Visiting Son, Need moderately priced help

[sammyo]

My wife and i will be visiting our son for a weekend. We are staying near Michigan and Ohio. He lives in Lakeview, near Southport and Belmont. Looking for 2 reasonably priced dinner and breakfast/brunch. Thinking about Mixteco Grill based on this board and other reviews. Also considering Thai Classic and The Bagel. Open to other ideas. I would prefer places convenient to his apartment. We will not have a car, so public transportation and cabs or walking.Thai and Mexican would be 2 cuisines that I know Chicago does well and we don't have a great selection of where we live, but other cuisines would be considered as well.

[lemiller610]

Mixteco is a great choice - make sure to make a reservation!

Other choices I can think of are Delecce on Irving/Southport, which is moderately-priced and on a few bus routes. I've had many great meals there.

There's a few Thai places on the Brown line Western stop (Lincoln/Western area), which are all good. Opart Thai probably has the nicest atmosphere.

[Pete Oldtown]

I'd recommend Spoon Thai at the Brown Line Western stop (to the left and across the street) and ask for the translated Thai menu. It has dishes you will probably never see elsewhere and the prices are dirt cheap (about $5-6 per dish, although they're fairly small).

You're walking distance from the Brown Line (just walk down Michigan to the south, across the river, and take a right on Lake), which will go to both Belmont and Ashland, depending on which stop is closer to your son's apartment.

I'd also recommend Devon Ave., where the Indian and Pakistani restaurants are. Again, get off at Western on the Brown Line and switch to a northbound Western bus right outside the station. Get off at Devon and turn right. Or left. My favorite is Hema's Kitchen, but there are many, many choices. You can find a lot of discussions here, because, seriously, no one can really try all the restaurants there.

I'm sure your son knows lots of great places, but it's your trip, and hold out for something unique. I really, really recommend Spoon.

Here's a link to an early version of the translated menu.

http://www.sptsb.com/spoon_thai_secre...

Today, they have a better version now at the restaurant. It's a very small, intimate place and the waitresses are helpful (if lacking in English skills). The squash blossom salad isn't exactly a salad, it's more like stuffed peppers or something, but it's delicious. Some of the tastes are foreign, but in a good way. The sausage dishes have a funky taste that is weird on the first bite and delicious by the second.

I'd also recommend Cafe Iberico for tapas. It's walking distance from your hotel (about 8 blocks) at Chicago and LaSalle. It's inexpensive and very good. I recommend getting there early (before 6) on weekends, because it gets PACKED and the wait can be two hours or more. Also, the food is better then. The pulpa (octopus) is terrific, and they have a weekly specials menu which is a bit more expensive, but worth it. And cheap sangria. Three of you can eat there, with sangria, for $60 or so.

Hope that helps.

[sammyo]

Thanks a lot . These sound like what we are looking for.

[Eldon Kreider]

The Brown LIne turns west just north of the Belmont stop (1000 west) and runs west at about 3400 north for about a mile before turning north again. There are stops at Southport (1400 west) and Paulina (1700 west) but not at Ashland (1600 west).

If you take the Brown Line to Western and want to go to Devon, you must use the North Western (49B) bus rather than the Western bus (49). Route 49B runs north from a turnaround at the Western Brown Line stop to Howard. The regular Western bus ends at Berwyn (5300 north) and would leave you over a mile south of Devon Avenue (6400 north).