Neckbones @ Danny’s Café & Deli, Melrose Park

Neckbones @ Danny’s Café & Deli, Melrose Park

Neckbones first came to my attention in “She’s Gotta Have It,” wherein Mars Blackmon (Spike Lee) disses two guys by referring to them as “Joe Neckbones,” which for some reason I found quite amusing.

Today, on the suggestion of the august Vital Information, we went to Danny’s where the special of the day was neckbones, which were nothing like I imagined they would be. I pictured them as mostly bone that one gnaws to the point of frustration. I was wrong. These boys were steaming meaty, with good pork flavor and much moisture provided by lots of classic Italian American red sauce.



VI had the meatball sandwich, which he shared, and I was glad he ordered giardiniera alongside, which pepped it up. I had kind of envisioned a deep-fried meatball, but this was a slice of meatball-like material, “fried” in the American sense (i.e. in a pan or griddle with a little oil).



Condiment Queen and I both had the pasta fazool, which was okay but not earth-shaking, and the cubbie cottage fries seemed a great idea but could have been a bit more crisp, though blue cheese and wing sauce is a pleasing condiment for them.



Based on the neckbones alone (a Wednesday special), I’d go back to Danny’s, if I were to ever go to the same restaurant twice, which I almost never do. This is a very neighborhood place, much like Freddy’s further south, and many of the folks walking in seemed to recognize others they knew, which made for a very friendly, everyone-knows-everyone vibe.



Danny’s Café & Deli
15th Ave and Division
Melrose Park, IL
708.343.9999
http://dannyscafeanddeli.com/

I may have to try those neckbones. My family uses them for the base in our tomato meat sauce (over pasta). I guess it was my great-grandmother's recipe when they lived in the city in the early part of the last century. They made the same west suburban pilgrimage that many Italian Americans (although they were French) did over the past 3-4 generations: Near west side, far west side, Maywood/Elmwood Park/Melrose Park, Addison, etc. The neckbones had to have been an Italian influence.

We still do it this way though and the sauce is incredible - assuming a very beefy flavor. My wife still craves this whenever we visit my mom.

Thanks for the post.

I grew up eating a whole lot of red sauce that was flavored with neck bones as well as various other proteins. They would spend the day on the bottom of the pot. But i never saw the bones served as a stand alone item. That Danny is one creative capitalist, turning what i've always thought of as a flavoring agent into a special. And it sounds like they were tasty!!

Joey A wrote:I grew up eating a whole lot of red sauce that was flavored with neck bones as well as various other proteins. They would spend the day on the bottom of the pot. But i never saw the bones served as a stand alone item. That Danny is one creative capitalist, turning what i've always thought of as a flavoring agent into a special. And it sounds like they were tasty!!

I'm not sure, but it didn't seem that the bones had been cooked in the sauce. Now, I understand making sauce with neckbones is the way to go (this according to my barber, Emil Messina), and the sauce was maybe made with neckbones, but I don't believe we were served neckbones that had already been cooked in sauce. They had too much life in them.

Hi,

About 18 months ago, when Rene G and I were in pursuit of Coney Dogs in NW Indiana. We stopped at a diner where Rene G ordered a Coney Dog. I had the daily special of pork neckbones for $4.



We were dining in, though my meal arrived in a take-out container. While this may have been a mis-communication, it really was appropriate. The container weighed several pounds with more food to pick through than was expected. These braised neckbones were heavy in unrelieved porkiness that the tomato sauce in David's serving would have been very welcome. I soldiered through this meal, though it began to overwhelm me.

There were several items posted on the walls I found intriguing. What caught my eye was a sign for fried pies. A Southern specialty I have never had beyond the original McDonald's apple pie, which was fried. I was pretty excited until I learned the owner's Mother no longer made them for the restaurant. In pure time warp fashion observed frequently in the region, the signage lives on long after they ceased offering it.

Charlies Coney Island
2490 Broadway
Gary, IN
Tel: 219/883-2117

I thought neckbones were a staple everywhere we ate them so much. Stews, pots o beans, definitely in red sauce (we aren't even Italian.) I also know several Italian families that have them on a regular basis.

I don't believe we were served neckbones that had already been cooked in sauce. They had too much life in them.

Were they braised or slow roasted or what? I'm gonna take a crack at it at home.

I thought neckbones were a staple everywhere we ate them so much. Stews, pots o beans, definitely in red sauce (we aren't even Italian.) I also know several Italian families that have them on a regular basis.

Having read this I'm now surprised we never had them. I'm guessing they ended up on my grandparents' table whenever they could afford it.

Joey A wrote:

I don't believe we were served neckbones that had already been cooked in sauce. They had too much life in them.

Were they braised or slow roasted or what? I'm gonna take a crack at it at home.

I would guess the ones I had were braised then covered in sauce right before serving.

I had lunch at Danny's yesterday. I arrived just before the noon rush. It was my first visit. I discovered it searching the Rewards Network web site.

I selected the sub special which consisted of provolone, tomato, and fresh mozzarella. It came on ultra fresh Turnao's bread. It was quite tasty.

Interesting clientele. The service was pretty good considering the time of day. I'd definitely stop by when I'm in the neighborhood.

David Hammond wrote:Based on the neckbones alone (a Wednesday special), I’d go back to Danny’s, if I were to ever go to the same restaurant twice, which I almost never do.

Well I found out the hard way that you need to pay attention to all the details in these posts. Made a trip here last night and quickly discovered the neck bones are really only available on Wednesdays and Saturdays (actually neck bones with ribs on Saturdays). It was late and we ordered some pasta dishes which were good but not above Italian neighborhood joint good. Certainly an informal atmosphere and I hadn't had the pleasure of an accompanying airplane sized bottle of Sutter Home Cabernet, in quite a while.

I have a long-standing fascination with the idea/occurrence of foods or at least restaurants associated with certain days of the week. In Brazil, in Rio especially, Saturday's are dedicated to fejoda; in parts of Mexico, especially Acapulco and surrounding areas, Thursday is for pozole. Us Jews fill the calender with food holidays, including a weekly event called Shabbat with its attendant feedings; (it is also somewhat traditional to have a dairy meal on Thursday). Likewise, there are certain restaurants that just feel right on certain days. As good as the food is at Commander's Palace is (said from someone who has not eaten there in about 10 years), nothing compares to the package that is Sunday brunch. In this vein, I wholly endorse Danny's for the Saturday lunch.

OK, I wholly endorse Danny's about any day of the week. It's a real LTH kinda place, with it's combination of neighborhood character, house made foods and unique specials. Speaking of Commander's, I mentioned to my wife yesterday that Danny's very much reminded me of the kinda neighborhood places one would find in New Orleans. She agreed. (Of course we both agreed that such a place in NoLa would include a wide helping of fried seafood.) Still, I think Saturday lunch is the best way to enjoy this place. For one thing, you have some on their more interesting house specials, not just the neck bones with red sauce, but also spareribs with greens, a real reminder that ribs are not just for the grill. For another thing, this is a place best enjoyed with a bit of spare time. Given their small staff and dedication to each dish, it's the kinda place that an order of stuffed Melrose peppers is gonna come out at a lot different time than those neckbones. The cottage fries, made to order, come on their schedule too. There's cheap beer, cheap wine, the ice tea is surprisingly good (must be that New Orleans connection), a TV showing a football game, rather interesting conversation to eavesdrop (don't tell anyone I told you that). Portions are huge, the prices are low, over-order, eat too much, you have the rest of the weekend to sleep it off. It just feels right.

This is a winner any day. For Saturday lunch, give it extra points.

No need for words here...

Ugh. I hear that Danny's has now been featured on Check, Please! I guess I'll have to wait for my next visit to Chicago to be able to get in the door.

After hearing good reviews about the Breaded Steak Sandwich...



... My Bride and I stopped by last Wednesday for a sandwich dinner.

What a hidden Gem! Nestled away on Division St in Melrose Park I had hunted it out a few months ago and passed it by as it appears to be more of a Cafe instead of a Deli.



Stepping inside would confirm that they have taken the Deli more upscale and it is more of a true Cafe.



The BSS was very good! A big sandwich on ciabatta bread (not house-made) with a good sauce and nicely cooked red peppers.

My Bride had the 'Downtown' ...



... which is a breaded chicken sandwich with melted Gruyere cheese and beautiful slices of bacon. It is hands down one of the best sandwiches she has had all year. Once again served on the ciabatta.

They advertise that they are the 'Home of the Fried Meatball Sandwich' (including a massive half pounder) which is also a favorite of mine and I was able to resist the urge to order enough to feed four even though there were only two of us. There were many items on the menu board I also had an urge to try.



Another trip will be a must.

Even though it was the middle of the week the main room was almost filled to capacity (Check Please effect?) and they had opened up the party room to the west to accommodate additional diners.

Other notes...

I also had the Cream of Potato Soup. Very good. Perfect sized chunks of potato with plentiful small bits of ham.

The pictures here do not do the Neck Bone Dinner justice as while we were eating several were brought out to other diners. A large platter filled to the rim brought out with a flourish. A plastic bib/apron affixed to the wide eyed patron and always much hubbub from the rest of the table.

Well worthy of a Check Please episode (haven't seen it yet) and maybe a GNR?

I got to thinking about neckbones at Danny's and while looking through their website found that Danny's is coming north. They are planning to open sometime in mid to late January under the name Cuzzins at 1881 Oakton in Des Plaines. Based on some research, I found that Carl and Paula are fully involved so I am hoping Cuzzins will have the same quality and neighborly ambiance that Danny's has in Melrose Park. They should be open from 11am to 9pm Monday through Saturday.

I know that area, but cannot think of what might have been in that location.

I did a quick google search and 3 restaurants showed up with that same address in Des Plaines: Thai Viet, Cesar's Pizzia and Lam's. Have no idea which one of these was the most recent, but I am hoping that Cuzzins does well. I also hope that they bring the neck bone special with them, as this NW-sider would love to try them.

saluki68 wrote:They are planning to open sometime in mid to late January under the name Cuzzins at 1881 Oakton in Des Plaines.

This is excellent news!!! Only a hop, skip and a jump away from home for me. I'll report back as soon as it opens and I'm able to try it.

I hear that Friday is the day...

Just called Danny's and the word is they will open Cuzzins in Des Plaines Wednesday January 20th.

Last night the Oak Park Boys visited Danny's for our monthly get together. There were three of us there. We ordered 3 appetizers and 3 entrees and shared them all “family style”. Short summary of the food:

Apps:
Stuffed Artichoke – not good at all, fairly inedible. It was a large artichoke stuffed/buried/covered with an overabundance of what one diner called “very stove top stuffing like”. After a few attempts at eating it and a fruitless search for the heart we gave up on it.
Polenta w/marinara and crumbled sausage – above average. Polenta cake was what you would expect, sauce and sausage were very good, so much so that everyone kept going back to the plate for more.
Sausage w/grilled romaine – best of the 3. Tasty sausage accompanied by grilled romaine that was nicely wilted and dressed with garlic, lemon, olive oil.

Soups (included with dinner)
Escarole or Pasta Fagioli were the choices this evening. Both were very good.

Entrees:

Neck Bones – HUGE portion of neck bones. There were 6 or 7 on the plate smothered in a red sauce. They were tender and flavorful. Not necessarily something I would put on my “have to order” list, or go out of my way to make sure I am there for, but if you have a taste for Neck Bones, this is not a bad rendition.

Homemade Rigatoni Vodka Sauce w/crumbled sausage – The rigatoni was fresh and nicely cooked, it still had some tooth to it. The rigatoni were larger than what you would consider normal rigatoni, they approached manicotti size. They were well prepared. The sausage was the same as turned up in a few of the appetizers, very tasty. The Vodka sauce was not the favorite of the group. It was not bad, but maybe a little sweeter than desired. There are definitely better Vodka sauces elsewhere. Based on the fresh pasta and other ingriedients I could see some people loving this dish if the sauce is to your taste.

Pork Piedmonte (or something like that) – Breaded Pork cutlets covered in a mushroom gravy. Very good. Pork was well cooked and nicely breaded. Mushroom gravy was very flavorful. The dish was a winner

Overall impressions were that it was not a bad place. Nice family style establishment. Large portions and very reasonable prices. Service was friendly and attentive. Very limited selection of beers/wines. Basic menu is somewhat along the lines of a Jimmy’s Place, but the daily specials kick it up a notch. It is quite literally a “Neighborhood Place”. As you are driving in/out you realize that it sits right in the middle of all the houses, grade school, etc. Not on a commercial strip whatsoever.
I left pleasantly stuffed with a nice bag of leftovers for the next days lunch/dinner.

Thanks for doing that trob. Now I don't have to.

My review would be exactly as above. I came away reasonably happy. I would return next time with better ordering knowledge. I'm guessing Friday and Saturday has a little more "buzz." The place was cleared out by 8:45. I mean chairs up on the tables, we were the last ones there.

They have a tripe special that I would really be interested in on Thursdays I believe. I have to try that. I love tripe.

I think you guys liked it better than I. The pork was real good, I didn't like the pasta and thought the neck bones were more interesting than actually tasty. That said, I like tripe too. Keep me posted if you ever try it.

Next time I go I'm going to ask about BYOB. Either that or buy one of their bottles and do a little sleight of hand action. The wine options are inexplicably poor.

I make the neckbones at home. I don't have to worry about getting covered with red sauce in public. Valli foods and Caputo's has them on sale once in awhile and they are big and meaty.
As far as Danny's goes, I can take or leave the place. I've been here about 5 times. I find the service maybe too casual, and once it got busy the service got bad. It's not that big of a place for this to happen.
The wine choices are very limited and the house wine is on the nasty side. No anchovies in the house for my antipasta salad and the blue cheese I requested to be put on it was cheap stuff. The tomatoes were not ripe at all.
They do offer half orders of certain menu items if you ask. We had half order fried calamari. It was OK. The ravioli is very good and the sauce tasty. The pasta is always cooked to al dente, which is a good thing. Nothing worse then overcooked pasta at an Italian restaurant. Lunches sandwiches are tasty, although a bit pricey IMO.
This is a fun place to people watch-everyone knows everyone. Kind of gives you that warm fuzzy feeling.
I think they need to pay more attention to the kitchen and getting rid of the fruit flies. They were attacking my table and it was January.

At least last night the owner was watching over everything like a hawk. Had there been any problems, we could have addressed it directly with her. That's kind of nice I guess. Most of the time your best bet would be a manager who may or may not give a damn.

photo of above meal described by the trob

teatpuller wrote:photo of above meal described by the trob

Now, that looks like some 'old skool' grub.

=R=

teatpuller wrote:photo of above meal described by the trob

Image

No wander you liked the dinner better. From your seat it looks much better than it did from mine.

I got home late from work last night and threw the leftover neck bones in the microwave for dinner. I think they were better than the evening before.....or maybe I was just real hungry.

I will definitely try Danny's again, there are some other interesting things on the menu and/or specials I would like to try including the Bacala. I will not go as far as Pat Bruno and say I could eat there 4 times a week.

I've never been overly impressed with Danny's but we were nearby and decided to have an early dinner. Started out with pasta fagioli and escarlole soups, both are my favorites and I seriously was considering having soups for my dinner. The bread was stale so we asked for some fresh bread, which was stale as well. The escarole soup consisted of a large amount of beans and a few pieces of escarole. Someone forgot to put the pasta in the fagioli so it was basically all beans in a bright red soup. With both soups, the beans tasted and had the texture of coming directly out of the can and not being cooked in the soup broth to soften the beans and give it that slight thickness and bean flavor. We shared the soups and we both were beaned out.
It took awhile to get the waitress attention (during our entire visit) so we kept tossing food ideas around. The neckbones weren't ready which disappointed my partner. We eventually ordered cheese ravioli, meatballs and sausage. I asked if they could char the sausage but she said they grill it. I was looking forward to the sausage as I was expecting Danny's to offer some of the best. I was very surprised when the waitress presented a 6 inch piece of dried up sausage, with the diameter being slightly larger then a quarter. To top it off it was cold. Not warm, not grilled-cold. When the waitress finally returned to check on us, so much time had passed that the sausage would have been cold anyway. She offered another, we declined and watched her bring it to the owner, who was on the line at this time. Earlier the owner had come over to our table, took a good look at us, squeezed my shoulder and walked away without saying a word. She never came back to our table, even after the sausage incident. The meatballs were good, but the ravioli had much less filling then my last visit. Unfortunatly, something else has not changed, we spent the entire time waving off fruit flies and had to cover our wine glasses with napkins.