Chicago Restaurant Recommendations

Friend,

My most fervent prayer for you as you embark on this trip to the dark wood. I fear, like many who have been tested in similar fashion, you will find the coming year fraught with pain, suffering, and cold the likes of which you could not imagine. When you are suffering from a dreich early June day with a high of 52, you will wonder, Why? A cool summer day might not sound bad after a summer in New Orleans, but wait until you've spent 100 of the previous 150 days with highs below freezing. Sure you may have six or seven weeks of nice weather, but don't forget about the other 45.

The food does not promise to be much better. Sure, Alinea is fun for the experience. The food is good, but you're really paying for the experience, and once you've done it once, there is no real reason to do it again. Grace, which closed a few years ago, had better food than Alinea, but it never received near the acclaim.

Girl and Goat is vastly overrated. If you like that style, the Purple Pig is much better. For pizza, Piece is one of the only decent pizza places. Bebu, near Alinea, also makes a decent pie. Of course, neither Bebu nor Piece serves the abomination known as deep dish. If you must try that type, Pequod's is the best. Pequod's is really a pan pizza, though, but most there consider it a deep dish. For the tavern style cracker crust, the Nick and Vito's by Midway isn't terrible, but I would not make a special trip. Domino's thin crust is better.

Avoid Chinatown for dining. Those restaurants are terrible. If you want good Chinese food, try Sun Wah, who serves one of the best Peking ducks in America. They're from New York, which explains the anomaly. Imperial Lamian is also an excellent Chinese restaurant, and again, not in Chinatown.

As a general rule, avoid the Lettuce Entertain You restaurant, a local chain that has varied restaurants, all of the most average quality. They seem to be quite popular with the 20-40 crowd. Locals rave about RPM Steak, Joe's, and RPM Italian. Avoid, unless you want chain quality at 5 star price.

Former Shaya chef, Zach Engel, opened his Galit restaurant, which my second cousin who lives in Lake Forest tells me is the best Middle Eastern restaurant in the area. I tried a few places on Foster and Diversey, none of which were memorable. I have not tried Galit, but my second cousin has good taste, so I trust her.

As for Indian food, locals rave about the great selection on Devon. Again, not impressive in quality, though, there are lots of Indian restaurants there.

Italian food is surprisingly lacking. La Scarola used to be my favorite, but the last two meals there were below par. I hate that they serve cold, never toasted Italian rolls. The appetizers there are always better than entrees. If you go, I recommend the zucchini and calamari apps. Tufano's is decent. To be fair, there is not a single Italian restaurant in all of Chicagoland half as good as Impastato's. You will see.

As mentioned above, Portillo's has the best Italian beef sandwich in town. It is the standard, and is a very good sandwich, though, of them it is easy to tire. Always get it dipped with peppers. I prefer the sweet ones, but spicy is good too. Hot dogs are disgusting, and even when Hot Doug's was open, the so-called best in Chicago, they were stomach wrenchingly bad.

Chicago is known for its steaks, but none is as good as Metairie's Ruth's Chris, and Chicago's Ruth's Chris is actually bad. Gibson, Chicago Chop House, and Gene & Georgetti's are the most well known, but the best steakhouse is GT Prime.

I never found a good Japanese restaurant in Chicago. There were plenty of average ones. Osaka was always enjoyable, reasonable, and had excellent smoothies. But this was more of a takeout sushi joint. I tried a few higher end places, with no good results.

There are a good number of Korean restaurants, but none as good as the ones in Duluth. None stood out, although the grocery store, Joong Boo, was exceptional.

Like Chinatown, the neighborhood with the highest concentration of Mexican restaurants is surprisingly lacking. The best tacos I found were at Birrieria Zaragoza. If downtown, Frontera gets all the headlines, but I never was able to make it there. I would like to hear your thoughts if you go.

Perhaps I will remember some more and make some Top 10 lists for your thraldom. You will find this year a captivity from which you yearn for liberation. Please take courage and do not lose heart.

Yours,
TulaneLSU

P.S. As you say you will be moving just outside Chicago, I will take the liberty of assuming you are moving to Gary, Indiana. While there is not much good food in Gary, Captain's House might win the oddest decent restaurant in the region.

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Auchaval

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Just note the first couple seats at the bar are open game, first come. Just see if they are open and sit.

The burger is good, but the rest of the menu is better.

Mexican food is severely underrated in Chicago.

Best Greek food I've ever had was also there, and it was on at some food truck outside of a museum.

Deep dish is overrated, more of a tourist deal anyway, IMO (don't @ me) but the regular hand tossed/thin crust is where its at, Flo & Santos was my favorite.

There's a pile of places to get a quality steak, haven't spent enough time there to know the best.

Portillo’s is an institution. The Italian beef with mixed peppers and extra gravy is a treat.

Lou Malnati’s serves a very good deep dish AND thin crust pizza.

Search out one of each these near you.

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Chicago Pizza Oven Grinder Company, get the pizza pot pie

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Great spot and very unique. Great Italian restaurant next door also called Riccardo Trattoria.

Best pizza in city IMO is Pizano's thin crust. It's not really thin but it's also not a 2" thick vat of tomato sauce like deep dish.

Au Cheval

Greek Islands

. I meant Lou, but thought Gus.

So many good places in Chicago.

2 or 3 good German restaurants on North Lincoln and West Irving Park (Resi's Bierstube and Laschet's Inn). Sausage and Schnitzel - Makes you want to go take over Austria.

Great Mideastern food at Reza's N.Clark and Berwin (North of Wrigley Field. Also 3 other Reza's locations in town.

Cafe Vienna N. Clark and W. Deming Austrian food and pastry.

Harry Cary's Sports Bar on Navy Pier.

Portillo's all over town. Best Italian Beef Sandwich in the world, plus other good sandwiches.

Athena Greek Restaurant Halstead Street in Greek Town

Gale Street Inn - Old Rib Joint on Gale Street

I could probably tell you 50 more that you would like.

Highly recommend Maple & Ash for an amazing steakhouse experience with a really cool atmosphere.

Enjoy your trip!