Get out and about

Crispy chicken bao topped with pickled napa cabbage is a starter at Saigon Sisters during Chicago Restaurant Week.

The open-faced schnitzel sandwich, on toasted rye with a dill, mustard, horseradish cream and a fried egg, is the best dish on the menu.

Wide-screen TVs don't cover every surface of this two-level restaurant; it just seems like it. But along with the inescapable views of the game, there is Brian Jupiter's remarkable menu, chock-full of imaginative game dishes such as turtle Bolognese, lamb chorizo and pulled smoked boar shoulder, served with apple and celery slaw on a pretzel bun (pictured). There are plenty of more-familiar dishes (burgers, fried chicken, tacos) for the less-adventurous, however. Dinner daily; brunch Saturday and Sunday. 1072 N. Milwaukee Ave., 773-772-4322.

First course menu options include a vividly colored blood-orange and fennel salad with baby arugula, duqqa and white dots of labne, at Sepia during Chicago Restaurant Week.

Howells & Hood — Good viewing is available indoors and out at this sprawling restaurant, though the screens don't dominate the entire view, thankfully. The menu covers all the pub-food favorites, including a lineup of burgers. On the appetizer list, don't pass up the cheese curds. (435 N. Michigan Ave., 312-262-5310)

The clam chowder features a creamy broth filled with clams and Nueske's bacon chunks and perked up with a drizzle of red-chile sauce, accompanied by house-made oyster crackers.

The chocolate ganache has a modern feel, with two densely textured cubes of chocolate, crouton-size pieces of a brown butter shortbread cookie, stewed cherries, whipped cream and slivered fresh basil. At Saigon Sisters for Chicago Restaurant Week.

A single plump raviolo stuffed with shredded duck sits over reduced duck jus and is topped with bits of Medjool date, flecks of rosemary and tiny flakes of grana padano, a second course option at Sepia during Chicago Restaurant Week.

Spicy pepper relish adds just the right amount of heat to deviled eggs.

Jambalaya with black barley and sweet potatoes, topped with pea shoots, at Big Jones for Chicago Restaurant Week.

A winter salad with toasted rye berries, blood orange, grapefruit and sweet potato puree is the second course.

Peeking out from a delicious piece of grilled pork collar are soft pieces of cheddar and corn spoonbread and collard greens and a soft dab of smoked apple butter, at Sepia during Chicago Restaurant Week.

The Chocolate & Pumpkin dessert involves cubes of dense chocolate and peanut butter ganache, dollops of pureed pumpkin and apple, and pumpkin ice cream, the whole garnished dramatically with curled ribbons of spiced meringue. The elements march down a line of granola.

Buttery, tangy apricot kolacky are served with a stiff sweet-sour cream.

Dessert options include a note-perfect key-lime pie topped with meringue, matched to a gin-and-tonic sorbet, served on a plate dusted with raspberry powder.

One of the starters, Gumbo z'Herbes, greens in a dark roux served with rice, had a satisfyingly deep, smoldering heat with a slight vinegary tang.

A heaping pile of spatzle comes with broccoli, mushrooms, caramelized onions and more.

Calas, ca. 1890 features sourdough rice fritters drizzled with chocolate and goat milk caramel, at Big Jones for Chicago Restaurant Week.

Who says you need a burger or wings to watch the game? At this River North sports bar, brunch is king with standouts like the RumChata cinnamon bread French toast. 216 W. Ohio St.

A starter option at Saigon Sisters during Chicago Restaurant Week is a vegetarian spring roll stuffed with, among other items, firm slices of golden beets and avocado.

Doughnuts, generously coated in vanilla sugar, come with Bavarian cream and currant marmalade.

Add the duck egg to the pork belly course, which also comes with kale and fried parsnips.

Plin with La Tur (a tangy, three-milk cheese from Piedmont) and tossed in Parmesan-thyme butter, at Osteria Langhe for Chicago Restaurant Week.

Cornbread arrives nicely browned, topped with a nugget of butter, at Big Jones for Chicago Restaurant Week.

Barn & Company — A cavernous barbecue restaurant with jumbo-screen TVs built into the walls and more above the bar, Barn & Company is notable for its pitmaster: author and established barbecue guru Gary Wiviott. The garlic-butter wings are a prime example of his talent: He takes wings brined in buttermilk, applies a dry rub, and smokes them with hickory wood before flash frying them and saucing them with garlic-infused butter. Incredible. (950 W. Wrightwood Ave., 773-832-4000)

Parisian gnocchi with bold garlicky pesto, plump stems of trumpet mushrooms and ribbons of shishito peppers make up a main course lunch option at GreenRiver for Restaurant Week.

Grains of farro are topped with plenty of vegetables, celery root, roasted butternut squash, pretty slices of chioggia beets, and flavored with Parmesan, at Cherry Circle Room for Chicago Restaurant Week.

The four-course dinner menu at Whitney's during Chicago Restaurant Week begins with a huge plate of fried Brussels sprouts with pancetta, and a little maple syrup for the barest hint of sweetness.

The Itasca chicken is an entire spatchcocked bird, loaded with garlic and oregano, served with crushed Yukon gold potatoes and sauteed broccoli, for Chicago Restaurant Week.

Desserts include chocolate truffles, sitting in way too much whipped cream, at Whitney's during Chicago Restaurant Week.

The $44 dinner menu gets you upgrades on dishes, including shavings of black truffle, here showered over crespelle (crepes) with mushrooms, gorgonzola and leek fonduta, at Osteria Langhe for Chicago Restaurant Week.

Sweet meets bitter in the Negroni panna cotta, with blood-orange gelee and gin-Campari syrup, at Osteria Langhe for Chicago Restaurant Week.

The Cajun Boudin Balls, ca. 1955, featured two crisp patties of pork liver and rice sausage topped with sweet-sour bits of piccalilli relish, at Big Jones for Chicago Restaurant Week.

Main-course options include a flatiron steak with herb butter, or veal Milanese over pappardelle, at Whitney's during Chicago Restaurant Week.

Old Town Social — It's not all-sports, all-the-time here; many of the TVs retract when this place goes into restaurant mode. But when there's a game on, there is no shortage of views. The food is excellent — notably, specialties such as duck wings, chicken and waffles, and the OTS burger, topped with bacon, Gruyere and a fried egg. (455 W. North Ave., 312-266-2277)

Bar Siena — Pork ribs: messy but worth it. (832 W. Randolph St., 312-492-7775)

Bar Siena — The Randolph corridor's only sports bar offers plenty of TVs for watching and a Fabio-Viviani-executed menu of Italian-accented pub food. A wood-fired oven cranks out excellent pizzas, and if you order nothing else from the menu, get one of these (though the duck mac 'n' cheese will make you happy too). Lunch and dinner daily. (832 W. Randolph St., 312-492-7775)

For one of the starter options, burrata cheese is topped with a bit of smoked salmon, truffle and chopped onion, at RPM Italian during Restaurant Week.

The pork belly reuben features smoked pork belly pastrami, Swiss cheese, sauerkraut and Russian dressing on marble rye. 455 W. North Ave., 312-266-2277.

Frontier — Wide-screen TVs don't cover every surface of this two-level restaurant; it just seems like it. But along with the inescapable views of the game, there is Brian Jupiter's remarkable menu, chock-full of imaginative game dishes and more-familiar options (burgers, fried chicken, tacos) for the less-adventurous. Here, lollipop chicken wings come dressed with housemade Buffalo sauce, blue cheese dip and ranch. Dinner daily; brunch Saturday and Sunday. (1072 N. Milwaukee Ave., 773-772-4322)

Bar Siena — Duck mac 'n' cheese is as good as it sounds. (832 W. Randolph St., 312-492-7775)

Fried chicken over red beans and rice, with a side of voodoo greens, at Big Jones for Chicago Restaurant Week.

The other main course option is a hybrid of New England and New Orleans, an oyster po-boy served in a griddled brioche lobster-roll bun, with a sheaf of fried-oyster shoestrings and a saucer of lightly vinegared vegetables.

Walleye teamed with shrimp, mussels and clams in a smoked saffron broth with fennel, spiked with red chil pepper and garnished with grilled garlic bread, at Cherry Circle Room for Chicago Restaurant Week.

Eggplant Parmesan at Vivo is a fine version of the dish with half inch thick slices breaded and fried, then served over fusilli in a tomato-basil sauce, during Chicago Restaurant Week.

Can you see the slow-cooked egg hiding under this Brussels sprout salad?

Option two for the first course: Thick, unctuous pieces of cured mackerel over a refreshing melange of green olive, golden raisins and ciabatta breadcrumbs, at Sepia during Chicago Restaurant Week.

The signature Turtle salad, a finely chopped melange of kale, romaine, green and red cabbages, carrots, sunflower seeds and bacon, is mounded high on a salad plate and dressed judiciously with a sweet onion-citrus dressing, at Fox and Turtle, during Chicago Restaurant Week and beyond.

The Gateaux Na-Na, a dense and buttery pecan praline pie paired with vanilla bean ice cream, at Big Jones for Chicago Restaurant Week.

The second course is all about carbo-loading, with options that include two freshly baked, meltingly-soft pretzels, served with a spicy pimiento-cheese dip.

One dessert choice at Saigon Sisters, warm tapioca pudding with coconut milk, was pure old-fashioned comfort, and was garnished with slivers of crisp green apple, toasted coconut and golden raisins.

Octopus bolognese over radiatore pasta, with just enough spicy pepper to get your attention, is one of the entree choices at RPM Italian during Chicago Restaurant Week.

Grilled mahi-mahi gets an Asian treatment, the fish resting on a bed of shaved vegetables alongside Chinese black rice and a Thai-like sauce with peanut and ginger.

The second course is charcuterie, a generous serving of meats, cheeses, olives and bread, at Whitney's during Chicago Restaurant Week.

Lamb luc lac features cubes of well-seared lamb in an oyster sauce paired with steamed rice and a salad of arugula, pickled red onions and sliced radishes at Saigon Sisters during Chicago Restaurant Week.

A soft-boiled egg sits on a bed of mushroom ragu, accompanied by a thin beam of toast spread with truffle butter, a second course option at Sepia during Chicago Restaurant Week.

The other dessert choice is a devil's food cake with chocolate mousse, topped with dots of lemon curd and served with salted-caramel ice cream and a cocoa-nib tuile.

Dessert options at Sepia include a ginger-lime parfait, presented as an upright cylinder dripping with mango sauce, alongside a thin line of coconut crumble, offered during Chicago Restaurant Week.

Chicory salad in a spry vinaigrette topped with a poached egg and notably accented with chunks of pork belly bacon, at the Cherry Circle Room for Chicago Restaurant Week.

Bar Siena — Prosciutto pizza gets a sweet kick from fresh figs. (832 W. Randolph St., 312-492-7775)

One of Saigon Sister's main course options for Chicago Restaurant Week features cubes of pork belly, alternating layers of fall-apart-tender meat and meltingly soft fat, paired with a hard-cooked egg in a briny sauce. Pickled cabbage and steamed rice serve as foils for the saucy pork.

Caesar salad, one of three options for a starter on the lunch menu at Vivo, is a bright and light version with Parmesan crisps and anchovy vinaigrette (whole anchovies provided if you ask). It's part of the Chicago Restaurant Week menu.

Hot white chocolate and chocolate chip-loaded cookies for dessert at GreenRiver during Chicago Restaurant Week.

White chocolate flan at May St. Cafe featured dense tiles of custard drizzled with caramel and garnished with strawberries.

Fuller House — A seriously legit, bilevel sports bar with plenty of viewing opportunities and a kitchen that puts a lot of effort into seemingly simple-sounding dishes, such as Buffalo shrimp, lined prettily along a rectangular plate and sprinkled with blue-cheese crumbles. Burgers are big and hearty, and beverage options include craft beers, cocktails, a respectable wine selection and two dozen whiskeys. Lunch and dinner daily. (33 E. First St., Hinsdale, 630-537-1653)