Marion Street Cheese Market: User Reviews

It's a great place for a wine and cheese night with friends. We have been there for breakfast and lunch. The food is overall good but pricey.

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This place would be a regular hangout of mine as I live and work just down the street. I quit going because spending 5 minutes inside results in my clothes strongly smelling like i had been standing in front of the kitchen exhaust fan all night. It's a real disappointment too, because it's a very nice place and the owner spared little expense in the design. Certainly can't go there for lunch and smell like that at the office.

The usual messed up orders are forgivable as the staff is very friendly and comps are frequent, but the delays in getting the correct order make visits long.

I'll stick my nose in the door in a couple months to see if the problem is resolved, but I won't hold my breath.

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I looked so foreward to the re-opening of this cheese market and even more excited about dining there. The owner had a fantastic idea, but I'm not sure the staff is able to support it.

The server was not very knowledgeable about the cheeses on the flight and mispronounced the ones I was familiar with. This was true for the wines, as well. (If you're not sure as a server, it is your business to learn!)

As far as the food, our "pumpkin bisque" was (I am almost positive) to be butternut squash and was way too thick (almost a squash dip.) The plate-ups and accompaniments on the cheese flights/entrees were lacking and not worth the cost (I am more than willing to pay if it is worth it!)

Nice to have somewhere to lounge in Oak Park, but will only continue to buy cheese to take home.

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I recently went with a small group of friends (8) at dinnertime.
I hesitate to call this a restaurant as it seems to me more of a type of place where you "nosh", drink and chat.
Being a cheeseaholic I was delighted to see the cheese flights that were offered. Not wanting to waste any of my choices on sausages I chose three cheeses. Oh Mama! What a delight! I had a gouda and two other prize winning cheeses. I throughly enjoyed them. I should have chosen the 5 cheese flight.
Breads/crackers are placed on your table when you arrive. Again, do nor expect the usual bread baskets. It had some flatbread in it that was to die for. One was light colored and the other was dark. The dark one tasted like roasted pumpkin seeds. So yummy! Another option that was on the menu was hazelnut crusted brie. Hellooooooooooo! Maybe next time if I can expand beyond the cheese flight. I sampled someone's Hook Cheddar cheese (for those of you not into the stronger varieties). It was the best I have had. Verry creamy and tasty. I complimented the cheese flight with a potato leek soup. I felt it was lacking something but another thought it was scrumptious. The pumpkin squash(?) soup was also sampled at our table and seemed to be lacking. Perhaps just a personal preference. I would try a soup again when I return. Cheese puffs were good.
I did not have any of the wine but it was fun to watch those who did. Extensive list of wine and you can get "tastes" at a lesser price. Many switched from wine to wine sampling the different ones. Staff made sure that you liked what you chose. Glasse of wine were a nice size, especially for the price you paid.
I think one of the big selling points of the place was the attentiveness and knowledge of the staff. Very friendly without being overbearing. Any questions about cheeses or wines answered or she looked for someone to help if she did not have an answer, at one point even seeking out a cheese person. Presentation is A+. Cute dinnerware that the food was served on and in.
This is a great place to grab something to eat or drink, catch up with old friends and enjoy the evening without getting the feeling of being rushed out. I was very pleased and plan to return possibly by myself for a relaxing afternoon.

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If the food wasn't so darn delicious, I would probably never go to this restaurant again. It was a mess from the beginning. First of all, the waitress was young and seemingly inexperienced and it took her forever to bring us drinks and refill water glasses, but on top of that, she brought us the wrong wine 2 times. Two people in our party ordered the same rose' wine (which she pronounced ROSE like the flower) and neither one of us were actually served that wine. Now, in my opinion, a restaurant that is supposed to specialize in wine and cheese should have servers who are VERY knowledgeable about those goods, but she obviously knew nothing about either product. When we asked about the cheese flights she said that she doesn't really eat many of the cheeses (she only eats the mild, "easy" ones) so she couldn't answer our questions. She should have sent a manager or the cheese monger over, but she didn't offer that as an option. Our food was all brought out at the same time (aren't you supposed to pace it with small plates???) so it was overwhelming, and we still didn't have plates when the food started arriving. The manager brought over 2 large plates and 5 tiny plates for the 7 of us. Why? I really don't know. All I can think is that they didn't have enough clean plates so that we could all have the same size.

On the positive side, the food was really good for the most part. The mac n' cheese, the elk sausage, and the fried green tomatoes were good, and the cheese puffs were awesome. We enjoyed the flavor of the shrimp and chorizo, although we all thought the chorizo should have a different treatment--it was a bit tough to chew and would have been better out of the casing and ground or chopped up or something. We also had the apple and gruyere salad, and I thought the texture could be a little better with more crispness to the apples to contrast with the smoothness of the cheese.

The decor is quite lovely with a lot of natural elements. The live guitarists played well, but the music was blasting too loudly and it was hard to hear people at your own table talk.

All in all, great food, but they really need to get together in the service area. Everyone in our party was just like--are you kidding me??--for a majority of the evening because we couldn't believe how inept some of the servers were. I must say that the bus boys were doing a great job and were on top of it throughout the meal.

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My partner and I made the trek out from boystown because of a nice review on ABC 7. The experience didn't leave us with the desire to drive from the city out to Oak Park again. The wine list was well thought out and a nice young women was very helpful and knowledgeable about the wines on the list. We sat down and were disappointed by the limited options on the menu and relatively high prices. We started with the shrimp and chorizo. It came out on a nice sleek plate but the shrimp really seemed to be from the frozen food aisle of a local supermarket and the chorizo tasted more like Baco's. We ordered a pizza to nibble on and it came out dark and burnt. The service was very slow and although the servers were enthusiastic and friendly they didn't offer much in terms of explanation of the menu. Overall the wine list was impressive but the food and service needs significant improvements. I wish the proprietors the best but we will not venture to Oak Park again for the experience. There are too many places in the city with better service and food that I would prefer to check out with my money in this difficult economic environment. The cheese selection was nice but not significantly better than Pastoral in Chicago.

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The café at the Marion St. Cheese Market is latest addition to Oak Park’s evolving downtown restaurant scene. The Cheese Market, recently expanded to this new location, is an eclectic haven for yupscale foodies, featuring a diverse array of cheeses, prepared foods, wines, beers, condiments and food-related accessories. The café, tucked into the south end of the space, seeks to offer a similarly eclectic mix of breakfast and lunch dishes. For breakfast, savory and sweet plates include an array of wheat crepes as well as four skillet dishes. For lunch, diners can choose from a compact selection of soups, salads, sandwiches and pizza. The café décor is consistent with the overall theme of the market in its eclectic use of wood, tile and metal. (Not-to-be-missed decor highlights include the delightful art glass window-walls, designed by local artist Peter Morava, in the restrooms.)

But what about the food? Well, we tried a couple of the sandwiches: a Gunthrop Farms BBQ turkey with Cedar Grove sharp cheddar and caramelized onions, and a crispy Gruyere and Brie grilled cheese served with pickled vegetables. Both were novel and very tasty. The grilled cheese was toasted in a press and was, indeed, wonderfully crispy. The turkey, which seemed pulled, was fully flavored and yummy (it was marred only by a large piece of leg joint enrobed by the meat, prompting me to utter a line I’ve been wanting to use for years: “What’s a joint like you doing in a nice dish like this?”). The presentation was not up to the quality of the food, however -- the sandwiches were starkly plopped onto very plain plates. A high point: the beer menu is terrific, featuring selections by the bottle and on tap that you’re won’t easily find elsewhere.

Service was unpolished, to say the least -- by design, perhaps, in the interest of hominess? For example, the menu featured high-end potato chips, so we ordered some, expecting that they’d be presented on a plate. Instead, the cheerful young server walked over to the bar, grabbed a small bag and tossed them on the table between us, stating, “I can give you the chips right away!” Her method of determining whether the bag was empty later was equally direct: she simply pressed down firmly on the bag with the palm of her hand. Ah, youth. My sense is that servers may be local high school students who have not (yet?) been trained in a level of service commensurate with the Market’s price point. In any event, they were cheerful, sweet and energetic, and we had a good time. My hope for the café is that it adds some polish to presentation and service to bring these up to the level of the delicious food.

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