When I'm in Chicago I rarely eat on Michigan Ave. It's kind of like going to NYC and saying that you're going to eat in Times Square - it's the most touristy part of the city. But we were meeting up with an old work colleague who recommend this place for dinner plus the fact that it was within walking distance of our hotel made it an easy decision to give it a try. If I hadn't known about this place before hand, I would have never found it. There's no signage on the outside of the place and it's on the 2nd floor of a weird Men's Warehouse store but on the other side of it. Very bizarre.
When we walked into the restaurant, it kind of reeked of of American chain restaurant (which I later found out it is). It just had this boring, non-descript dark decor that didn't really wow me. It was surprisingly very busy but we were able to get a reservation for 6 people at 7pm on a Thursday night, so they clearly weren't that busy. We were seated in large circular table in the back corner, which was actually nice so that we could have our privacy without a lot of other tables nearby.
The menu is American with a mix of other random items like Tune Poke, Enchilada, and a lamb sandwich. While the waitress was quick to take our drink order, we had to flag her down a few times to take our appetizer order which was kind of annoying. We started with the spinach and artichoke dip ($13) and french fries ($5) to start. They were perfectly fine dishes, nothing really to write home about. The artichoke dip tasted like something you could make at home and the fries were the thinner less crispy version. For my main entree I ordered the lamb sandwich ($18) which coincidentally also came with fries as well. The rest of the table ordered the famous rotisserie chicken ($23) and one other person got the chicken and rib combo ($27). The lamb sandwich was served with roasted red peppers and arugula on soft bread and served with a au jus-like dipping sauce - which I thought was a bit weird because I've never really seen lamb sandwiches served with dipping sauces before. The first bite was pretty good - good flavor profiles and the meat was very thinly sliced and tender. But after a few bites the sandwich fell apart with the roasted peppers just kind of sliding out and the au jus making it difficult to hold everything in. I ended up just taking the bread off and eating the slices of lamb instead - so much for a sandwich! Since I had fries before, I didn't really go nuts on the ones on my plate. While the sandwich itself was fine, I didn't really feel like I was eating in fine dining establishment - it was just underwhelming for a restaurant on Michigan Ave. I would have preferred it with a cucumber yogurt or taziki sauce similar to how it's made in Greek restaurants just to give it a bit more authentic flavoring to it. To be honest, I felt like my meal was more like a good lunch time option and it's my fault for ordering a sandwich at dinner when there clearly were other options to choose from. I didn't try the chicken but everyone at the table said that it was delicious and very juicy - and judging by the looks of it, I believed them.
We all left some room for dessert and this is where it went a bit down hill from here. We waited forever to get our waitress' attention again but when we did we ordered the banana cream pie ($8) and the house made Oreo ice cream sandwich ($8). When they set the desserts down, they looked amazing! But the waitress didn't give us any plates, so we had to sit there and stare at them painfully when we waited another 15 mins to flag her down for some plates. Comparing this service to the fantastic one we had the night before we like night and day. It really made me realize how important spot on service can be. Luckily these desserts were really the stars of the night - especially the Oreo ice cream sandwich - it was kind of like an ice box cake with Oreos but in sandwich form. It was a delicious sugar overload. The banana cream pie was also quite sweet and pleasing on the palate. They definitely saved this review from going below 3 forks.
Overall, it was a fine experience for dinner although the service really could have been stepped up a notch. It was nice that they could accommodate so many of us at the last minute, but given all the other really fantastic restaurants in Chicago, I'm not sure if this would be on my repeat list. Total bill: Unknown - I didn't get a chance to see the bill
Photo Credit: Yelp
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