There’s something about getting seated in Siberia for no logical reason that really allows you to let down your guard. That’s what happened one evening at Remington’s, the new Michigan Avenue “American grill” from the 4 Star Restaurant Group (Dunlays, Frasca, Smoke Daddy, etc) and the Chicago homecoming of the immensely talented chef Todd Stein, who spent the last year and a half working in Atlanta. With barely a quarter of the restaurant’s 250 seats occupied, my pal and I were escorted to a booth hidden behind a private dining room, just above the stairs leading to the restrooms. It was so remote and peaceful nobody noticed that we ate the entire meal in the comfort of our foundation garments.
The scope of Remington’s menu seems designed, quite logically, to appeal to undiscriminating appetites, the same sort of demographic that once made the erstwhile Bennigan’s down the block a popular place to rest your barking dogs after a long day at Navy Pier. And even in an upgraded milieu where neighbors such as Seven Lions, Acanto, the Gage, and the Cherry Circle Room have significantly stepped up the game without frightening away unadventurous eaters, Remington’s is trafficking in familiar (mostly) American classics like wedge salads, burgers, crab cakes, rotisserie chicken, and barbecue ribs, the latter of the much-maligned fall-off–the-bone meat Jell-O variety that taste as if the kitchen were afraid of violating the no-smoking ordinance (hello, Smoke Daddy). Similarly, on one evening a half rotisserie chicken arrived with its skin sloughing off of wan white flesh that tasted more boiled than roasted.
20 N. Michigan 312-782-6000remingtonschicago.com
