Gibsons Bar & Steakhouse - Rosemont - Rosemont
One of the best steakhouses in Chicago is Gibsons Bar & Steakhouse in Rosemont, a fine place for steak that feels like, but isn’t, downtown. As the Gibsons Bar & Steakhouse website explains, “Gibsons Bar & Steakhouse proudly serves USDA Gibsons Prime Angus beef. We are the only restaurant group in the country to be awarded its own USDA Prime Certification. Our beef is region specific to upper Midwest sustainable farms and is breed specific Black Angus. It is corn fed for 120 days and aged for 40 days providing maximum flavor and tenderness.”
We’re fans of grass-fed beef (cows were designed to eat grass) but we have to admit: there is nothing like corn to fatten up cattle and give the meat the mouth-filling luxuriousness we’ve come to expect.
Angus beef, in case you didn’t know, comes from Aberdeenshire and Angus, Scotland; it’s the most popular native breed of beef in the U.K., and it makes for some tasty steak. At Gibsons Bar & Restaurant, you can get your Angus steak as bone-in sirloin, T-bone and porterhouse, as well as many other cuts, and you might want to consider ordering the W.R. Chicago Cut. Named after William Rice, formerly a food writer for the Chicago Tribune, the W.R. Chicago Cut was named by Zagat one of “8 Must-Try Steaks around Chicago”; it’s a 22 ounce bone-in rib eye that you’ll savor on the plate and then in your mind/taste memory for days to come.
Another contender for your attention is the Niman Ranch pork chop. Now, pork is not usually what people go at a steakhouse to enjoy, but pork this good should not be given short shrift. Niman Ranch pork is humanely raised, largely in pastures (which seems to produce better meat…and a cleaner conscience), on a one hundred percent vegetarian diet and without hormones or antibiotics, ever. Also, this Niman Ranch pork chop is a heckuva good piece of pig meat.
Read More
Lamb chops are from the Van Well Family Farm, which is part of the Strauss group of small farmers who are committed to the well-being of their animals and the preservation of the land. All of which is well and good, but the meat they produce has to be truly superior to make it to the menu at Gibsons Bar & Steakhouse, and these lamb chops definitely are worthy.
The dinner menu at Gibsons Bar & Restaurant includes most of the dishes from the lunch menu…and then some. For dinner, you can have, for instance, the Norwegian salmon. Why does it matter where the salmon comes from? Because salmon is one of the most popular fish on the planet at the moment, which means that demand is challenging supply, so a lot of salmon is farmed under less than awesome conditions. Farming is not always bad, of course, and it can in fact be very good, but concentrating the fish in an enclosed space can lead to infections, which leads to the use of antibiotics and other stuff you don’t want to eat. Norwegian salmon, which may be farm raised, is strictly regulated, fed an all-natural diet that never includes antibiotics. Norwegian salmon is also said to be clean enough to be eaten raw. It’s fantastic fish.
What really sets Gibsons Bar & Steakhouse in Rosemont apart from other steak sources in the area are the small, yet significant, flourishes added to each dish. For instance, the London broil is served with giardiniera, a mix of chopped vegetables like carrot and celery, some medium-hot peppers, oil and vinegar, a very popular condiment in Chicago’s Italian American community and typically found on top of an Italian beef sandwich.
The togorashi yellow fin tuna is served with a vinaigrette of kim chee, perhaps the most popular food in Korean, a pickled cabbage with very slight heat that adds a little dimension and lot of interest to this mild, though very popular fish.
The word “bar” is in the name of Gibsons Bar & Steakhouse, so you’d expect there to be a focus on better than average beverages. There’s a full bar, of course, and the wine list is very, very large (the better to have a business lunch with). Though it leans heavily toward California wines, the list also contains a section devoted to some unusual “aromatic whites” (including gruvees, pinot gris and a Montrachet) as well as what’s termed “interesting reds” (with heavy representation from Argentina, Chile and Spain).
Comparisons with the downtown Chicago Gibsons Bar & Steakhouse are inevitable, and a review from June, 2017 on TripAdvisor remarks, “Service, food, ambiance all in harmony with my previous experience with Gibsons downtown. It’s the same great food, service, and atmosphere with complimentary valet parking.” If you’re in the Rosemont area, there’s no reason to drive all the way downtown for an exceptional dinner.
