Brunch in North Shore: Walker Brothers Pancake House

Cuisine: American/ Brunch
Location: 153 Green Bay Rd., Wilmette, IL
Price: $$
Food: ****
Service: ****
Overall: ****
 
There’s something just so comforting about brunch – it starts with basic staples, like French toast or pancakes if you’ve got a sweet tooth, or eggs and potatoes if you’re more of a savory type. Add in proteins like bacon and sausage, throw in a slice of toast, some OJ and coffee (or Bloody Marys and Mimosas, if you’re in the drinking mood), and you’ve got a meal that is almost impossible to mess up. It’s so easy to you can whip up all of the basics in your own kitchen, yet the communal nature of fighting off a killer hangover to drown the poor decisions of last night in greasy food like syrup on a stack of pancakes never fails to bring people out for the tried and true tradition of Sunday brunch.

In the immediate Northwestern area alone, both Clark’s and Le Peep serve brunch food within walking distance of campus – yet that doesn’t stop hordes of college kids and Evanston residents alike from flocking to Walker Brothers Pancake House on Sunday morning.

Fine-dining in a college town; French-American in Evanston: Oceanique

Cuisine: French-American, Seafood

Location: 505 Main Street, Evanston, IL

Price: $$$

Food: ****

Service: 3.5*

Overall: ****
Website: http://www.oceanique.com/

Evanston, for some reason, is home to a litany of fine dining destinations – from the now defunct Trio¹ to the trio of chefs behind Camapgnola², there is no shortage of places to eat, and eat well, when in Evanston. Of course, this hasn’t stopped students from slogging through four years of college at lovely Northwestern subsisting entirely on Rodeo Cheeseburgers and that banana pepper that comes with your weekly Friday 1 am order of Papa John’s large pizza³.

Of course, the budget of your average college student makes it difficult to eat out and eat well on a constant basis. That hasn’t stopped restaurants from making a name for themselves in Evanston, as locations where Evanston locals can get out and have a nice meal or for students to splurge every now and then.

Two of my favorite restaurants in Evanston to date have been Bistro Bordeaux, a traditional French place right off of Church St. that offers amazing French Onion Soup to go with delectable classic entrees⁴,  and Davis Street Fishmarket, which has been serving up fresh seafood of all shapes and forms to doting parents hoping to take their kids out for a nice meal for years now.

Which brings me to my newest find of Evanston – Oceanique, a French-American/ Seafood restaurant down on Main St., a combination of Davis Street Fish Market and Bistro Bordeaux that manages to outdo both by the virtue of being extremely attentive to detail in their dishes and by being creative and inventive with their menu.

Burgers in Lincoln Park: The Counter

Cuisine: American/ Burgers

Location: 666 W Diversey Parkway, Chicago, IL

Price: $ - $$

Food: 3.5*

Service: ****

Overall: 3.5*

Website: http://www.thecounterburger.com

Excluding my lunchtime sandwich mainstays on Noyes St. in Evanston, The Counter marks my first time going out to eat since returning to Chicago from my trip home to Taiwan. The future roommates-to-be and I go apartment hunting in Lincoln Park and Lakeview on Sunday, where we come to meet a very… peculiar leasing agent¹, but unfortunately fail to find the place of our dreams. As the only one of our trio who is neither working nor studying (read: doing absolutely nothing) at the time, I volunteer to go back out on Monday to continue our apartment search.

By the end of my appointment on Monday, it’s 2 p.m. and I’m exhausted, having not eaten lunch yet. So I decide to venture around Lincoln Park and find somewhere to eat alone.

It’s not long before I run into The Counter – a place that draws me in with its open space and pristine interior². A burger bar that is casual enough that I don’t feel weird eating alone, but the place certainly looks nicer than a Chipotle³.