When it comes to restaurants, there’s currency in the new. We’re always in the hunt for the buzziest restaurant, the ones that look the most alluring on Instagram.
And yet, I find myself increasingly attracted to the restaurants that can pull off the classics. You just know a pan-seared whitefish with butter and capers will be a winner, every time.
On one stretch of Skokie Boulevard in Northbrook, two restaurants have combined 66 years between them (and neither of them are named Charlie Beinlich’s).
Judging from recent visits on a Friday night, Prairie Grass Cafe and Francesco’s Hole in the Wall seem to be as popular as ever.
Prairie Grass Cafe, opened in 2004, serves the type of modern American fare that feels like a Midwest version on San Francisco’s Zuni Cafe.
Chef and owner Sarah Stegner has two James Beard Awards, was formerly chef at The Ritz Carlton in downtown Chicago, and a former president of the Green City Market. She could’ve opened anywhere; she chose Northbrook.
There might be no dish more illustrative of Stegner’s cooking than its ever-popular crispy boneless half chicken. It comes with sauteed asparagus, a wild rice pilaf with pecans and grapes, and a rich pan sauce cooked down from the chicken drippings.
There’s nothing particularly flashy about this combination of ingredients. But it’s a dish cooked thousands of times, it is dialed in, and it’s hard to improve upon it. Elsewhere, you’ll find classic Caesar salad, that aforementioned pan-seared whitefish, and a bunless burger that Chicago magazine in 2009 named the area’s finest.
Just down the block from where Prairie Grass Cafe is located, at 610 Skokie Blvd., is Francesco’s Hole in the Wall at 254 Skokie Blvd.
Francesco’s Hole in the Wall has been around even longer — open since 1982. They don’t make restaurants like ’em anymore, and they certainly don’t make owners like Frank Gallo, a restaurant industry-lifer who’s an omnipresence in that cozy dining room.
There’s no menu at Francesco’s, only a whiteboard that’s updated according to what’s fresh. And Gallo’s interpretation of Italian cooking does not need updating to accommodate with the times. Veal ossobuco and chicken Vesuvio were pleasing crowds four decades ago, and they’re every bit as delicious today.
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