Few probably look at Restaurant Week like a marathon. But once you’re in the throes of it, you feel an urge to push your limits and see where you might end up. A late start and closing in on the final days, this year’s RW has already been a roaring success.
With the goal of pushing the fruit closer to ground with enticingly attractive pricing, RW’s a formula that reaps bigger dividends for the diner every January/February. 2019 turned into a personal challenge and one with a very low difficulty threshold. Find two repeatable restaurants not yet visited and check in to see how two familiar spots with name recognition do RW. The untested vs the tried and true.
Venues were based on Restaurant Week menus as posted on choosechicago.com who were prompt in relaying that RW would be extended five days to Feb. 12. Imagination, variety and a mindful expression of the restaurant’s identity were some of the things we looked to find in the menus created for the now 19 days making up Restaurant Week.
First up, Upstairs at the Gwen. Delightful space and wonderful to walk into from the raw cold of an early February afternoon. Sleek, bright and so open it seemed serenely majestic. Glorious. And as quiet as church at dawn. The cold probably had a lot to do with it. There are two seating areas. The more casual dining area fronting the bar and a more formal space to the right. At 12:30pm, there was only one other occupied table. If Restaurant Week is intended to lure guests from comfort and contend with the elements for a memorable meal, it wasn’t working that Friday.
In this case, defying the elements was more than worth it. Sticking to the RW formula, the $24 lunch is broken up into three parts; appetizer, main entrée and dessert. Dinner is $48 with a few more options in each category, generally. The uniqueness of the menu stood out early. Celery root soup, creative takes on salad, a muffaletta, tortellini, prime rib, pecan (pie) tart with brown butter ice cream all made seductive overtures to the palette’s ear. But it’s sometimes good to check in with the waitstaff to see if you’re headed in the right direction. Here, they were more than willing to weigh in with recommendations. Even better, they were in total concurrence in their choices.
The lightness of chef (Matt) Jensen’s touch caught us off guard. The celery root soup with its sliver of pickled apple and decorative whisk of bright green chive oil was almost Asian in its flavor make up. Slightly sour, very soft and even approaching delicate, it was a curious and tasty beginning. And an adventurous prelude to the main dish, the prime rib sandwich with brie and pickled onions.
Taking something that’s usually intentionally intimidating, Upstairs at the Gwen made it into version that was just as filling but much more inviting. Stacking the meat between two thin slices of toasted bread, and adding arugula and brie to boost the flavor components, the sandwich was wonderfully tender and delectable. Deceptively diminutive, just half was more than enough to please the average appetite.
Because a pecan tart with brown butter ice cream sound so perfect for a summer day in August, their presence on the menu immediately conjured up the feeling of hot afternoons and steamy nights on a day that was flinty cold. A single scoop of creamy ice cream sat on a circle of sweet decadence. Dense and concentrated the tart was a dream you didn’t want to end.
Just three days later the same kind of dessert magic struck again; this time on Grand just west of the Dearborn Post Office at Tanta Chicago. As one of the few authentically Peruvian restaurant’s in town skewed to fine dining, the menu not only looked interesting but it came highly recommended from a recent émigré.
If Upstairs at the Gwen is space age light, Tanta is embracingly dark; brightened with a wall of colorful graphics on one side and a long welcoming bar on the other. At 1 in the afternoon, the restaurant was a hive of movement and conversations as wait staff zoomed from table to table and diners chatted over their meals.
Famous for the many influences reflected in Peruvian cuisine, with healthy doses of Chinese and Italian included, how much of that diversity might be found on the RW menu was a point of curiosity. Some of the options were no brainer choices. The ceviche didn’t warrant even a moment’s hesitation. Using salmon rather than a milder fish as its core, a bolder flavor was being introduced from the start. With a few scattered peanuts and crispy wontons adding texture and green onions supplying a bit of brightness, it was a departure from many ceviche interpretations. But the ingredient that tied everything so beautifully together was the leche de tigre (milk of the tiger) marinade. The name comes from its appearance. Even though it contains no dairy, it has the look of watery milk. The color comes from blending lime and clam juice with cilantro, habanero peppers, garlic and red onions. And the taste is delightful. Made fresh at the restaurant every day and a sensational aspect of their ceviche, it acted as the perfect harbinger of what was to follow.
China showed up in the main course, arroz norteno. Stir fried shrimp, calamari and octopus with kabocha squash and criolla with dabs of a sauce made up of lime and mayonnaise. The dish may have been a little sparse on the sea food but it definitely delivered some remarkably comforting delicious flavors that were sometimes familiar and sometimes quite new. More of a revelation than anything else, it was a splendid introduction to Peruvian food and made us look forward to coming back to explore the restaurant’s standard menu. Especially since the dessert proved just as interesting. The purple corn cheesecake with small chunks of pineapple and a rice pudding foam (cheesecake de chicha morada) made you slow you pace and savor every swipe of the fork.
Service was a little off. Clearing plates from tables didn’t seem to be a high priority. But the waiter eventually became more solicitous and in the end a very willing and useful resource.
Upstairs at the Gwen
521 N. Rush St.
Chicago, IL 60611
312-645-1500
Tanta Chicago
118 W. Grand
Chicago, IL 60654
312-222-9700
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