| rev:text
| - 55 Chicago sucked. I just don't understand taking such a great location and such a beautiful bar/restaurant and patio space and turning it into an overpriced, poorly serviced shitshow.
The Local is not 55 Chicago. I mean sure, the inside just looks like they painted over a few of the things in there, and the decor totally doesn't match their sports bar vibe, but there are plenty of TVs so that's nice, and there's a good beer selection.
I feel like there's a disconnect between the menu and the actual food. The B.L.A.T. mentions heirloom tomatoes, crispy bacon and avocado. The wimpy and mealy tomato that came with it wasn't even present enough to notice if it was heirloom or not. The 3 little wisps of avocado that came with it were kind of embarrassing. The bacon that came with it was solid, and there was a decent enough amount I guess, though the bread was barely toasted. A BLT on sourdough kinda needs that toasting of the bread, so this felt kinda underwhelming. Plus the BLT at Meridiem has me spoiled. That thing is loaded and amazing AND CHEAPER. That's the biggest problem - this mediocre BLAT is $12. It's two slices of bread and a quarter of an avocado and 3 strips of bacon, why the hell is it $12? And for a $12 pricey sandwich with fancy heirloom tomatoes and herb mayo, to come served in a plastic basket seems kinda funny. I don't mind, I mean I'm not fancy by any means, but this makes it seem like the food is high-end and then it gets schlepped to you in a cafeteria basket.
Still, it wasn't bad. The green chile brat also wasn't too bad - the brat itself from Von Hanson's is good, but the cactus pickle relish A) made the entire thing kind of slimy...which is not great, and B) The entire thing was covered in it, like I could barely find my actual brat because it was smothered in cactus pickle relish. Slow down with that shit, good lord.
The happy hour prices were decent enough, the food is overpriced, the regular beer prices are kinda bad, but the building is still in a great location and luckily the staff doesn't seem snotty and exclusionary like the 55 Chicago staff was - those guys almost seemed like they were instructed to be dicks. I don't know if this is a new staff or the same staff but they're not wieners like they used to be.
This is an improvement on 55 Chicago. It's not perfect. The prices could be better, the decor could be warmer, the food could be executed better, but here's hoping it ends up improving and sticking around.
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