Finally, these hipsters have somewhere else to hang out.
There’s been much talk about the name of Jason Hammel and Amalea Tshilds’s new restaurant in Pilsen, Nightwood. But I care less about a Djuna Barnes novel that I read in college than I do about a wood-grilled cheeseburger, so enough about the name—here’s last night’s menu, after the jump with prices in dollars. Two notes first: (1) Like the superseasonal farm dinners at Lula, Nightwood’s menu will change almost every day, so don’t get too attached. And (2): A word to folks who like to hit these places early: The restaurant got its liquor license today, so bye-bye BYOB.
Appetizers
Mixed lettuces with radish and croutons, dressed with olive oil and vinegar 8
Spinach and parmesan salad with cucumber, hard-cooked egg, and aged balsamic 10
Chicken liver pate with potato chips 10
Marinated beets with aged Sardinian goats cheese, pesto, and pinenuts 6
Beef carpaccio with sorrel, aioli, and ash-roasted beets 12
Deep-fried Mississippi prawns with bacon-sardine vinaigrette 13
Handcut pasta with morels and stewed beef 10
Green garlic and cream soup 8
Entrees
Wood-grilled cheeseburger with fries and a dill pickle 13
Spit-roasted half chicken with a bread, mustard, and white bean salad 20
Wood-grilled trout with lentils, ham hock, and cream 19
Roast beef sandwich with blue cheese, slaw, and fries 12
Vegetable and white bean Panini on brioche with a soft poached farm egg 12
Suckling pig and morel ravioli with spinach and green olives 20
Desserts
Strawberry sorbet with macerated berries 2.50 per scoop
Almond tart with creme caramel ice cream 8
pretzles and chocolate 7
The decor is sleek and trendy; the staff friendly and accommodating and the morel garlic soup at 10+. After that, I found the menu that day uninspired. An expensive hamburger arrived luke warm, the corned beef and pate sandwich, while tasty can be had at a good deli and be twice as good. The bread pudding also fell short of our expectations. While I didn’t drink wine, my friends did and said that for $9, it was a very small pour although the wines themselves were quite good. Its brand new and its menu will change and the chic and young will love the place. But the quality of the food does not live up to is parent restaurant thus far.
I went the other night and was very disappointed. The food just didn’t live up to the price and snotty attitude. You’ld think they were curing cancer. Nothing innovative really. Just trying to do what every other American Contemporary Chicago Resturant is doing. But not as good.
Thank U Time Out for moderating nasty and libelous posts. My friends restaurant in a city other than Chicago was a success from day one. Jealous businesses and their friends damaged his biz by constantly posting hatefilled and insane reviews.. I watched him get out of the biz after 25 years because of the emotional toll the cyber bullying took as these irresponsible sites took his career away. A very large following was left behind and angry about it.THIS IS SERUIOUS stuff slamming a business for reasons of biz jealousy or whatever other menatl illnessmThe new war fronteir for small restaurants is City Search, Yelp, Urbanspoon and others. by people who have NO CLUE the Dedication, intense labor and care of staff it takes.
He was just signed by a big bublisher so the cookbook out soon.
Avoid opening a restaurant on the west coast or Portland, OR. Esp.