Re: Loop eateries now gone.
Posted by:
caribiner23
(---.pools.spcsdns.net)
Date: October 26, 2012 02:48PM
Some of my favorites from the late-80s/early 90s when I was first working in the Chicago Board of Trade Building:
- Yee Wall: Chinese place next door to the Chicago Board of Trade on the Wabash side. We used to go there for the Chef's Special, which was a pile of fried rice, an egg roll, a chicken tender, and a piece of shrimp. And it was always $5.13. They closed when they knocked down the building to expand the CBOT. I learned many years later that they moved and became ABC Chinese on Jackson and Wacker, and I used to walk by there all the time not knowing it was the same people. By the time I learned this, they were gone.
- Cafe Chicago (I think that was its name): this was a cafeteria downstairs in the Sears Tower. We used to call it "The Hungry Heifer" (after the place where Norm on "Cheers" used to eat) because they seemed to have every kind of food and it was ridiculously cheap.
- The Savoy: located in the basement of the Chicago Board Options Exchange. A Lettuce Entertain You-owned cafeteria, it was pretty good although more expensive than other options. I remember they had an awesome Caesar Salad.
- I can't remember the name, but there used to be a cafeteria in the Civic Opera Building, at least as late as the mid 1990s. I remember it was really old-school but the deli sandwiches were awesome. I went looking for it in the early 2000s but it seemed to be gone.
- Faber's: these were all over downtown, and I used to go to the one in 2 N Riverside (after getting off the train at Ogilvie) and the one in the Insurance Exchange (175 W Jackson). My favorite sandwich was the Hungry Hunter, a roast beef sandwich with au jus.
- The Dill Pickle: a great little deli on, I think, Wabash.
- Pago Pago: another chain of Chinese places. As I remember it now, it seems to be right out of "Mad Men" -- lots of dark red decor and tiki drinks. It would probably be very hip now. We used to go to the one on Jackson just west of Wells.
Wow-- I can't believe I recalled all those. :)
Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 10/26/2012 02:49PM by caribiner23.