The new Hollywood Casino resort in Aurora has announced two additional restaurants, set to serve different types of Asian fare, that will be available at its food hall.
The $360 million land-based casino and resort project — located along Farnsworth Avenue and Bilter Road, across the street from Chicago Premium Outlets mall and near the Interstate 88 interchange — will replace the casino currently in downtown Aurora along the Fox River.
After being under construction since 2023, the new Hollywood Casino location is expected to open on June 24.
Since early last year, Hollywood Casino Aurora has been periodically revealing the restaurants that will be located within the new location.
This week, company officials announced that the casino’s new food hall will feature Tabo Sushi, the counter-service restaurant by James Beard Award-winning chef Takashi Yagihashi that was formerly located in the Wells Street Market in downtown Chicago, as well as a location of Urbanbelly, originally opened in Chicago by renowned Chef Bill Kim and his wife Yvonne Cadiz-Kim in 2008.
To celebrate the announcement of the two new restaurants coming to the Boulevard Food & Drink Hall, a “Taste of Hollywood” will be held at the Chicago Premium Outlets from noon to 2 p.m. Saturday, April 25, according to a news release. The free event will feature samples from Urbanbelly and Pretty Cool Ice Cream, another restaurant coming to the food hall, while supplies last.
Those who visit the pop-up will get the chance to have “a little tasting of some of the things we might do” at the new location of Urbanbelly, Bill Kim told The Beacon-News.
He described his restaurant as being “Asian food cooking without borders.” When he first opened up the restaurant in 2008, Kim wanted to take all the techniques he had learned — from studying French cooking and working in American restaurants to eventually finding one of the best Asian chefs in the country — to tell a story through food.
That story, he said, is about how he grew up in Chicago, and about how his wife is Puerto Rican and he’s Korean. They wanted Asian food with some traditional flavors but also with some of the techniques he learned throughout his culinary career, he said.
When asked for his favorite thing on the menu, Kim said it was very hard to choose. But he pointed to a few signature things served by his restaurant, including coconut pho — a dairy- and gluten-free dish that combines coconut soup with pho — and Korean fried chicken.
The Hollywood Casino Aurora version of Urbanbelly will be one of the restaurant’s two locations. The other location is currently in Wicker Park but is expected to close this month, with a new location in Fulton Market opening in May to replace it, said a news release from Hollywood Casino announcing the new restaurants.
Those who have visited Urbanbelly before can expect the casino-based location to have a “tighter” menu, according to Kim. While it will be smaller than other locations in the past, he said, the flavors and presentations are going to be the same.
In general, the menu is set to feature dumplings, noodles and more Korean-American dishes, the Hollywood Casino Aurora news release said.
Urbanbelly is part of the Cornerstone Restaurant Group, the Chicago-based hospitality company behind several dining concepts including Michael Jordan’s Steak House, The Table at Crate, and most recently Italian concept Dimmi Dimmi, according to the news release. Kim has also published a cookbook, “Korean BBQ,” which contains 80 recipes.
Tabo Sushi, the other recently-announced new restaurant, will be a continuation of the one that closed in the Wells Street Market because of the COVID-19 pandemic, Yagihashi told The Beacon-News.
While most of the new location’s menu will be very similar to the previous one, with fan favorites returning, there will be some new additions, he said.
Yagihashi described his restaurant as being traditional, but also as fun and relaxed, not fancy or high-end. The menu is still being finalized, he said, but “it’s going to be a lot of fun.”
In addition to Tabo Sushi, Yagihashi also developed other, now-closed restaurants in Chicago, including Michelin-starred Takashi and the more casual Slurping Turtle, according to the casino’s news release.
The two newly-announced restaurants will be joined in the Boulevard Food & Drink Hall by Lucky Goat, a burger restaurant by celebrity chef Stephanie Izard, as well as Antique Taco, Pretty Cool Ice Cream and Five50 Pizza. The food hall is being developed in partnership with McClain Camarota Hospitality, the restaurant group of James Beard Award-winning chef and restaurateur Shawn McClain.
“When MCH set out to create Boulevard Food & Drink Hall, we were excited to return to our roots in Chicago and reach out to some of our closest friends and greatest chefs we know,” McClain said in the Hollywood Casino Aurora news release. “Building on the success at Hollywood Casino Joliet, we can’t wait to open our doors in Aurora with the additions of Urbanbelly and Tabo Sushi.”
Yagihashi said he’s been culinary friends with McClain for a long time, probably more than 20 years. So when McClain asked him to open up Tabo Sushi in Aurora, Yagihashi said he never had to think twice about it.
For Kim, opening up Urbanbelly in Aurora feels like “getting the band back together again.” He used to work at McClain’s restaurant Trio as a sous chef, Kim said, and his wife opened up Takashi as its general manager, among other connections.
“Just a lot of familiar faces, and there’s a level of comfort knowing the fact that we have all worked with each other in the past,” Kim said.
Outside of the food hall, the new Hollywood Casino Aurora is expected to have other restaurants, too. For example, it was announced early last year that celebrity chef Giada De Laurentiis is planning to open an Italian steakhouse called Sorella, which will have outdoor seating and an open kitchen with a menu including fresh pasta, steaks, Roman-style pizza and other Italian dishes.
In addition to restaurants, it has also been announced that the Hollywood Casino Aurora resort will include the second location of a Pennsylvania-based luxury wellness spa.
Drift Spa, by beauty and wellness entrepreneur Stacey Steffes, is set to offer classic spa experiences along with hair and beauty services. In addition to the services offered at the spa’s first location within the Marriott at Penn Square in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, it will also offer additional services including a “Drift Drybar.”
Along with Drift Spa, the on-site resort will feature an upscale 226-room hotel offering a variety of standard rooms and suites. An outdoor entertainment area and a roughly 12,000-square-foot event center with meeting areas are also planned.
And, the casino portion of the complex will feature 1,200 gaming positions and a retail sportsbook along with other bars and restaurants.
The city of Aurora is supporting the project through an agreed up-front payment of $50 million, to be paid back to the city through a tax increment financing district on the property. The passage of that TIF district was controversial and was opposed by current Mayor John Laesch, who was an alderman at-large on the Aurora City Council at the time.
City officials previously said that the incentive was needed to keep the casino in Aurora.
rsmith@chicagotribune.com
