Au Cheval Owner Sets Sights On New Japanese Restaurant in River North

After opening a restaurant in New York, Brendan Sodikoff (Au Cheval, Bavette’s Bar & Boeuf) is turning his sights back home. Nearly three years after he said he was working on a Japanese spot for the space, Sodikoff is going forward with plans for an “affordable sushi bar” next to his first restaurant, Gilt Bar, in River North. He tells Crain’s that Radio Anago will also include an izakaya component at 226 W. Kinzie St.

There’s no opening timeline that’s been shared. Sodikoff says the 50-seat restaurant may even incorporate dim sum. That Chinese tradition is something that’s only recently taken off in Japan. Sodikoff’s company, Hogsalt Hospitality, has actually hired a team dedicated to “Asian cooking”—presumably focusing on Southeast Asian cuisine—according to Crain’s. That may lead to a Chinese delivery-only restaurant, sounding like the virtual restaurant trend that’s growing in popularity around the country. Sodikoff teased interest in Chinese food back in 2015, saying he wanted to created a restaurant that mixed shopping center Chinese-American food with more traditional flavors.

Radio Anago is not Hogsalt’s first foray into Japanese food. Sodikoff’s group opened High Five Ramen in 2014 in the West Loop, creating some of the city’s spiciest broths.

As this trademark application shows, the idea for Radio Anago has been around for a while. The Crain’s report also mentioned Sodikoff will open a Las Vegas location of Bavette’s.