CheekyChicago

Fact: Rock clubs are not especially known for gourmet dining. Fact: Most rock clubs don’t even serve food at all. Fact: Bar food, albeit tasty, is generally laden with greasy fries, nachos, wings and burgers. Fiction: Bar food is comprised of local, seasonal and organic ingredients made from scratch daily. Well, my music and food lovers, Harmony Grill (the restaurant attached to the uber-awesome music venue, Schubas) is a place where fact and fiction collide: down-home, laid back bar food meets gourmet cuisine and delivers one outstanding dinner/lunch/brunch destination.

Harmony feels like your momma’s country kitchen. That is, if your momma was Joni Mitchell, not Julia Child. The space is warm in every way. Warm with its attitude (the staff is always smiling and even more patient), warm with its dim lighting (antique sea shell fixtures adorn the room) and warm with its decór (think big, cozy booths that seem to hug you as you sit and beautiful vintage art). And amazing music plays in the background – duh. There’s a Southern American flair to the menu, that unless you are a macrobiotic, it’s impossible not to love its offerings. Harmony is kind enough to have made the entire menu vegetarian-friendly, while still providing the meat and potato lovers a solid experience as well. (Besides, how many vegan rock stars do you know?) For the opening acts (aka: appetizers), they serve crab cakes with remoulade and crystal hot sauce, potato and cheese empanadas with corn relish and homemade chipotle hummus with fresh pita (my personal fave). Salads are plentiful and come topped with anything from skirt steak and pineapple to barbeque tofu and black beans to poached egg and sage croutons. Entrées include diablo shrimp, catfish tacos, braised short ribs and, (what pseudo-Southern restaurant would be complete without it?) fried chicken. However, the (rock) star of the menu has to be the Honey Chicken Brie sandwich with grilled chicken, honey glaze, brie cheese, green apples, smoked pecans on tomato focaccia. Can I get some applause please? They even have four, yes four, different variations of macaroni and cheese. Where’s my encore? Desserts include chocolate bread pudding with Maker’s Mark caramel sauce and streusel-topped apple pie. With an amazing list of crafted draft beer and a rather refined wine list, you may not only be rethinking the essence of “bar food” altogether, but start re-considering your career as an office dweller and dream of stealing the spotlight behind a guitar, just so you could eat here all the time. Or maybe that’s just me.

Fiction: I am a great singer. Fact: If I had to sing for my supper, I would teach my toned-deaf ass how to wail for this kind of food. Fact: At Harmony Grill, you are going to eat well. Very well, indeed. Let the standing ovation ensue.