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Emil's Bar & Grill
Rating Details »
Category: Restaurants [Edit]
Neighborhood: The Loop101 N Wacker Dr Lbby 1
Chicago, IL 60606
(312) 332-4333
- Nearest Transit:
-
Washington/Wells (Orange, Brown, Purple Express, Pink)
Clinton (Pink, Green)
Clark/Lake (Pink, Brown, Green, Blue, Purple Express, Orange)
- Hours:
Mon-Fri. 6:30 a.m. - 8:00 p.m.
Sat. 4:00 p.m. - 8:00 p.m.
- Price Range:
-
$$$
- Accepts Credit Cards:
- Yes
- Attire:
- Casual
- Good for Groups:
- Yes
- Good for Kids:
- No
- Takes Reservations:
- Yes
- Delivery:
- No
- Take-out:
- Yes
- Waiter Service:
- Yes
- Wheelchair Accessible:
- Yes
- Outdoor Seating:
- Yes
19 reviews for Emil's Bar & Grill
Literally just walked out of this place, plus my mom and friends are still there, since I had to go back to work. Ok, enough about me, this is about the restaurant.
I enjoyed my first experience here and but first I mean I plan on going back if my wallet will permit. It is a tad expensive for me personally but when you got someone paying the bill, very nice.
The staff was nice, but on the web it said that they open at 4:00 on Saturdays, but really when I called to get a reservation for 4:oo the lady on the phone said they don't start serving until 4:30, would have been nice if the web info was correct. But not a big deal.
Our waiter was very nice and attentive, the food was tasty, atleast mine was, yum Horseradish encrusted Filet (even though I could not taste the horseradish, and my filet was medium rare not medium well, but it was delicious never the less). The rest of my party had pleasant experiences as well, the little Zucchini's were cute and tasty. Apparantly the Lobster Ravioli was the best, but seeing as I cannot eat seafood, I do not know, but the other 3 people loved it. Same thing with the shrimp bisque. The end.
I enjoyed my lunch, and the environs. High cielings, zero noise, good service and a really good Ceasar Salad.
I'm not sure I get all the sniping in many of the other Yelp reviews. You get what you pay for. If you want louder, cheaper, and dirtier, that's no problem. It costs roughly the same amount of money to eat lunch here at quiet Emil's as it does to eat lunch at the loud and chaotic Lou Mitchell's.
I had lunch with an old law pal - a former opponent, actually. It was a pleasure to have a nice place to chat without the underhums of noise that many places offer.
Emil's is your typical business lunch spot located in the Loop. You walk in and see suits everywhere. People look grateful to be out of the office, but technically they're still "working". Not a beer in sight (during lunch, that is). There is a bar for anyone looking for a place to drink after work.
I've been here more than a handful of times, usually when the other restaurants around the area are closed for the day. The food is nothing spectacular, the usual salads (chicken caeser salad, cobb), sandwiches (reuben, tuna), entrees (strip steak, seared salmon), and pastas (primavera, tortellini). There are daily specials, as well.
I usually get the steak sandwich on garlic bread or the chicken salad sandwich on a croissant. Prices are a bit high, but that shouldn't be a surprise for anyone who works downtown. It's a decent place for those looking for a non-fast food/greasy diner restaurant in the Loop.
extremely meh. rude on the phone. high horses. owner is rude. berated his staff over the phone.
one star for nice chairs. the ones inside. not the cheap plastic green ones you find on my deck even though this is the loop.
I was a frequent customer while working in the building next door for two years. Emil's prime season is certainly summer. Their very large outdoor seating was always my preference for a Friday afternoon lunch on a warm summer day. During the colder months, we made friends with the bar tender and frequented for after work drinks or quick lunches. They always did well by us, remembering that we were frequent customers.
The customers are all staunchy suits but I didn't mind. It is understandable for the area and I probably wasn't dressed much different. I am not sure how this place would fare on a weekend. This area of the loop tends to roll up its sidewalks by 7pm on weekdays.
The food was decent. Being that most of my meals there were lunches, I took particular interest in their chicken caesar salad. The greens were always fresh and the chicken hot. The bar was generous with the liquor portions, even more so if you made nice with the tender.
I went there for a breakfast meeting recently.
So keeping in mind that it was a meeting & that there were quite a few people in attendance, I'm going to refrain from commenting about how I was the second to order (eggs over-medium, potatoes, English muffin) but the second to last to get my order (just moments before the meeting was scheduled to end). There. See how I did that? By refraining to comment, I actually commented?
I'm such a sneak.
Anyways, the English muffin was cold cold cold. I'm sure it had been warm at one time as it was tinged with toasty-browness, but since it sat on a big tray behind me for about half an hour, by the time it got to me it was cold again.
The potatoes were good. Seasoned, which was nice since there was no ketchup available & I didn't feel comfortable smacking a large glop of ketchup on my plate during the meeting (i wish there'd've been ketchup!!!).
The eggs, which, as you may remember, I ordered over-medium, were barely even over-easy. Runny as all get out, but tasty anyways ... even though whenever I eat runny eggs I get ... how do I say this politely? ... well ... runny.
::pausing to decide if i will keep that part in the review::
So it was pretty good. Nothing extraordinary, but what can I expect at a breakfast meeting, right? So ... three stars is average & three stars is what I will give it.
Emil's is one of those places that I'll happily go to ... as long as my company is paying for my meal. The entire vibe of the restaurant is decidedly "unsexy", which is not necessarily a bad thing when you're having lunch with your coworkers on a Wednesday. Plus, as another Yelper also mentioned, the noise level is conversation friendly, which seems like a rarity these days in the Loop
The food at Emil's won't blow you away but it's decent enough. I ordered the Pasta Palermo (fettucine with spinach, prosciutto and pine nuts in an alfredo sauce) and found the pasta to be nicely al dente and rather tasty. Prices are a bit on the high side but this is the kind of place that probably gets the majority of its business from folks eating on the company's/client's tab. I probably won't be going back again any time soon but I would have no reservations recommending the place to others either.
As usual, the Yelp reviews are spot-on. Actually, the two-star description of "Meh. I've experienced better." pretty well captures Emil's. The food was okay, the space was nice (especially the large outdoor patio) and the prices were a tad high for what you get. I had the chef's salad and made the mistake of ordering it with grilled shrimp, which was fishy and barely edible. My lunch companion (a co-worker, naturally) ordered the mushroom ravioli, which she claimed to enjoy. Bottom line is this is a decent place to take a co-worker or client for lunch, but the food is merely decent and I wouldn't return to eat here on my own dime. I'd recommend Kinzie Chophouse for someone looking for a business lunch spot in the area - the food and service are significantly better there.
I really don't think this place is as bad as folks make it out to be. That said, I've only ever been here for lunch, so I can't really vouch for happy hour or dinner or any of that.
A vendor has bought lunch for a few of us at work here twice and both times I had a perfectly pleasant experience. It's not mind-blowingly awesome, but certainly tasty and the service was fine both times. The other advantage it has over some of the other financial district eateries is that it's not as LOUD during lunch. Lloyds, by comparison, is so loud you have to yell to make yourself heard to whomever you're eating with.
Perfectly satisfactory.
I gotta tell you, I've never been destined for the corporate world and its funny little nuances really do amuse me to no end.
For instance - the corporate lunch. Rather formulaic, wouldn't you say? Decent food but remarkably forgettable. Generic decor as the corporate types tend to skeeve from anything remotely modern, artistic or trendy. Overpriced.
That's Emil's.
I recently had a company happy hour here. There were a lot of Big Dogs from the company in town, so we needed a nicer place to go. Let me just say I will never be going back here and will continue to frequent Sidebar for my post-work cocktails.
The appetizers they had were mediocre at best. The crabcakes were about 95 parts fried bread, 5 parts crab meat. I thought I was going to have an instantaneous heart attack after eating one of those things.
The service was terrible. I only had 2 beers in over two hours, not because I wasn't trying to drink...because that's how often the waitress came.
There's a ton of great happy hour places in the loop, so no need to go to this place to meet up with friends for post-work drinks.
If you're going to have lunch on the company dime, might as well go to some place expensive! My entire work team had $15 salmon which was pretty good and a nice big portion. Since it was lunch, it was pretty busy and the waitress rushed us to get our orders from us. It was an average experience, and it's not somewhere I would choose to go on my own.
So I decided to have dinner with a coworker on a Thursday night when an opera happened to be playing. We walked up and down Wacker trying to find a restaurant without a reservation. Finally we came to Emil's and I was surprised it wasn't more crowded. We were able to sit in the bar, which was misleading because there were a handful of tables and booths in the 'bar' section. The service was very good and the specials that night were all appetizing. I settled on a shrimp and asparagus risotto (if you read my reviews you will notice my love of risotto) :) My coworker had lamb. Both meals were very tasty and the presentation was beautiful. We had a great bottle of Cabernet and a simple, delicate piece of cheesecake. Overall a good meal.
Emil's is convenienlty located in the loop and has a spacious outdoor seating area. The expansive menu includes fresh salads, sandwichs, stirfrys, pastas, and larger entrees. Our salads, soup and pasta selections were ok, but nothing special. Good place to stop in the summer for an afterwork cocktail, but for lunch I would look elsewhere.
Honestly, I agree with the overall vibe of the reviewers. Decent place, nothing special, too expensive, good for business lunches. The food is ok, the atmosphere leaves a lot to be desired, and the noise level is good. Service is fine, nothing special or memorable about anything here. I take clients here often, but would be happy to find a new spot.
my boss took me here for lunch and i thought it was good. not OHMYGODBESTEVER. but nice.
don't know if i'd go again, but if somone else was paying...
I've only eaten at the restaurant itself a few times, however, they have a takeout area for breakfast and lunch that I frequent! Today I got Chili Cheese Nachos for lunch and they were yummy! The soups are typically very good, not as rich as some, or as spiced as some, but agreeable nonetheless. I'm quite into their prepared salad bar with Chicken Caesar, Spinach & Chicken, Egg, Pasta, etc... every day. It's not very expensive and it's relatively quick. I really love it for lunch!
I had lunch here today with my coworkers. One of the guys got engaged over the weekend so we decided to go eat lunch together at a nice restaurant to celebrate. I don't remember how we made up our decision to come here? Food was C- quality with much higher prices than other upscale restaurants. I had risotto with shrimp. It wasn't all that, they are trying too hard to make the presentation and ambience looking swanky but food quality could be much better. I brought back bunch of little cracker sticks with me because that was the only thing that was tasteful. I would definitely go back here for only cracker sticks. I kind of wished now we should have gone to somewhere else.
Emil's has a greasy spoon annex that I call Slime (reverse the letters). The only reason I eat there is it's in the building I work at, and sometimes have to due to time restrictions. The food is bland, sometimes mediocre, sometimes terrible.
