Last weekend, Colleen and I attended the friends and family preview dinner at the restaurant we supported via Kickstarter – The Rabbit Hole. We liked it so much, we went back with kid two later in the week also.
Located just outside the Midtown Global Market on Lake Street, this project is the second offering from the (now) husband and wife team of Kat Melgaard and Thomas Kim. We’ve been big fans of their first location, The Left Handed Cook, which is also located in the same building.
Thomas and Kat have been busy: they celebrated the one year anniversary of LHC by starting a family (hello baby Kyu!), getting married and opening a wonderful new full service restaurant (not in that order). Couldn’t be happier for them – super nice people and talented restaurateurs.
I’ll keep this initial review short so you all can just get over there and try it out. Right now they are only open for dinner (Monday thru Thursday – 4pm to 10pm, Friday and Saturday – 4pm to 11pm, closed Sundays), with a happy hour in the bar from 4pm to 6pm.
The drink menu was created with help from one of the old Town Talk Diner bartenders (now with @holaarepa), so you can’t go wrong with any of those items. We tried the Citron & On & On, along with the Blood, Sand & Ice (and I wanted to try about ten more). One night I’ll find a designated driver and just try the lot.
As for food, we had the chicken wings and truffled parmesan fries on both visits and have tried the buttermilk fried pork katsu, the crispy poussin and the eggy burger – all wonderful. Kid two had the teriyaki chicken skewers and wanted more. Chef Thomas surprised us at the end of the second night with a sampler tray with all their desserts: mango pudding, sweet pancake, tartlet and flourless chocolate cake (my favorite).
The room is beautiful and was hand-built and designed with love by the owners (and helpers). All of the Kickstarter supporters have their names on the walls around the booths (look for ours in the middle section) and the bar area sports long, shared tables with chairs that reminded me of high school chemistry class. The seats along the grill are called the kitchen table seats and it was fun to spy on Thomas and his crew.
The kitchen scaled back the full menu when we went during the week. We were told the staff is still getting used to the workflow, but it will be back soon. Lunch hours are also planned – perhaps as soon as next month. That will be a mixed blessing financially for Colleen, as she works next door and will be tempted daily.
Head down the Rabbit Hole – good stuff awaits!
