Chicago Diner

Pizza Puffs

We went to dinner at the Chicago Diner.  The Chicago Diner is a vegan restaurant.  We heard about it on a show from the Cooking Channel about Unique sweets. That show was focused on the desserts and shakes but we tried out the other food as well.  Once again, we seem to like Karyn's (a raw and vegan restaurant)a little better.

For savory items we had:
Pizza puffs - empanada-esque items

Burger

Karma burger - sweet potato-tofu patty, grilled pineapple, sprouts, onion,

Gyro - sliced seitan, onion, tomato, lettuce

These items were good for what they were - non-meat items, but we still would prefer the real thing of these dishes.

Dessert items:
Mint Chocolate Chip Shake- very good, you can tell it is not really ice cream but it is delicious

Caramel Crunch Torte - almond cake with vanilla cookie crunch filling, chocolate ganache coating, caramel sauce

Gyro

The desserts were very good and you wouldn't be able to tell (even with the milkshake) that they were vegan. We would go again just for the desserts but it is quite a distance from us so that probably won't be happening.

Final thoughts on The Chicago Diner:
Food - it didn't feel like you were eating vegan; but it wasn't quite the same as the meat filled options for the savory dishes.  The desserts could stand on their own though.

Service - there were only a few people in the restaurant at the time we went so service was pretty quick.

Mint Chocolate Chip Shake

Atmosphere - good size space.  We couldn't get too much of a feel for the atmosphere because there weren't that many people there.

Caramel Crunch Torte

Roy's

Appetizer Trio

We went to dinner at Roy's Hawaiian Fusion restaurant in Chicago.  We have been to Roy's restaurants before in Las Vegas and Hawaii but not this Chicago location. We were there to have their Restaurant week menu.

We have enjoyed eating at Roy's in the past and wanted to see what they would do for restaurant week.  Overall the food was good, but we had such a bad service experience that overall we were quite disappointed.

Course 1 - appetizer trio of pork & shrimp gyoza, Szechwan pork rib, vegetable spring roll.  Small bites to be able to try everything.

Lobster Dim Sum

Course 2 - Maine lobster dim sum - with lobster cream sauce.  The lobster sauce was great. We enjoyed this dish and wish there had been more of it.

Course 3 Macadamia crusted mahi mahi - with red potatoes, asparagus and lobster cream sauce or braised beef short ribs - with yukon mash and broccolini.  Both options were good.  The same lobster sauce for the dim sum was with the mahi mahi so that was great.

Course 4 Dessert - either strawberry lemongrass creme brulee or chocolate spice cake.  The creme brulee was good and we should have ordered 2 of those as the chocolate spice cake tasted more like fruit cake than anything else so it wasn't that good.

Mahi Mahi

As for our service experience.  We got to the restaurant right at our reservation time.  But they didn't seat us because they said there weren't any available seats.  But there was an entire section of tables that didn't have anyone at them so that was weird.  We waited about 20 minutes and they told us that it would be longer but we would want to sit in the empty section.  We said that was fine but maybe we should have waited longer because the service we experienced was very slow between each course and that may have been because we we in the no man's land section and they may have forgotten about us.  It just felt like we were there forever when we could have been done in half the time.

Short Rib

Final thoughts on Roy's
Food - good food but misleading on the chocolate spice cake.  Overall doesn't compare to Roy's in Hawaii.

Service - see above.  We were definitely disappointed with the service and it definitely tainted the whole experience.

Atmosphere - nice overall feel.  Bar upfront and main dining area in the back.  There is an open view to the kitchen.

Creme Brulee

Farmhouse Tavern

Fried Cheese Curds

We went to dinner for Restaurant Week at Farmhouse Tavern in Chicago.  We had seen this restaurant featured on Check Please of couple of months ago and decided to go when we saw they were participating in Restaurant Week. They offered a 3 course $33 dinner.

1st course
Fried Cheese Curds with house made catsup and spicy sauce.  These were amazing.  I guess you have to like cheese.

Winter Salad

Winter Salad with endive, bibb lettuce, cranberries, pistachio, mint, white balsamic.  So this salad offset whatever guilt we were feeling about the cheese curds.  It was light and refreshing and tasted great. Definitely one of the better salads we have had recently.

2nd course
Braised Short Ribs with celery root, puffed wild rice and wheat berries.  We enjoyed the short ribs themselves and the whole dish had a lot of flavor.  What we didn't like was that the short rib was presented still attached to the bone.  It was extremely difficult to get the meat off the bone and would have been so much easier to eat if the kitchen had just done that part for us. It probably was part of the presentation to have it arranged this way but was quite challenging.

Pork Loin

Grilled Pork Loin - with cabbage, mushrooms, bacon and peanuts.  So this dish was a lot spicier than we would have ever imagined as there was no indication of this on the menu. The flavors of the pork with the veggies and especially the peanuts was neat. We didn't like the bacon that was part of the meal as it tasted like all fat to us.  Fortunately it was arranged as 2 larger chunks that we could easily avoid eating without mixing with anything else.

Chocolate Budino pudding with toffee and ice cream - the pudding was good and it went down easily as we were starting to get full.

Rice Pudding - milk jam, pistachio and cherry brittle. Very sweet and a little more liquidy than other rice pudding, probably due to the milk jam.

Chocolate Budino

Final thoughts on Farmhouse Tavern:
Food - we didn't know what to expect from the food, but we enjoyed most everything.

Service - pretty good service, but nothing special

Atmosphere - the interior of the restaurant is a bit cramped.  There are 2 levels but both levels have large bar areas so the actual restaurant seating is tight.  We were at a very small table and felt a bit crowded when others were seated at a table next to us.

Rice Pudding

Lawry's

We went to Lawry's for dinner during Restaurant Week and man did it deliver.

Spinning Salad

Natalie had been to the Lawry's location in Las Vegas for lunch and it didn't even come close to comparing to the food, service and ambiance here.

Lawry's is located in the River North area of Chicago about 1 block away from Michigan Avenue. It is housed in an old mansion that has fantastic decor inside.

The wait staff is all dressed up for a different era and the prime rib is cut to order by a carving cart that is brought to your table.

Prime Rib dinner with potatoes, yorkshire pudding & lobster tail

The restaurant week deal was fantastic - salad, prime rib, lobster tail, mashed potatoes, Yorkshire pudding and dessert for $44 per person

Salad - they call it a spinning bowl salad because of the way it is presented and served to you. The salad consists of Romaine and Iceberg lettuce, baby spinach, hard boiled eggs, beets and croutons. It has a house made dressing that kind of tastes like Thousand island and they put it together table side by spinning the salad in a bowl while the dressing is drizzled on top of it to coat everything. It wasn't the best salad ever but they do try to ratchet up the flair.

Prime Rib - nice cut of meat, not the most tender we've every had but certainly quite flavorful. Once again the presentation wins out on this because a carver comes to your table with a massive cart where he cuts the piece to order and he doles out the mashed potatoes as well. The Restaurant Week menu included the smaller cut of meat which was quite a big size to begin with but Nick opted for the Lawry cut - a little larger and probably the traditional size cut of prime rib served there.

Carving Cart

Yorkshire Pudding - popover type of bread that is used to mop of the juices and gravy. It is served at your table in a skillet.

Lobster tail - so this is the something extra that puts this deal over the top. It was not a super large lobster tail but it tasted great. With this being put onto the restaurant week menu it went from being a small deal to quite a nice dinner deal.

Dessert - choice of sticky toffee pudding or bundt cake.  We probably should have both ordered the toffee pudding but we wanted to try one of each. They were both quite sweet and we barely had enough room to eat them at all.

Final thoughts on Lawry's.
Food - we loved the food and definitely want to return.  This is a special occasion type of place.

Service - the service is amazing. They definitely have all the bases covered here with the presentation both of the salad and the prime rib.

Sticky Toffee Pudding

Atmosphere - The setting is very neat being in an old mansion. It is quite fancy and different than most other restaurants we had been to.  We would consider this a special occasion restaurant but there seemed to be a lot of business diners there as well.

Bundt Cake