Giant - Jason Vincent - Logan Square

Giant is open, Jason Vincent is cooking again and all is right with the world . . .


Giant - 3209 W Armitage Ave


Little Biscuit | jalapeno butter


Fried Uni Shooters | cucumber, soy


Sweet And Spicy Peppers | bread & butter


Bread & Butter (served w/ Sweet And Spicy Peppers)


Jonah Crab Salad | waffle fries


Broccoli | meyer lemon, yogurt, sunflower seeds


Onion Rings | parmesan


Pici, with chew | jalapeno, bacon


Cal/Med Sea Bass | tomato, cucumber, olive


Pecan Smoked Baby Back Ribs | bbq and baked beans


Fresh And Fried Garbanzo Beans | hummus, albacore tuna


House Made Pita | with Garbanzos


Garlic Buttermilk Potatoes | Fore Street style

Yay!

=R=

Giant
3209 W Armitage Ave
Chicago, IL 60647
(773) 252-0997

ronnie_suburban wrote:Giant is open, Jason Vincent is cooking again and all is right with the world . . .


Giant - 3209 W Armitage Ave


Little Biscuit | jalapeno butter


Fried Uni Shooters | cucumber, soy


Sweet And Spicy Peppers | bread & butter


Bread & Butter (served w/ Sweet And Spicy Peppers)


Jonah Crab Salad | waffle fries


Broccoli | meyer lemon, yogurt, sunflower seeds


Onion Rings | parmesan


Pici, with chew | jalapeno, bacon


Cal/Med Sea Bass | tomato, cucumber, olive


Pecan Smoked Baby Back Ribs | bbq and baked beans


Fresh And Fried Garbanzo Beans | hummus, albacore tuna


House Made Pita | with Garbanzos


Garlic Buttermilk Potatoes | Fore Street style

Yay!

=R=

Giant
3209 W Armitage Ave
Chicago, IL 60647
(773) 252-0997

You had me at fried uni shooters!!!

I was there on opening night. Truly had a wonderful time.

Had an excellent meal at Giant this weekend... enjoyed the Jonah Crab Salad, Sea Bass, Onion Rings, BBQ Ribs, and Bavette Steak. Was hard to choose among so many things that sounded good, so I imagine we'll get back there soon -- especially since it's in the neighborhood.

Since this is so close and so packed, it's with mixed emotions that I chime in on what a wonderful place Vincent seems to be running, even this early on. A simple cocktail program to start out, a mishmash of ordering (somewhat close to Ronnie's photos, though fewer dishes) left to the server to pace out as she and the kitchen saw fit. Excellent pacing, no rush, but no lull either. Very interesting wine list and well priced, though a bit bare at the lower end (strangely our wine had the price tag still on it and the markup was only double).

All the vegetables were distinct, well textured, balanced but particularly the peppers and the eggplant (this may be new to the menu and has a sweet and sour feel that fully soaks through the eggplant and is served with things that looked like the "pita" in earlier photos, but felt more like thicker blini). Somehow they managed to maintain the essence of the vegetable but also cast them against an unusual flavor backdrop. These are dishes I will likely mis-recreate at home.

I've seen some reviews that mention the closeness of the tables. We didn't find this to be a problem in terms of hearing each other and not overhearing everyone else. It took us 5 tries to get reservations (same day) but we're last minute types, so that's on us. Prices are reasonable, but that makes you want to order everything, so...

whocanitbenow wrote:I've seen some reviews that mention the closeness of the tables. We didn't find this to be a problem in terms of hearing each other and not overhearing everyone else. It took us 5 tries to get reservations (same day) but we're last minute types, so that's on us. Prices are reasonable, but that makes you want to order everything, so...

The tables are indeed close together but that aspect of Giant reminded me of some of my favorite places in Paris, so it didn't bother me one bit. It's in a great tradition.

Prices were ridiculously low. No idea if they'll hold there forever but if memory serves, when we visited the priciest large dishes were $18, which is a steal.

=R=

I'll add to the praise for Giant. The first thing you notice is that this is an eclectic and whimsical menu. You have Asian influence (uni shooters), farm to table stuff (peppers and bread) and comfort food (biscuits and onion rings). The common trait of all the food was big, bold flavors. The dishes tended towards the rich side, but the portions were modest, so you could try a lot of dishes. Service was excellent and, as noted, above, they do a great job of pacing the meal. They filled the table with several dishes, and then there was a nice pause before the remaining dishes came. I also agree that the pricing is quite modest.

Like virtually all new restaurants, the place was too loud for me. It wasn't awful, and it wouldn't prevent me from returning, but it mystifies me why people like that. Also, our table for 5 was fine, but if I had gone just with my wife, the tables for two looked too close for my liking. Maybe this do this in Paris, but I like some privacy when I'm dining as a couple.

These are minor quibbles, however. This a great new addition to the dining scene.

We tried this over the weekend based on glowing praise and a good meal at Nightwood back in the day. It was very good for this class of restaurant which often disappoints us. I agree that everything is very rich, unnecessarily so IMO, such that it somewhat mutes the flavor.

Here is what we had:

Uni Shooters: My wife wanted these, but I was unconvinced. I think our opinion fell on my side. We just didn't get it. It was a fried ball of fat with no discernible uni flavor. State fair food and probably the weakest point of the night.

Marinated Zucchini: Really tasty dish with a bit of sourness and great textures from the addition of pumpkin seed. A whole lot of (admittedly delicious) cheese though.

Sweet and Sour Eggplant: This was an extremely flavorful dish, really too strong by itself. Thus the side of "pita bread." However, I found the pita bread terrible, so much so that I complained about it (which I very rarely do) and they brought me some sourdough which worked pretty well. The pita bread has some nice crisping on one side around the edges, but was soggy in the middle from too much butter. The texture was kind of gummy and it was tasteless. The eggplant itself was phenomenal, however, and the crunchy toppings added that little extra to turn it into my favorite thing of the night.

Tomato Sortallini: This was a good but not great dish. This one was in an over the top rich sauce. In fact it broke a little bit and you could see oil gliding on the surface. The pasta had great texture and the dish had just a hint of guanciale flavor (the wife wanted more). However, the cheesy fattiness of the sauce muted the already weak tomato flavor.

Swordfish: We don't typically order this kind of dish (piece of fish with accouterments), but put pickles on something and we are there. Everything paired well here, the well seasoned and cooked fish with the fat of the aoli braced against the pickled vegetables. Once again, however, unnecessary fat was added here as the entire thing was sitting in a garnishing puddle of oil.

Just to be clear, I am not a health prude, especially when eating out. But I actually think the excessive richness detracted from the food. To me fat is typically not tasty in itself, but merely as a way to intensify and transmit other flavors.

botd wrote:Uni Shooters: My wife wanted these, but I was unconvinced. I think our opinion fell on my side. We just didn't get it. It was a fried ball of fat with no discernible uni flavor. State fair food and probably the weakest point of the night.

Completely agree. Just very rich, but not much else. I wasn't impressed and thought the butter really drowned out everything else. That being said, my friend loved it, and it seemed like everyone around us loved it too.

Besides that, I enjoyed the broccoli and loved the Pici, with chew.

botd wrote:We tried this over the weekend based on glowing praise and a good meal at Nightwood back in the day. It was very good for this class of restaurant which often disappoints us. I agree that everything is very rich, unnecessarily so IMO, such that it somewhat mutes the flavor.

This was my biggest critique of Nightwood and why I never visited a second time. The menu here really doesn't read that way, though, so I appreciate the reports here. Guessing I just don't dig Chef Vincent's style.

I used to love Nightwood and look forward to Giant, but it really blows my mind that there are virtually no open reservations available at a reasonable hour for a 4 top between now and like weeks and weeks from now, weekdays and weekends alike. It's almost all 5:30 or 10pm. I mean, good for them, but I'll have to set myself a reminder to check back in 6 months or so.

Vitesse98 wrote:I used to love Nightwood and look forward to Giant, but it really blows my mind that there are virtually no open reservations available at a reasonable hour for a 4 top between now and like weeks and weeks from now, weekdays and weekends alike. It's almost all 5:30 or 10pm. I mean, good for them, but I'll have to set myself a reminder to check back in 6 months or so.

Are you using opentable? Might want to try calling, "hot" restaurants often block out or restrict their prime time tables for online reservations.

I actually did call first, and after I came up (for all practical purposes) empty, she told me the Giant website/reservation system (not Open Table, but like that) is just as accurate as calling - no blocks or restrictions, just first come, first served. She suggested checking back occasionally for last minute cancellations, but I don't really have any interest in playing whack-a-mole so will just happily wait it out!

so disappointed at my meal at giant. i havent been so excited about a restaurant in awhile. we had uni schooter, crab sald, eggplant, broccoli, pici, smorgasbord dessert. each dish left something to be desired .. the uni was not great. tasted like uni cut with lots of cream... crab salad was good but nothing special. also served with only 4 fries. broccoli had good components on the dish but the broccoli itself was bland and undercooked. eggplant was really tasty. puffed wild rice on the dish was underfried resulting in hard pieces that threatened my teeth. pici was ok but almost too acidic. ps it is spicy! i love spicy food so it wasnt a problem but i can see howsome would not enjoy this. finally the dessert was again below average.
overall a decent meal but with expectations so high and so many misses its tough to not feel underwhelmed

gocubs88 wrote:overall a decent meal but with expectations so high and so many misses its tough to not feel underwhelmed

On my third visit this was my feeling as well. It won't deter me from trying again, but there appeared to be a clear dropoff in both service and food (save the eggplant which is a great dish, I liked the earlier incarnation of the peppers a lot). As an aside, I still think the wine list, while interesting, is overpriced or rather doesn't provide all that much for the customer that just wants a good bottle of table wine. I think overall what they're doing with vegetables is more interesting than what they're doing with meat. A lot of industry folks I've talked to say the kitchen is really still coming together and the concept isn't solidified. I've had one really great meal here and two declining ones. You can't get in anyway, so what's the point!

Haven't seen much about Giant lately so I figured I'd chime in. Had my first visit last Saturday at a 5:00 seating for 4. Early but actually a great time because we could settle in and dine somewhat leisurely.

We ordered the uni shooters, biscuits, scallops, brussels sprouts, mashed potatoes, twice-cooked pork, eggplant, sortallini, sword fish, cajeta ice cream, and s'moregasboard. We were stuffed.

We enjoyed the meal and thought service was friendly and ticked along at a decent pace. The highlights were the scallops, eggplant, sortallini, and cajeta ice cream. Boyfriend and I thought the sword fish in a lemongrass and coconut milk broth with crisped cubes of rice was fine but a little flat, needing more brightness or acidity or something, even though it was accompanied with a slice of lime and sliced jalapenos. Everything else was good. Rich but not cloyingly heavy. Great for a winter meal.

We had dinner at Giant last night. We liked it a lot! Chef Vincent clearly prefers big, bold flavors, and so do we.

I looked at some of the photos above and thought to myself that the portion sizes look smaller in Ronnie's photos than actual. Then I looked at my own photos and realized that the problem is the way the dishes are plated. There were six baby back ribs and 6-7 nice sized onion rings, but you would never know it from the photos, his OR mine. Just to confirm this, I'll share all my photos even though some of them duplicate his.

Exterior


Interior


The restaurant is named after a children's book by Shel Silverstein, a portion of which is on the wall:


As noted above, the seating is indeed cramped, with tables just inches apart, and requiring moving them so diners could squeeze past to the banquette. The noise level is very loud - not ear-splitting like Publican or Avec, but loud enough to make it occasionally difficult to hear each other right across the table.

We ordered all the dishes at once, and asked our server to bring them in whatever order made sense. This is the order in which they were served. Comments appear directly below the photo to which they apply.

JONAH CRAB SALAD
waffle fries


We both liked this dish. The accompanying sauce was not quite ketchup and not quite cocktail sauce, somewhere between the two.

A LITTLE BISCUIT
jalapeño butter


This was great.

thai chili
SWEET CORN
tiny shrimp and peanuts


This was terrific, one of our two favorite dishes of the meal. A great blending of flavors, colors, and textures.

cold dumplings with
GREEN BEANS
pork, shrimp, and peanut


One of us liked this, the other thought it was just okay.

saffron
TAGLIATELLE
king crab and chili butter


This was also terrific, the other of our two favorite dishes of the meal.

Sourdough bread


This was nothing special, served at room temperature, with a soft crust, no accompanying butter, sauce, or oil.

pecan smoked
BABY BACK RIBS
bbq and baked beans


These were excellent, nicely spicy and not at all fatty.

ONION RINGS
chili salt and parmesan


These were very good indeed, although we thought they would be even better without the grated parmesan on top.

horchata pudding
RASPBERRIES IN SYRUP
‘nilla wafers


This was nothing special. The individual components were meh and they didn't improve in their usage in the dish.

Most of the dishes were excellent, and we really liked it a lot. There are two areas where they could make significant improvements.

First, the desserts were only so-so. (We only tried one, but the other two - cajeta ice cream, and babka - didn't sound compelling enough to try.) In Vettel's review, Vincent admitted to not being a pastry chef. He said they got help from Scott Green of Travelle (a really terrific restaurant that doesn't get as much press as it deserves) and from Mindy Segal. They still need more help in this area.

Second, Giant needs to pay more attention to offering a well-curated wine and beer list that would truly complement the fabulous food. There were very few wines available by the glass, and those that were, were uninspired choices. Considering the amazing craft beers produced in Illinois, Michigan, Colorado, Canada and even Indiana, surely they could do better than offer a ho-hum low-alcohol beer from Wisconsin and a couple of obscure beers from Oklahoma. The table next to me asked for an IPA and they had none. (Note, there are some beer choices shown on the website list that were not available last night.)

In posts above there was some speculation whether prices would be increasing. Here is their current menu, so you can decide for yourself:


All in all, this was an excellent dinner, with way more standout dishes than the couple of misses. We were very happy and would gladly return in the future.

We dined at Giant last night, and after reading a couple of the reviews above, went with some trepidation. Happily, our fears were unfounded as we enjoyed a lovely meal.

Big flavor was the theme, and nearly everything was on point. I was going to skip the Uni Shooter, but the woman at the table next to us had just enjoyed hers and was having a bit of a "When Harry Met Sally Diner Scene" moment, so how could I pass that up? The shooters were excellent if not, perhaps, poorly named since the uni component of the flavor is more complementary than primary. Great stuff! We did the biscuit, eggplant, piri piri pork and the crab taglitelle and brussel sprouts, one better than the next. Mystifyingly, we then had onion rings for desert (don't ask), perhaps not the best closer.

Only downside to this place that I can see is the very limited wines by the glass list. We started with cocktails, and didn't want a full bottle, and would have liked a bit more of a selection. That said, we did enjoy a nice Pinot.

Can't believe it took us so long to get here, and definitely will put it in the rotation!

Anniversary evening with the bride. Drink Scofflaw, dinner Giant, ice cream bar Pretty Cool Ice Cream. 6-years in and Scofflaw remains one of the best places in Chicagoland for hospitality, ambiance and a quality cocktail.

Bride and I both loved Giant, hard not to go into hyperbole overdrive, Uni Shooter and lemony punchy perfect pasta King crab and chili butter tagliatelle were two standouts, suffice to say Giant deserves the many accolades its received.

Pretty Cool Ice Cream was more than pretty cool it was Very cool.

Heck of an evening as befits a 30-year celebration.



Giant Chicago, Count me a Fan!

We ever going to get back to talking about the food at Giant? Our recent anniversary dinner was fantastic! Uni Shooter all that and a bag o chips*, King crab w/ chili butter tagliatelle masterful point - counterpoint of richness balanced with bracing fresh lemon acidity.

Giant, Count me a Fan!

*picture upthread

LTH,

We split the Glad-wrap discussion off into its own thread in Other Culinary Chat:

Giant - Jason Vincent & the Glad-Wrap event

Thanks,

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for the Moderators

The Acclaimed Team Behind Giant To Open a Bucktown Bar With Chinese-American Food

https://chicago.eater.com/2019/1/31/182 ... e-american

Had a stellar meal at Giant earlier this week. I'd been kind of avoiding a return because it can be such a tough table (Yogi Berra's old line certainly comes to mind). But with conducive weather, the back patio opens up ~50% more seating. And if you combine that with a willingness to eat a bit on the early side, getting a table is not a problem. We made a reservation for a 6 pm, Wednesday night 2-top just a couple of days in advance . . .


chef’s special pork and shrimp egg roll
This item was an aptly-named teaser for Chef's Special, the Giant team's upcoming, new place and it was quite tasty. It was served with a cute little tube of hot, Chinese-style mustard. At first, I thought the pool under the egg roll was another condiment but it wasn't.


spicy sweet corn with thai chili and peanut
Nice combination of flavors and textures here that accentuated the crispy-sweet kernels nicely.


marinated zucchini with pumpkin seeds and cilantro
Possibly my favorite dish of the meal. I don't even know what the rich sauce (or some of the other) components were but they were delicious. And the zucchini was cooked perfectly -- slightly soft but with just the right amount of bite left in it.


harissa lamb artichokes and date yogurt
I made a bunch of mini, one-bite wraps, happily working my way through this plate and the delectable piece of grilled pita.


pici with jalapeño and bacon
I love this pasta. So much so, that in spite of the fact that several other great-looking pastas appear on the menu (a total of 5, iirc), I couldn't resist ordering this one again. It was great, as usual . . . satisfyingly chewy, dotted with tender lardons, slightly spicy and smothered in richness.


wild trout with garlic, tomato, bacon, and peas
This was another winning dish. The sauces (one of them pesto-like), the tomatoes, the peas and the moist, crispy-skinned fish all combined into an irresistible composition.


gooey butter blueberry microwave cake buttermilk ice cream
I'm not much of a sweets person but this dessert blew me away. Again, amazing individual components -- blueberries, ice cream, tender cake, crispy business -- came together in a way that made it impossible to stop snarfing this down.

Giant's menu is pretty consistent year-round but the small, seasonal tweaks they make to it are thoughtful, well-executed and, as a diner, really fun to experience. This was a great meal from end to end.

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I know not to look at LTH before lunch. Those great photos make my sad lunch look pitiful.

What was under the egg roll if it wasn't a condiment?

The GP wrote:What was under the egg roll if it wasn't a condiment?

I think it was excess oil. The egg roll was delicious and crispy on the outside but maybe not drained or patted dry optimally?

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Looks great

I, too, love that pici.

I had a great follow-up meal a month or so ago as well. We actually walked in on July 3rd during prime time. The patio absolutely has made it a bit easier to get in.

The food was outstanding, but I didn't document it well. I will say that even simple sounding dishes had a lot more going on and were very enjoyable. So far, I feel like I can order with a blindfold and do very well. And that's about as good as a compliment as I can pay to a place.