Prairie Grass Café

Northbrook is one of the more affluent suburbs on Chicago's North Shore, so I'll admit I walked into Prairie Grass Café half expecting a place built for being seen. What I found was a chef-owned room tucked away on a stretch of Skokie Boulevard more interested in feeding people than impressing them.

Chef Sarah Stegner, who has two James Beard Awards and once ran the kitchen at the Ritz-Carlton's Dining Room downtown, opened Prairie Grass with chef George Bumbaris in 2004. It's their only location. I came straight from O'Hare off a flight in from South Bend, bag in hand, and the staff checked it in the coat room before I could ask. That turned out to be the smoothest part of the first half hour.

The Vibe

White tablecloths under an exposed black ceiling, stacked-stone walls, heavy curtains splitting the dining rooms, and big drum pendants throwing warm light. There's a stone hearth, a private room behind glass French doors for bigger parties, and a green marble wraparound bar with the game on. The crowd skews older and regular. That doesn't bother me a bit, because the room hums with conversation, and a full house talking on a Tuesday night makes me happy. If I had one wish for the space, it's a little more warmth and character, so it feels less like a restaurant dining room and more like somewhere you'd want to settle in.

The drink list tells you who this room is for. The beer list is short (staff told me beer just isn't that popular here), while the cocktail menu is thoughtful and the wine list runs deep.

Now the service. I'm fine with a two-hour dinner, and I prefer it, in fact. I just want drinks and an appetizer ordered in the first five minutes so the meal can begin. Fifteen minutes in, the only person who had stopped by was the guy pouring water. I mentioned it to Mia, the hostess, on my way to the bar to order my own drink, and she took the order herself and promised me a server. At 25 minutes I was still alone at my table, so Mia brought the drink and took my appetizer order too. The house bread showed up at the half-hour mark. The challah I'd ordered got lost, and at 50 minutes I still hadn't been able to order an entrée.

Then the tide turned.

Yolanta, a server from Poland, finally picked up my table and took care of me the rest of the way, and Mia checked back more than once. You could tell it mattered to her that I didn't leave with a bad impression. They comped my cocktail and a beer without my asking, and when the boxes came out, Mia told me to take my time. This place isn't built to turn tables, and I respect that. They just let the lingering start before the meal did. If you end up waiting like I did (and I doubt it happens often), speak up early.

The Food

Yolanta told me the menu rotates around whatever vegetables are fresh locally at that time of year, so what I ate in October won't be exactly what you find in March. It shows in the care that goes into the produce on every plate.

The cocktail was the PGC Old-Hattan, billed as somewhere between a Manhattan and an Old Fashioned: Woodford Reserve, Luxardo, vermouth, bitters and zest. It carries a twang that lands somewhere between cinnamon and rye, and it never drifts sweet.

The free house bread is warm, with a cold cube of butter. Good bread for what it is, nothing special. Then the challah arrived, and it made the other bread feel bad for being bland. The challah has no crust to speak of, just a soft outer layer that eats like the rest of the loaf, and the honey whipped butter is smooth, with the honey blended all the way through. Order it, and don't fill up on the freebie.

I make my own deviled eggs and I'm picky about them. These are next level. The filling is piped with fantastic texture and a bold flavor, then topped with a house sauce that two staffers could (or would) only tell me is Thousand Island-based with a kick, plus a streak of herb oil. Shaved watermelon radish and crispy shallots sit in the middle over pea shoots, and even that garnish is worth eating. That's a kitchen paying attention to the whole plate.

October is Brussels sprout season, which fits a kitchen that cooks around the harvest, and the sprouts are the dish I couldn't leave alone. My first bite of a sprout on its own struck me as a little dry, but I didn't feel that way for long. Add a touch of the basil remoulade pooled underneath, the Parmesan and the Maple Creek Farm bacon, and the salty, crisp bacon against the sharp basil becomes something unique. Go easy on the remoulade, though. Scoop heavy from the bottom and it coats the sprouts like a thick salad dressing and buries everything else. Even with the eggs and that challah on the table, I kept going back to these.

Then the burger, which the menu bills as Chicago Magazine's #1. It's a 10-ounce sirloin served without a bun, and after eating it, no bun is the only way. I added all three of the add-ons they offer (avocado, River Valley Ranch mushrooms and that same farm bacon), swapped the blue cheese for mozzarella, and asked for no tomato. The warm tomato came anyway, so I pitched it and rebuilt the plate my way. Medium-rare plus came out right on: warm pink all the way through and plenty of juice.

Yolanta brought tomato and mayo, and I told her I'd better not need them. I didn't. This is ground steak, not a burger. The grilled red onion melts in your mouth, the mushrooms carry a gravy-like richness, and I caught myself cutting the onion with a fork and scooping it up with mushrooms on their own. The juice gets mopped up with the potato wedges. Every other burger is busy competing with every other burger. This one is out on Burger Island, and it may be the best I've ever had. Call it the don't-call-it-a-burger burger. I took every last leftover back to the hotel.

The Bottom Line

Prairie Grass knows exactly what it is: a modestly upscale neighborhood restaurant for a crowd that keeps coming back, run by a chef with the résumé to cook anywhere who planted herself on Skokie Boulevard. If I close my eyes and judge the food alone, this is Worth the Crawl. The room could use a bit more ambience, and the front of house needs to get the meal moving sooner, so it lands at Worth the Drive. Even the check fits: no leather folder, just the receipt paper-clipped to a Prairie Grass postcard. Make a reservation, order the challah, the eggs and the sprouts, and don't call this burger a burger.