Cafe 28
Chicago, IL 60613
Phone: (773) 528-2883
- Price:
- $$
- Cross Street:
- North Ravenswood Avenue
- Directions:
- El: Brown Line to Irving Park
- Best of Citysearch:
- Cuban Food 2007, Latin Food 2004
- Hours:
- Mon 11:30am-3pm, 5:30pm-9pm, Tue-Thu 11:30am-3pm, 5:30pm-10pm, Fri 11:30am-3pm, 5:30pm-10:30pm, Sat 9am-2pm, 5:30pm-10:30pm, Sun 9am-2pm, 5:30pm-9pm
Editorial Review for Cafe 28 – by Citysearch Editors
The Scene
This neighborhood restaurant keeps growing, having added another room to its cozy front bar and spacious, sunny middle dining area. It's a comfortable, cheerful place, with exposed-brick walls, handsome dark-wood accents and wide picture windows looking out onto Irving Park Road. A rhythmic soundtrack of Latin tunes is barely audible over the loud buzz of conversation.
The Food
A little Cuban, a little Mexican and a little Southwestern, cooks serve chicken, beef and seafood creations with Latin spice. Weekend mornings, Cafe 28 serves a hearty menu of egg dishes, pastries, fresh fruit and sandwiches. Southwestern eggs Benedict is a satisfying palate-stinger, while stuffed French toast is two large, thick slices of country bread split open, filled with bananas, cream cheese and brown sugar. At dinner, almond-crusted halibut is a big hit; also try grilled shrimp or chicken quesadillas, traditional ropa vieja, fajitas and duck breast with mole sauce and corn bread.
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Insider Tips
The ExtrasA three-piece band plays Brazilian grooves in the back dining room during Sunday brunch (11am-2pm).
User Reviews for Cafe 28
02/16/2007 Posted by pjs2780
We've been to Cafe 28 twice now. Both times, the food was delicious). The first time we went, the service was great. The most recent time, though, we went on a busy Friday night and left less than impressed with the waitstaff. We were seated at the "extra" table that was placed in an area where there just happened to be room for one. This was fine by us, since we just wanted some dinner. However, the less-than-desirable table came with less-than desirable service. We didn't get the list of specials until our waiter came to take our order (and we sat there for about 15 minutes waiting to place our order). We were never offered more bread/butter either. And at one point, one of the servers came to take the extra chair from our table in the middle of our meal -- I was using its rungs to rest my foot on (I'll also mention that, shortly after being seated, one of the servers was leaning on the chair while talking to someone else -- while we were sitting there!). The food was delicious though. The bread (not warmed, weirdly enough) and spicy-sweet butter were a great start to the meal, and if our waiter had stopped by for more than half a second, we might have asked for more. For the main course, I had the cuban pork, which was an explosion of flavors, a tangy sauce complemented everything very well; the fried yucca was delicious (Cuban hush puppies?). My husband had the scallop and lobster risotto, which was amazing. We opted to skip dessert, though the last time we were there we had the tres leches cake which was tasty (though it had coconut on it -- we're not huge fans). All in all, we would probably go back for the great food, but not on a night so busy that the service suffers tremendously.
Pros: yummy mojitos!, delicious butter, well-seasoned dishes
Cons: service on busy nights is terrible
11/16/2006 Posted by melisyte
Cafe 28 is an amazing place. Flavor is infused into every dish, even the butter (believe me, you'll be asking for the recipe)! The ambience is relaxing, the food is hearty and excellent. Definitely great for a romantic evening, a large dinner party or fun with the kids!
Pros: service, food, ambience
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