Jimmy Bannos, who developed a cult following for his original Heaven on Seven, a cramped office-building dinette that initially served neither dinner nor liquor, moved into the big time with the June opening of Heaven on Seven on Rush, a 130-seat, full-service sequel operation at 600 N. Michigan Ave.
In the process, Jimmy and his brother, George Bannos, picked up a couple of new partners: Rich Melman and Bob Vick. But despite the participation of these two Lettuce Entertain You heavyweights, Heaven on Seven on Rush is not a Lettuce restaurant, to the chagrin of patrons hoping to pick up Lettuce frequent-dining points. Nor is there any apparent Lettuce influence in the operation; this is pretty much Jimmy’s show.
The questions about Heaven on Seven on Rush are these: One, can Jimmy Bannos re-create his signature Cajun-Creole food on a much larger scale? And two, can the Bannos’ keep on top of service in a restaurant this size?
The answers are Yes and Perhaps. The food is as good as anything Heaven on Seven has done before, and in some respects better; clearly, Bannos is thriving on this larger culinary stage. Just as clearly, service is not yet where it needs to be. Although the level of service has been improving, it needs more consistency.
As the name suggests, you get to the restaurant using the building’s Rush Street entrance. Take the escalator up a flight (an elevator accommodates wheelchairs) and follow the zydeco sounds and tantalizing cooking smells to the dining room. You could find it blindfolded.
An enormous wall near the entrance displays hundreds and hundreds of hot-sauce bottles collected from all over the world. A smaller number — about two dozen bottles — grace each table. Personally, I’d cut that number down to 12 or less — all these bottles take up too much table room — but they do make interesting conversation pieces, given that the sauces bear names that are humorous and occasionally unprintable. (The idea in naming a hot sauce is to make it sound as lethal as possible; “Khmer Rouge Interrogation” would be a good hot-sauce name.)
The bottles, and a basket of sturdy Italian bread, will keep you occupied while paging through the menu. The selection is substantial but could be better organized; appetizers, for one, can be found on the first page, under Starters, on the second page, under Appetizers, and among the three or four daily specials the waitress may (if prompted) tell you about.
Good beginnings include the grilled andouille sausage, a mildly spiced version served over a soft sweet-potato polenta, offering good flavor and texture contrasts. Also worthy are the barbecued shrimp, which come with white rice and an addictive New Orleans-style barbecue sauce that doesn’t spare the butter or cream. A trio of crawfish cakes (about to become shrimp cakes as crawfish season ends), served over a rich remoulade sauce, are plump and delicious.
Lighter appetites will find refuge in the grilled calamari, expertly cooked and perched on a thick slice of grilled bread; a light vegetable sauce lends interesting flavors to the squid and bread.
Entrees come with soup or salad. The salad is perfunctory, though the sweet jalapeno dressing is somewhat interesting, but the soups are very good, ranging from a Mississippi-muddy spicy gumbo with chicken and andouille sausage, to a cheese-heavy tomato-parmesan soup, to a to-die-for tomato-cream soup with chipotle peppers.
The Mardi Gras etouffee is a dish any place in the French Quarter would be happy to call its own, a bountiful array of crawfish, chicken and andouille sausage over rice, with an appreciably spicy broth. Ditto for the pecan-crusted trout, topped with a crabmeat slaw and served with an indulgent pecan meuniere sauce.
Grilled strips of surprisingly tender flank steak work well with a macque choux of corn niblets, diced peppers and tasso ham, as does grilled salmon, atop a hash of Yukon gold potatoes and diced andouille with a worcestershire-barbecue sauce. A shrimp and grits combination looks odd on the plate, but the flavors — the shrimp with a light batter and the grits laced with parmesan reggiano cheese — are very good.
Side dishes are hardly needed, but do make room for the monstrous jalapeno-cheddar corn muffin, which is packed with sweet and spicy flavors.
Desserts are as indulgent and rich as most of the preceding dishes. There’s a rich and gooey chocolate pecan pie and an equally caloric peanut butter chocolate pie, a slab of fudge called Iberville flourless chocolate cake, a buttery bread pudding with bourbon creme anglaise and a refreshingly tart Key lime pie.
Service has improved greatly since my first visit, when our waiter forgot the soup and salad, neglected to replace flatware until asked and overcharged us as a finale. But while most servers seem to have a good grasp of the menu, the finer points of service still elude them at times.
Once the front room gets its act together, Heaven on Seven on Rush will be a three-star restaurant. Even now, the food more than compensates for the occasional misstep.
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(star) (star)
Heaven on Seven on Rush
600 N. Michigan Ave.
312-280-7774
Open: Dinner Mon.-Sun.,
lunch Mon.-Sun., brunch Sun.
Entree prices: $8.95-$18.95
Credit cards: A, DC, DS, M, V
Reservations: Accepted
Rating system
(star) (star) (star) (star) Outstanding
(star) (star) (star) Excellent
(star) (star) Very Good
(star) Good
Satisfactory
Unsatisfactory
Reviews are based on no fewer than two visits. The reviewer makes every effort to remain anonymous. Meals are paid for by the Tribune.
