City Winery at the Riverwalk — Restaurant in Chicago

TLDR: loved the staff but for $250 for two people I would opt for somewhere else.

The only reason this place has any stars (Granted I can’t give zero, I wanted to give two at first for them, but for the food had to come back and give it one) is for the staff. Super friendly and want to make the poor food experience you’re about to have as enjoyable as possible. No complaints about any of the people who helped us. If it weren’t for them I probably would’ve complained onsite for the price we paid.

Got a dome for two and when making the reservation they had us pre-select our 4 course meal. See our selections in photo attached. Burrata was probably the best part. Charcuterie board was okay enough so that no blaring red flags were being raised at this point. Salads were coming out in paper bowls and were comparable in quality to something you would get at Panera (not the best, but not the worst). Main entrees were the biggest disappointment. The sliders consisted of 3 buns, 3 overcooked slices of beef, and 4 pieces of asparagus. The salmon was the color of a chicken breast and the couscous was seasoned with salt, salt, and from what I could taste, salt. The dessert platter when I was making the reservation I guess was free, but definitely could’ve just gotten a 4oz container of mixed fruit, a slice of a lemon loaf, and a slice of coffee cake from Kroger for $5 instead and would’ve been way better. Everything mentioned above for $160 and still paid $90 more for a couple things of wine (sizing in pictures).

The mice that came to visit us a couple times in the dome were cute. Nobody involved with the restaurant can do anything about this given that we’re eating next to the Chicago at night time, nor would I want them to as an animal lover but it just added to the experience that we were already laughing about.

Overall, whoever is actually in charge of this place needs to realize that location is not everything for a dining experience. If they made some serious changes this could be a much better place to eat and drink at any time...

I’m not usually one to leave a review but this one warrants it because of a very negative experience we just had at your establishment, the City Winery Riverwalk in Chicago.

My family is in town visiting from Arizona and I made a reservation to take my parents to drinks on the river before our dinner reservation afterwards - we were looking forward to it.

Things started off well, we got seated on time right next to the entrance. We ordered drinks and the waitress asked if we wanted any food.  We asked for more time, looked at the menu and decided against spoiling our appetite. When the waitress came back again to ask if we wanted anything we politely said no thank you and that’s when things went south.

To our surprise, our waitress rudely informed us that in order to sit at a table we had to order food. I said that it didn’t say anywhere upon booking, checking in, or on the drink menu that this was the case. The waitress seemed pretty hostile and combative as she asked us if we wanted to close out because we weren’t going to be ordering food - after we had just gotten our drinks.

What happened next was even more unprofessional and disappointing - the waitress went and said something to the host who then came to our table and said “we forgot to tell you when you checked in but you’re only allowed 60 minutes for your reservation” - which obviously seemed made up, and a misrepresentation of the reservation since it again didn’t say anything on Resy, or our menus.

I live in Chicago and was a regular patron of City Winery, even planning corporate functions here.  But unfortunately because of this very negative experience, I will not be returning again, and I will be encouraging everyone I know to do the same and take their business elsewhere.

Overall a very unprofessional, rude, and disappointing hospitality experience.

Hopefully this matter is taken seriously and City Winery wants to do better...

HOMOPHOBIC!!!!!!! well, literally never return already had enough nightmares trying to find this place when it was actually open to begin with . i’ve tried to come here for the last six weeks and every single time I come here it’s closed for an event and there’s no details posted on the website. Some loser called my voicemail and let me know that it’s basically my problem that I don’t know when they are and are open. I just feel like that’s extremely disrespectful for Manager to call and slip on someone’s voicemail. brought a friend here who is visiting from out of town and we were definitely enjoying our time. Our servers were really nice then out of absolutely nowhere THE Manager came out and told us that we were “” no longer being served” after they were the only people that served us today. It wasn’t until my boyfriend came and sat beside me and put his Hand on my leg then out of nowhere, we became the biggest problem to basically nothing that was happening at this restaurant. I feel really bad for the server, because his managers like that who basically take out the pockets of people who need money, and our surviving off of being a community servant. I will make sure that all of the people that interact with anyone in the future I know never sports this place and I will make sure that they know the stain of this Establishment. They said we were “drunk” Because we’re all grown 30 year-old, who had just left the office for the day. I promise you when I say, if you come here will be the worst experience of your entire life and I genuinely hope whoever the manager is gets his life together. CPD is hiring. Take care. Do NOT COME HERE!!!!!! It’s almost embarrassing after we spent over $200. I wish we could somehow...