Burger Bar Chicago

 

Kind of plain atmosphere, brick walls and chalkboard panels accented by found wood assemblage on the walls that looks like the work of local artist Chris Silva. Photobooth in the back, with ambiguous M/W restrooms that are easy to get wrong. View of the dumb metal brick of an Apple store out the front window.

Staff were quick to greet us and take a drink order, but didn’t know a whole lot about the beers. They had a FFF draft for $17, and all they could tell me was it was like “so rare”. Opted for some Lizard King, 1st can was 2 months old, 2nd was a month old.

Beer selection wasn’t bad, some FFF, Pipeworks Passionfruit Guppy, and a couple other good local beers, plus a couple from Firestone, SN, Goose. Pretty standard bottle list. They had Off Color’s logo on the wall but none of their beer, oddly enough since they’re 3 blocks away. Can’t say there was anything worth making a trip for.

The best thing about the place was the burger, I had a barbacoa stacker, which was basically pulled pork, guac, tortilla strips, and cheese on a huge beef patty. The patty was great and perfectly cooked. The barbacoa was underseasoned and the tortilla strips were a little chewy. Minor stuff, would get the standard burger next time. Sully’s around the corner makes a nice lamb burger too though.

Can’t say i’d come back, but would probably order a burger over to the Mousetrap sometime...maybe.

Meah. Many places in Chicago do a better burger with a better tap list. It is OK, but nothing to write home about and the burgers are too expensive for what you get...

 

Located right across from Red Line North and Clyburn stop this place is easy to get to... As a plus we were able to walk right in on a Friday night and get a table. The place is spacious with tables, booths, and high tables. The bar has a chalkboard menu with prices, looks kind of cool. They had about 15 beers on tap with another 20 or so bottles. The beer is all low to mid shelf craft, nothing that blew me away but nice Chicago stapes of Alpha King and Daisy Cutter that you can always enjoy. There is a nice touch of a coaster sized menu that offers slightly in depth descriptions of the beer, would be useful for new beer people... The food has interesting combinations of burgers with several types of fries and fry dipping sauce that are great. I highly recommend the truffle fries and sweet potato fries. I'm not a burger guy so sadly the non-beef selections are pretty half assed and don't sound nearly as good as the burger combo's. For someone like me, almost felt like there wasn't anything for me to eat. The food was good overall though. However, it was way too pricey, $50 bucks for 2 sandwiches and 2 beers.

If you're a big burger person I'd come here to eat and you're able to grab a decent beer as a bonus. For non burger lovers in your party or a more beer selection head to Kuma's.

Burger Bar Chicago is an upscale burger joint that doesn't serve your normal everyday burgers. The atmosphere is great. Open spaces and doesn't smell of dirty burger joint. The beer selection is pretty big and there are many quality craft brews on tap (alpha king, Matilda, daisy cutter to name a few).I still don't get the whole 'PBR in a can is cool' thing, but if you're into that trend then you should head here because they have a whole fridge filled with canned beers. The bar is pretty cool, but I must admit I expected it to be much bigger with the selection they have.

With a creative selection of gourmet burgers and a very good selection of craft brews, this is definitely a place I plan to frequent often. They've definitely turned craft beers and burgers, two of most proletarian foods around, into an upscale experience.