:format(webp)/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_image/image/46444842/18144176436_a852835b81_k.0.0.jpg)
The Cherry Circle Room's menu gives diners many throwback options — if they're not vegetarian. Land & Sea Dept.'s main restaurant and companion hospitality projects opened last week inside the restored Chicago Athletic Association Hotel on Michigan Avenue.
Chef Peter Coenen, formerly of The Gage, has developed a hearty, sophisticated menu based on original late-19th and early-20th century Cherry Circle Room menus to match the hotel's retro feel. If the Game Room is known as a playful stroll back to childhood, the Cherry Circle Room is a refined, mature trot. The menu includes raw bar favorites like caviar and tuna crudo, and a French-style epis baguette with goat butter. Also featured is the "OG," a 20-ounce, 30-day, dry-aged prime ribeye. Carnivores can also expect a roasted leg of lamb for two. But besides a selection of salads, the sole dinner veggie entree is a farro "risotto" (fava bean, Parmesan and spring pea).
The beverage menu from Paul McGee (Lost Lake) features a robust selection of drinks, including six house cocktails concocted from gin, whisky and rum. There's the Toronto (rye whisky, demerara and fernet) and Old Cuban (rum, lime, mint and champagne). McGee then brings drinkers six classic or "historic" cocktails on a menu inspired by famed bartender Jacques Straub's recipes from 1914. They include the Pompier High Ball (dry vermouth, cassis, lemon and soda) and a daiquiri cocktail (rum, lime and sugar). A tableside cocktail cart is also available.
Twelve canned or bottled beers are available, with an emphasis on German and Dutch varieties. There's also three beers on draft, including Marz Community Brewer's Cherry Circle Red Ale.
Besides dinner, check out the breakfast and lunch selections, as well as the brunch menu below. Staff serves food from 7 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. and from 5 p.m. to midnight.
