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| - Awesome. Actually, half of the owner team is Guatemalan. They also own Milo's in bufu, Urbana but as Escobar is the chef, Escobar's is his place.
I always have a good time with their wine staff, especially the lovely salty gal that has only been tending a short while but swigs wine like a sailor, which is to say she doesn't take a dainty white-glove approach. She's a no-nonsense, straight-up pro that can take in a mouthful of wine and nail the flavor notes without all the swirling and sniffing and sloshing. It's the only time I've been able to say, "this one tastes like a chewy, sweaty S&M jock strap" and have someone know exactly what I mean without further explanation. And despite the fact that she's a beer girl, her vino recommendations (granted the list is not as extensive as other places downtown) are excellent.
I've done a few different things on the menu but I always go back to their duck a l'orange. The meat is always cooked to succulent perfection and maybe it's because everything on the plate is a shade of orange but the entire dish tastes juicy, earthy, bright and warm. Like 6pm sunshine! Like it's made from Care Bears! I want to liquify it, put it in an IV and jack the whole tasty lot right into my veins!
The mussels are excellent as well and my friend scarfed the ceviche on our last visit (I had my face in the mussels - so much for sharing).
The bread is baked in house and they have a bombin' spicy corn focaccia so it's easy to load up on table bread guilt-free because you can't nosh on Escobar bread anywhere else but Escobar's.
Most importantly I like this place because the food is so good and the staff is so nice that it doesn't need all the flash and glam of other restaurants to earn five stars on yelp! The closest comparison I have is the cluster of restaurants out in Napa: sun-drenched, family-owned, friendly and in an epic love affair with food. Outdoor seating means gazing into a parking lot as cars zoom by but it is still the only place in Champaign where I am a little saddened at the end of my meal because I don't have four stomachs, four wads of cash and four hours to sit and eat four more servings of Escobar's duck a l'orange.
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