street (west of the tracks) - there's a short tunnel under the tracks - or from Church Street (approaching the restaurant from the north) or Davis Street (from the south and east). You can get there by Metra or by CTA (the Davis Street stop on the Purple Line is right next door). I don't know if they have any specific arrangements for parking (valet, maybe?) but there are two inexpensive parking garages within a block, one on Maple Street a block north of Church, the other on Davis on the block east of the tracks, with entrances on Davis and on Railroad. If you are going there on Thanksgiving, meter spaces on the street should be plentiful and will be free on the holiday. At other times, you can often find meter spaces in the vicinity; make sure to feed the meters, which are operational till 9 pm and strictly enforced.

I would describe the decor at Chef's Station to be "upscale but whimsical". The whimsy can be found in the denim pockets used to hold flatware, and in the painting on the side of the balcony of the backs of people eating. They also have a "chef's table" in the kitchen. It's a nice place. Atmosphere is usually lively but not particularly loud, and the layout of the dining room isn't overly cramped. On Thanksgiving it was perhaps more subdued than usual but still celebratory in tone.

I have eaten there numerous times and all of the food has always been outstanding, from starters through mains to desserts. You can see their regular menu on their website at chefs-station.com. It doesn't show prices, but my recollection is that entree prices are in the mid to high twenties. They also have a very respectable wine list, with 350+ selections.

For Thanksgiving last year, they served a special, limited menu. My recollection is that there was a starter, or maybe a choice of two? It might have been a squash soup, I'm not sure. I know they had a choice of several (2-4) entrees, one of which was the obligatory turkey and I don't remember what the other one(s) were. And then there was a choice of several (2-4) desserts, one of which was pumpkin-based but I don't remember whether it was pumpkin pie or something else. So you can get the traditional Thanksgiving items, but you don't have to, and the other items are representative of their normal cuisine, reasonably creative and excellently prepared. I believe it was a fixed price, but I don't remember how much (sorry!). I'm sure they will be happy to tell you the entire menu over the phone. We were extremely happy with our meal there last year. Over the years, I've had some unfortunate experiences on holidays at other restaurants - inflated prices, worse-than-normal food (the regular chefs being off, maybe), or the limited menu being not very appealing - but none of these were a problem at Chef's Station. We are planning to go back again this year, which I guess is the best testament of all, right? (Looking over their regular menu on their website, we might even go back there between now and then!)

Oh, and if you plan to call Chef's Station, note that they are open Sunday evenings, but closed Mondays. So you may want to call today rather than tomorrow.

Since Lawry's is being discussed, I'll briefly tell you about our experience there as well. This was the first and only time we ate at Lawry's. If I recall correctly, they offered a choice of prime rib or roast turkey. Either one came with their famous spinning salad bowl. The atmosphere was typical steakhouse. As I mentioned, it was good - not unusual in any way, but good food competently prepared.

HTH