When my wife and I were in Chicago for her birthday just before Christmas, we stayed in downtown Evanston. My wife was hellbent on getting Mediterranean food while we were in the area for a long weekend and I had heard of a place called Reza's Restaurant in downtown Evanston that had been in business for quite some time. We decided to head over to Reza's for dinner one evening.
Reza Toulabi and his brother John were both in Chicago in 1979 when the Iranian revolution broke out. Told by family members to stay put in the city, the brothers found that there wasn't a lot of Persian or Mediterranean restaurants to eat in. They decided to open their own restaurant using family recipes and hiring people who had fled the revolution to the U.S. In 1983, Reza's Restaurant opened their doors in the Andersonville neighborhood on N. Clark Street in Chicago.
At one time, Reza's was known as the premier Mediterranean/Persian restaurant in the greater Chicago area. They opened up a second location in River North, and a third one in Lincoln Park. A Reza's opened in suburban Oak Brook in 2004.
Turmoil between the brothers caused the closing of the River North and Lincoln Park locations, but in 2021 Reza Toulabi opened another location in downtown Evanston in what was the former Pete Miller's Steakhouse that had closed in August of 2019. Since the opening of the Evanston location, financial problems have forced Reza's to downsize their original restaurant on N. Clark.
We took an Uber over to Reza's from our hotel. We could have walked to their location on Sherman Ave., but it was a blustery evening and my wife didn't want to walk. (see map) Before we left, we called to see if we needed reservations and a man in a thick accent said that no reservations were needed if we came right away. It turned out that we wouldn't have had to worry about reservations at any time that evening. With Northwestern on holiday break and downtown Evanston was not very busy at all.
It was tough to miss Reza's when we turned onto Sherman Ave. The bright red wood-slat facade just jumped out compared to other buildings on the block. I have to say that Reza's was a bit tired and a bit shabby. It was like they had taken over the old Pete Miller's, moved a few things around, took some things away, and added some trim artwork to the place. The bar wasn't really even a bar any longer as there were no chairs around the bar.
The dining room was set up with tables in the front windows and some booths along the wall. There was a large open area in the middle of the room, and there were two other dining areas - a step-up area in the back, and a small room on the opposite side in the back of the restaurant.
Wassey was the one who greeted us when we came in and he showed us to a table by the front windows that looked out on Sherman Ave. It was a bit cold by the windows, but - quite frankly - that was the only place they were seating people that evening. By this time, I was starting to question our choice in restaurants.
After he handed us our menus, Wassey asked what we wanted to drink. My wife tried to order a Tito's and cranberry and Wassey said they had no hard liquor. OK - that was interesting. She ended up ordering a glass of William Hill cabernet that they had. I asked what kind of beer they had and Wassey said, "Modelo." That was it - no other beer other than Modelo! By this time, I was really wanting to get out of the place. But we decided to stick it out as my wife was really jonesin' for Mediterranean food.
The food at Reza's is more Persian than fully Mediterranean. There was little to choose from on the menu in terms of seafood. There were a lot of beef, chicken and lamb dishes. Appetizers included stuffed grape leaves, sautéed veggies, falafel, and roasted feta cheese. For larger groups, Reza's featured family-style dinners that included appetizers, entrees and rice.
My wife wanted some hummus and Wassey brought out a huge, but very thin piece of pita bread. It was actually more like a tortilla than bread. But we could tear it off and scoop the hummus onto it. The hummus -which I've been getting into more and more lately - was very good. A small relish plate with feta cheese, cilantro and chopped radishes came with the hummus.
And somewhat surprisingly, my wife also ordered the grilled mushrooms. She usually doesn't like mushrooms, but she saw something in the description on the menu that intrigued her. They were basically whole mushrooms that were topped with herbs and served a garlic butter sauce. I have to say these were pretty damned good.
After we ordered our entrees for the evening, we both had a choice of soup to start out. I got the chicken barley soup - chunks of chicken in a heavy broth along with barley, leeks, dill and Persian spices. It was also very good. My wife went with the tomato lentil soup - it featured vegan cracked-bulgur wheat with lentils in a tomato herb broth.
My wife looked at a number of options for food. She thought about the lamb kabobs, and the salmon and shrimp entree sort of got her thinking. But in the end she ordered the Filet Mignon Chengeh - beef tenderloin filet cubes that were marinated, then grilled. It came with Persian rice (dill and fava beans mixed in), and roasted bell peppers. The portion was HUGE! First of all, there had to be over a pound of beef cubes on the plate. And the rice portion was also HUGE! There was no way my wife was going to finish even half of what she had in front of her.
What she could eat, she liked. The beef tenderloin cubes were tender and cooked to a medium temperature. She concentrated more on the beef than she did on the rice. But the few bites she had of the rice, she seemed to like.
I really didn't know what I wanted, but there was something on the menu that intrigued me - the Kabob Makhsous. It the same beef tenderloin filet that my wife had, that was stuffed in a roll of seasoned ground beef, then broiled. And when it was brought to the table, I didn't really know what to think. Now, I'm not a seasoned Persian food enthusiast, but I was expecting the meat to be on skewers. This was like a big friggin' beef log that had the ground beef wrapped around the chunks of beef tenderloin. I also got some of the Persian rice.
The flavor and texture were interesting. The beef had a seasoning that I couldn't quite place my taste buds on, but it tasted fine. The ground beef flaked apart with each cut with my fork. The chunks of beef tenderloin were caked with the ground beef. It wasn't exactly what I was thinking I was getting from the description on the menu. It wasn't bad, but it wasn't great.
We couldn't finish up the meal we had in front of us. Had we shared one of the two plates we got, we STILL couldn't have finished all the food. And when Wassey asked us if we needed boxes, we declined. Even if we weren't traveling and staying in a hotel, I'm not certain it would have tasted as good at home.
And when Wassey came with our bill, I pulled out my credit card. He then asked me if I could pay with cash, or a combination of cash and credit card. Well, I could have, but I didn't. That was a major red flag with a business who asks for cash or a combination. I guess it's a sign that they needed cash.
We were sort of disappointed in our choice of restaurant in Reza's. A few days later, I was talking with a friend of mine who lives on the north side of Chicago and told him that we had gone to Reza's for dinner when we were in town a couple weeks earlier. "Reza's has lost its charm," he told us. "Used to be a big fan, but they've gone through some changes." While the food was fine - and the portions were huge - the place was gloomy and drab. And with no liquor and a minimum variety of wine and just one beer to be offered, it appeared to me they were doing just enough to keep the place open. If they didn't serve such huge portions, maybe they'd make more of a profit. 😉
Comments