Review: Primehouse

New Primehouse is already aging well

By Phil Vettel

June 6, 2006

 

Originally published June 1, 2006

2 stars (out of four)

Rating key:
4: Outstanding
3: Excellent
2: Very good
1: Good
Satisfactory
Unsatisfactory

Theorists who believe in an ever-expanding universe might point to Chicago's steakhouse scene as confirmation. A city crammed with high-quality beef emporia keeps adding worthy newcomers without ever pushing out any of its established operations. Apparently, Chicago's appetite for beef is, like the cosmos, infinite.

The last noteworthy steakhouse to shut down was Eli's the Place for Steak, and that was because its landlord reclaimed the building.

And so it is impossible to predict anything but success for David Burke's Primehouse (click for address, maps, hours), a 10-week-old steakhouse in River North's new James Hotel. A good-looking restaurant with sharp service and an ambitious menu, Primehouse is the latest Chicago concept by the B.R. Guest group, the folks behind Blue Water Grill in Chicago and owners of the James. They're in partnership with acclaimed chef David Burke, best known currently for DavidBurke & Donatella restaurant in New York.

Burke has enjoyed success in Chicago before; he was the creative force behind Park Avenue Grill (which had a respectable seven-year-run here) and Smith & Wollensky (eight years and counting). Indeed, a few items from Burke's previous restaurants have made their way onto the Primehouse menu.

But the restaurant is, foremost, a steakhouse, and steaks are where Primehouse shines. The restaurant features prime beef that's dry-aged (a process that is more expensive than wet-aging, which is what nearly every other steakhouse does). Below the dining room is the restaurant's salt-lined aging room (Burke says the salt adds flavor and inhibits bacterial growth), where the steaks (filets excepted) spend about 28 days before heading for the kitchen.

If you're a real fan of aging (which tenderizes the meat and gives the flavor a "bleu cheese" tang that not every steak-lover appreciates), try one of the 40-day steaks, which are cuts that have aged even longer. They're not always available, but I was blown away by the 40-day ribeye I sampled--one of the leanest, yet tastiest steaks I've ever had.

Another good option is the Porterhouse for One, a 25-ounce cut that's somewhat less daunting than the 3-pound monstrosities one finds elsewhere. It's also delicious, the filet side of the cut remarkably tender and the strip side toothsome and packed with beefy flavor.

Steaks are served with two of the restaurant's signature steak sauces, and for a couple dollars more there are other sauces available. The sauces are fine, but why would you want to adulterate the flavor of top-quality beef? Skip 'em all, I say.

If you're not up for beef, Primehouse has much with which to tempt you, though execution is less reliable with these dishes than with the steaks. The fanciful lobster steak, in which claw and tail meat are formed, with some butter-pureed lobster, into a 3-inch tall hunk, was accompanied by a mountain range of fries. All well and good, but the plate's third element, a cloying sauce of caramelized honey and vinegars, enveloped the lobster and was drizzled all over the fries. The sauce was inescapable and grew tiresome rather quickly.

Starters are full of style and creativity. A sextet of dumplings offered an interesting take on surf and turf; half the dumplings filled with a lemony lobster mousse, and the other half containing oxtail meat and foie gras. Both were exotically rich on the tongue. Tuna and salmon tartare, a dish that dates back to Burke's earliest days, was as good as I remembered: twin disks of tartare, one atop the other, crowned by a thin layer of creme fraiche. A trio of sauces--ginger, curry and miso-tomato vinaigrette--gave the dish contemporary accents.

Caesar salad gets a tableside presentation, a nice bit of theater for a classic dish, but I wish the preparer had not been quite so generous with the garlic. Lobster bisque, accented with shredded lobster and diced apple, arrived with a long lobster-mousse spring roll straddling the bowl. The soup itself was smooth and sweet, but the spring roll was so salty it overwhelmed everything else.

I like the offbeat presentation of crab meat, bundled in Japanese pretzels, fried tempura-style and sprinkled with mustard seeds; only an excess of oil kept this concoction from being a hit.

Because it's the James Hotel's only restaurant, Primehouse serves breakfast and lunch daily, and weekend brunch. The morning menu has a few eggs Benedict variations, homemade granola and lots of smoothies; lunch includes some smaller-sized steaks, including a very good petite steak frites, and a first-rate burger.

The killer chocolate-layer cake leads the list of worthy desserts. I like the gimmick behind the Kickin' Donuts, in which a Chinese take-out carton-full of doughnut holes is served with squeeze bottles of sauces to be injected. And I enjoyed the made-to-order "rack of cookies," a sextet of fresh cookies served in an English toast rack, paired with a miniature vanilla shake. Very cute.

The dining room is contemporary and neutral, the cream walls trimmed with dark wood. Tables are covered with pebbled leather, putting me in mind of a steamrollered basketball, and spacious booths are clad in soft leather as well. In other words, dead cows provide the decor as well as the food.

But the star of the restaurant is very much alive; that would be Prime 207L, the premium Black Angus bull owned by the restaurant. Prime lives on a Kentucky ranch where he helps with, um, production. Nice work if you can get it, though it probably makes for some awkward family reunions.

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Primehouse
616 N. Rush St.
312-660-6000

Phil Vettel is the Chicago Tribune restaurant critic.

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