Leyla a wrote:I find the food & the cocktails to be wonderful in this gold coast spot. Am I the only one? I feel like people who have "dissed" it have not given it an honest try.
jdymeats wrote:Leyla,
No you are not the only one. I normally stay clear of that part of the city, but we decided to act like tourists one day. We ended up there for a bite at the end of the evening because everywhere else was packed. We were the only ones in there and I have no idea why? How could Stefani's be packed and this place empty? It was great food with a great bartender. Life in the Viagra triangle I guess.
Daniel wrote:cocktail genius Tom Lacey?
headcase wrote:I only ever go in there for drinks (I am friendly with all of the bartenders), there is a time between 930 - 1030 or so where I wouldn't bother showing up because it is packed, the rest of the time it is pretty slow. It's pretty strange.
krm61965 wrote:i could live on bacon "squared". the rest of the food was great, but i couldn't live on it.
happy_stomach wrote:headcase wrote:I only ever go in there for drinks (I am friendly with all of the bartenders), there is a time between 930 - 1030 or so where I wouldn't bother showing up because it is packed, the rest of the time it is pretty slow. It's pretty strange.
We arrived maybe at around 10:30, and I was shocked that the place was more than half empty. It was Friday night, and the weather wasn't particularly bad--very strange, indeed (though good for us, I think).
happy_stomach wrote:Finally, I think I realized from our visit on Saturday that The Drawing Room never gets nightclub crowded, like I think I've been imagining that it does. We arrived at around 11:30, stayed until almost 2, which presumably is a peak weekend time. All of the seats at the bar remained occupied as did all of the tables while we were there, but the space never felt anything but relaxed and with very moderate noise level. There's a lot of distance between tables, so I was barely aware of other parties there. I like this.
Khaopaat wrote:happy_stomach wrote:Finally, I think I realized from our visit on Saturday that The Drawing Room never gets nightclub crowded, like I think I've been imagining that it does. We arrived at around 11:30, stayed until almost 2, which presumably is a peak weekend time. All of the seats at the bar remained occupied as did all of the tables while we were there, but the space never felt anything but relaxed and with very moderate noise level. There's a lot of distance between tables, so I was barely aware of other parties there. I like this.
Did you have a reservation, or did you just show up? I ask because, the last time we tried to show up on a Saturday (around 9:30pm), we were asked if we had a reservation. When we said no, we were told, "Sorry, reservations only", which made me assume that going there on the weekend is a bad idea. Next time maybe we'll try to go earlier or later, before or after the "let's start the night with a couple of nice cocktails" crowd gets there.
After we got shot down, I joked to my wife that maybe we weren't dressed nicely enough...but right then another couple got denied also, and they were dressed in formal attire. So at least it wasn't personal
Paul Barman wrote:You can make a reservation for a table via open table or calling 3 headed productions (312) 266 2694. In the past it's not been too hard to get a reservation for a table for late dinner/early club hours. Not sure how the groupon will effect that situation.
As for the bar, I've only been a handful of times on the weekend and I've never seen an open stool at the bar.
ymmv
spiffytriphy wrote:I called and was told that reservations for drinks only could be made beginning at 10pm. Nice!
spiffytriphy wrote:
I called and was told that reservations for drinks only could be made beginning at 10pm. Nice!
Excellent. Very good to know this. Thanks.
happy_stomach wrote:Anyone know if there's been a change in ownership/management or some other big shift at the Drawing Room? The website is still linked through Le Passage, but the former is completely different. It's much more toned down and friendly, in a bloggy way. (The actual blog looks like it started on May 25.) The Le Passage part of the site hasn't changed. I've visited more recently than I've checked the site, and I'm 95% sure Charles Joly is still there. Maybe just a new website?
http://www.thedrchicago.com/
headcase wrote:happy_stomach wrote:Anyone know if there's been a change in ownership/management or some other big shift at the Drawing Room? The website is still linked through Le Passage, but the former is completely different. It's much more toned down and friendly, in a bloggy way. (The actual blog looks like it started on May 25.) The Le Passage part of the site hasn't changed. I've visited more recently than I've checked the site, and I'm 95% sure Charles Joly is still there. Maybe just a new website?
http://www.thedrchicago.com/
The website change actually happened months ago, I know I noticed it back in the Spring sometime, so that date is probably close. As far as I know there has not been any kind of shake up: Charles, Tim, and Christina are all still there. If I had to guess, I would say it is just the Drawing Room trying to separate themselves from the club side of things. It made sense early on to use the name "The Drawing Room at La Passage" as a way to be noticed, but they are well past that point now. I also know alot of people that love cocktails, but have shyed away from DR because of it's associations with the club, figuring that it would be extremely pretentious.
happy_stomach wrote:Ah, makes sense. I never check the website, but tomorrow I think will be my first weekday visit, so I wanted to be sure of the hours.
kl1191 wrote:happy_stomach wrote:Ah, makes sense. I never check the website, but tomorrow I think will be my first weekday visit, so I wanted to be sure of the hours.
I'm not sure how frequent an occurrence this is, but on my last weekday visit I arrived a few minutes after 6 PM to find the place still locked up tight...they didn't open for business that day until about 6:30.