Bye-Bye Body Sushi Set to open in three weeks, Ai Sushi Lounge (358 W. Ontario St.; 312-335-9888) is the third brain child of Agnes Yoshikawa and Eugene Chua, the brother-and-sister team who own Tsuki (1441 W. Fullerton Ave.; 773-883-8722) and Ringo (2507 N. Lincoln Ave.; 773-248-5788). Since Toyoji Hemmi, Tsuki’s sushi whiz, will now split … Read more
We put eight Margherita pizzas head-to-head, and crowned one the champ.
A new River North nightspot caters to a well-heeled crowd
… you can actually snag a seat outside
Right before a restaurant opens, they usually throw a party for the media. Since our dining editors review eating establishments anonymously, they never show at these parties (waiting, instead, to dine there shortly after the opening so they won’t be “outed”). But sometimes they get curious, and when they do, they send someone like me.
I was jazzed. Earlier this week, I was asked to check out Table Fifty-Two, the debut restaurant from Oprah Winfrey’s chef and prolific cookbook author Art Smith…
Q & A with Jose Garces
Chef Jose Garces is coming to Chicago. Who’s that? A James Beard–nominee you probably never heard of. After all, we don’t pay a bunch of attention to the Mid-Atlantic category. Maybe we should. Garces is a 35-year-old Chicago-born Kendall grad who owns two highly acclaimed restaurants in Philadelphia: Amada, an Andalusian tapas bar, and Tinto, a Basque-inspired wine bar. And he’s about to launch Chilango, a high-energy Mexican spot in Philly. That’s nice. But, even nicer, Garces plans to open Mercat early next year in the renovated Blackstone Hotel at 600 South Michigan Avenue. We had a few questions for the prodigal son…
The Early Returns EditionWith a spate of openings all around town, Dish couldn’t resist taking the pulse of the newcomers. We tried everything from Turkish pizza to Mexican parillada-with decidedly mixed results. (In general, we give a place a bit of time to get up and running before visiting for the purpose of a review, … Read more
Haute mex, relaxing lounge, new dining, budget beat
Relax: It’s just a bar, not a sign of the neighborhood going down the drain. That’s the underlying sentiment behind the little lounge that could, once called Pharmacy, now called Relax Lounge (1450 W. Chicago Ave.). After seven months of waiting for its liquor license, the rock ’n’ roll-inspired West Town lounge will open to the public next Tuesday, July 17th.
The delay, owners say, was due in part to neighborhood residents petitioning against the bar, fearing the addition of a dingy dive to the ’hood. But Relax is in keeping with the burgeoning area’s other cleaned-up hipster hangs, Five Star and Sonotheque, both of which draw a slick, grown-up crowd and help drive business into the area. After inviting residents to a series of open houses and generally making nice (not to mention sitting through two hearings with the liquor commission), co-owners David Lehtman and Brian Eldridge received word on July 3rd that their license had come through. “I had a sense of relief, excitement, and victory,” Lehtman says…
Park Place “Tavern at the Park (130 E. Randolph St.; 312-552-0070) is not a gastropub,” says chef John Hogan; “it’s a mainstream American tavern.” The 300-seater overlooking Millennium Park, scheduled to open in early August, is the brainchild of Hogan and his partners at Keefer’s (20 W. Kinzie St.; 312-467-9525), Glenn and Richard Keefer and … Read more
