I will post my review shortly. But I’ve eaten here twice in the last 10 days. My only initial reviews I’ll post for now are. Complete and utter letdown.
Give me until tomorrow but I’m curious if there are others who have dined here and been unimpressed or confused.
Sadly I can’t say I’ve eaten there (I don’t have the Freemott connections and I’m too old to chase a table otherwise) but a few of my friends echo your sentiment.
Also similar comments regarding Aviary–people have said to me, in essence, “it was fine, but no better than that.”
Eager to read your reviews.
Wilfie, we should discuss the meal on your deck. I don’t have The Boy next weekend. You free?
I ate with Chris and one of the meals and I have a good idea of the review to come. I too was underwhelmed. The menu could be really, really great but the kitchen, at least the night that I was there had a terrible time with temperature and seasoning. Everything came out at room temperature, many things were way over salted (and I love salt). This was communicated to the wait staff several times during the meal. Nothing was done. The restaurant has the feeling of an assembly line. We purchased the higher end wine pairing which had some good wines but not what I would expect for $100. There were pairings that were just bad IMO also. Don’t get me wrong there were some great dishes especially the Amuse “platter” many of the dishes, would have shown much better if they were served at the right temperature and seasoned properly. They couldn’t even seem to get the Espresso hot. I was also surprised by the other diners, I am 44 and I believe I was the oldest person in the room. Many tables of 20 somethings.
The Pork rinds at Publican were phenomenal. We went there after dinner as the line was very long for Aviary. First come first serve you know. It doesn’t matter that we just dropped a grand on a poorly prepared dinner.
George
Over the course of the last 10 days I’ve had the opportunity to dine at Next. Twice I was part of a 4-person group. I’ll leave who I dined with out of the first group, that’s up to them to decide if they want to agree or disagree with my review but I will indicate that those three are ‘names’ in Chicago’s wine and food scene so they may want to be more discrete with their opinions of the meal. I will say that they were similar to mine so I’m not placing them into this boat without their agreement in principle. The second event was with my father (early father’s day gift) and very good friends, George and Ann Hejna. George, thank you for the ticket.
George’s summary of the event for our meal together is spot on but before I expand on this I want to let you know that I did not inform George of my previous meal as he wanted to dine without any preconceived notions of what was to come. As our meal progressed he began noting things that were precisely my complaints on the first meal so our dialogue opened up as the courses came. In retrospect I think that once you begin to do that at a meal’s flaws become easier to spot and seem ever more glaring. And, you start to miss the meal as you pick apart those flaws.
My first meal took place on one of the hotter, if not hottest days of the year we’ve had here so I think the air conditioning of the room wasn’t up to speed yet and tried to catch up. That being said, they do make weather forecasts and back to back 80-90 degree days don’t surprise you. The dining room was uncomfortably warm when we arrived at 6:00. Now, I’m a big guy so I tend to be warmer than most but of my dining partners (two men and a woman) at least one of the gentlemen removed his jacket. Saturday’s dinner with George had no such climate control issues in the room. If I were asked to pick a temperature of the room I would put it between 78 and 84 degrees - which can be exceptionally comfortable and a big reason why folks move to San Diego - but the room was quite humid during dinner #1.
Dinner #1 started off as a disaster. This restaurant is louder than I think it should be. It’s not Publican or The Bristol. It’s a place with white tablecloths, bone china and subtle but high quality decor. The db level is 5, perhaps more units too high. This became an issue immediately as one of our servers - and Next appears to place 4 people on your table from a staffing perspective - was a woman who’s voice did not project or carry. Two of the four diners had to ask her to repeat her opening line and even with that turned to those that did hear and laughed “I still have no clue what she said.” Dinner #2 got off to a much better start as we had a very vocal and excited male giving us the background and logic/inspiration behind the meal we were about to eat. George did mention that he seemed “A tad excited!” - and he was, but we all heard him and got the pitch on the story and concept of Next.
One thing you’ll note if you eat here is the pace moves rapidly from the ‘Here is what we’re doing’ story to getting your food. Amuse starts with a 5-bite plate. At both dinners the food here was agreed to be pretty solid and well done with smiles and nods of agreement on the brioche / foie bite as well as the custard egg. I would rank them in order of Foie,custard, pork rillette, mushrooms in leek, egg/anchovy.
The wine service - a grower, NV blanc de blanc was far superior at Dinner #2. Granted, any wine service would have out-performed Dinner #1 as you’ll see, so here is a sample of what happened on the first meal. The young lady pouring the champagne to start our evening handled the bottle with the same grace and aplomb as a nun would handle a wedding day cock. Four glasses of wine took 6 minutes and required 6 spills as the lass worked a table of 4. We seriously contemplated taking pity on the poor thing and offering up our water glasses as larger targets. Badiot is the sparkler. That’s a nice touch.
Course #2 was the turtle consume. Both experiences were the same. I know I may get crap for being this nit-picky but the menu specifically states, and it’s repeated, that this is a consume. I think it’s a broth. My reason is simple (and I’m open to education here from anyone) - this consume is not clear. It is cloudy. It was cloudy the first time and it was cloudy the second time. Service comes in the form of an empty bowl placed before you with vegetables politely arranged. If I recall correctly they are a fennel cluster, radish, carrot, turnip and celery. The broth/consume/soup is discussed and poured from a pot at each station to the diners as the server walks the table. At both meals I found this to be a heavily salted soup and at dinner #1 it was luke warm and on dinner #2 just a touch warmer than luke warm. In both cases you could have picked up your handled bowl and drunk the soup from it without any fear of heat being an issue. I would prefer my soup hotter simply because it would take longer to eat and enjoy as you discuss the food with your fellow diners. In both cases we found ourselves consuming the soup quickly, getting a sip or two from the wine pairing and then finishing it off as it rapidly cooled at your table. So, cloudy warm turtle consume paired with an oxidized (purposefully) white wine was a bad course for me. The wine, and I cannot recall the producer, was a Savagnin from the Jura region of France, proved a bad pairing for me both times. George made a comment that the wine turned vinegary in the mouth and enhanced bitterness/tartness. The consume is finished quickly with madeira. George and I and my first dinning company felt a burgundy may have gone better here.
If you get the wine pairings the way they do this is by pouring you a glass, a very small glass and then they place the bottle on your table in a quasi-serve yourself presentation. I think the small pours are designed to prevent waste and the leaving of the bottle to allow for self-paced consumption. It’s a nice touch if done correctly. IF…
Next course - the crawfish and sole is a brilliant course. And, at both meals was the potential super-star (yes, even with the duck course pending). There are several bites on this plate that are divine and working your way through this course is a real treat. Unless, of course, it has been handled so roughly with salt that several bites are borderline offensive with seasoning issues. Dinner #1 did not have salt issues on this course and all 4 bites (roe, mushroom, dover sole and crawfish mousse) were quite good - but at dinner #1 this dish was cool to the mouth. Dinner #2 was warmer but still lacking any heat. Comments were made to the staff at both meals. Polite apologies were offered but due to the pace, size of the dish and the pace you feel you need to eat, you can consume 1/2 of your plate in two bites so sending it back or getting a replacement feels piggish. The wine pairing on this is a white burgundy. I liked this wine. I don’t recall it specifically but it was very good as a match for this dish. At dinner #1 we each got our “tasting pour” as we took to call it and then handed the bottle around to get a bit more. One of my guests got short-sheeted on the pour as the bottle used at our table was only 1/3rd full upon presentation and the ‘topping’ of 3 of the 4 glasses removed the rest. We got the attention of the front of the house gentleman (rather than our servers) and he indicated that he would replace the wine and get more “right away”. He was never to be seen again. Dinner #2 appeared to have each bottle service started from a new bottle. We did not have an issue last night with partially filled wine being left for us.
Next is a cucumber and chicken dish called Suprêmes de Poussin. The culinary creativity of this dish really struck me both times. From a technical standpoint I think this is the highlight of the meal. Cucumbers are poached in butter then cored out and filled with a chicken mousse. That ‘log’ is then rolled in pork and served. It is accompanied on the plate by a separate dish of chicken cutlet done in sous vide an finished on top with a foie emulsion of sorts. If you spin your plate the right way the dish actually resembles a smiley face with the supremes making up the eyes with dill eye lashes and the cutlet making out a triangulated mouth. Sadly, this dish was heavily salted as well (yes, more comments made to the polite staff) though it really paired very well with a red wine from the Languedoc. Wine service at dinner #2 went well here. The bottle, a virgin, was left after the tasting pour and we handed it around and got what we wanted. Dinner #1 - not so much. The wine was served warm. Not a degree or two above serving temp. Warm. 75+. And, shockingly to all of us, after the tasting pour was completed and the bottle dropped into its silver disc holding plate - it was empty. I kid you not, they poured no more than 3 mm of wine in each glass (think of a tasting pour at a wine shop) and then left an empty bottle in the ‘you serve it’ section. We flagged down a server and got more. This bottle had enough left to pour 3 more glasses - again short-sheeting the same guy from the white burgundy. We flagged our staff again and a single glass was requested. That glass arrived swiftly. And, corked. At that point the guest gave up on the wine for that course. Due to the pace and the continued temperature issues with the dish, a replacement of that glass was declined as all of the food had been eaten. And, this course comes with a bread pairing. The rolls - cute aromatic little buggers made from a sourdough - were so hard, and so hot to the touch (they found the warm spot in the kitchen so one does exist!) we couldn’t touch them and when we finally could, they were impossible to break open. The salted dutch butter the server was so happy to present and then reveal with flair - was so warm that it had begun melting in its serving bowl and when your knife went to get some - the butter slipped off! I resigned to a swipe of the bread in the butter dish, a dining faux pas that made us laugh. The remaining rolls were untouched.
Duck. I would be hard pressed to think of another dish I’ve been served family style that looked as beautiful as this dish did both times. At a 4-top you are given a full duck. Two legs that have been prepared confit style and the remainder of the duck sliced with such precision that I not be surprised if the chef doing this is a former surgeon. This dish continues to get rave reviews and it should. It’s nearly perfect with a potato dish that is 40% potato, 40% comte cheese and 20% butter.
Well, at least at dinner #1 it was perfect, or could have been…Dinner #1 has the presentation getting us excited. “THE SAUCE” you hear from tables on either side of you as other diners giggle and have shouts of joy… “THE SAUCE”…It’s good. It’s damn good. We can only imagine what the sauce and the duck would have been like had they been served hot. By the time we got our duck the fat wasn’t crispy any longer, the sauce began to separate and even potatoes finished under a broiler or salamander (or are they browned with a hand torch - as the serving platter is not hot at all) had given up whatever heat their thermal mass had to the Gods of convection. But, we were hungry and ate.
There is massive potential for this dish. It’s beautiful, smells wonderful, has the richest sauce I’ve ever had served with it and you want to take bread and sop up everything on your plate and finish it with a glass of wine and smile. But, the wine at dinner #1 came out warm - again. We got our tasting pours and were left a bottle, which, of course, was empty (no joke). A replacement was found, cooler as we’d commented on the wine temps now and they were dunking our bottles in ice buckets - but this replacement was also 1/4 full which shortened our pours again.
Dinner #2 had the same expectations. The differences were our duck was warmer - though still not hot - the sauce was not broken and fresh rolls were brought which are key to sopping up that duck sauce. But, our duck was so salted that the four of us - duck lovers across the board - did not finish the platter and left 1/2 the confit (which was far better tasting and less salty than the breasts) and roughly 20% of the sliced bird on the platter. Dinner #1 did not have any over-salt issues, and the platter was cleaned. The potatoes got rave reviews in both meals but, really, Yukon Gold, salt, butter, comte and bread crumbs isn’t that hard to execute. The second dinner’s wine pairing was fine. A full bottle was presented and consumed. Nice pairing, but certainly nothing special.
The salad irma is no big deal - asparagus tips with a flower on top and what George replied “costco salad dressing”. No pairing. Intermezzo course. Unremarkable in both meals.
Dessert!
Bombe ceylon. Dinner #1 and Dinner #2 were the exact same here. A pretty dessert. A half-sphere of ice cream with a chocolate cookie bottom and a powdered coca dusting on a plate with creme anglaise and a rum reduction with 3 rum poached cherries was paired with a 10 year tawny port… The servers announced that there are xx number (20??) ‘bombes’ in Escoffier’s book and this dish was homage to them. Well, Auguste Escoffier would be pretty pissed if he ate this. It is a flavorless dessert where both times I noted heavy ice crystals on the ice cream which noted a freeze/refreeze cycle. There is absolutely nothing going on here and in both cases no diner at either dinner finished theirs. I don’t get what they are doing on this dish. I must be missing an interpretation and perhaps need guidance on it. I know Escoffier would not have had access to the same levels of refrigeration we do so perhaps he couldn’t make ice cream. Fine - but that doesn’t mean Next should try to not make ice cream too. Oh, and the tawny port is ‘meh’. Brings nothing to the dish. I’d have preferred to skip a dessert wine and used those funds to upgrade the previous glasses.
Mignardises - coffee and small bites to send you on your way. These bites are all excellent. I could eat the nougat daily and the salted caramels are wonderful and the jellied beet is a nice switch on your expectations of flavor. The coffee service however should be outsourced. Both dinners had coffee requests placed during the ‘bomb’ of ceylon. In dinner #1 coffee did not arrive for 23 minutes. So long in fact, I left prior to consumption as I had something else to attend to. Dinner #2 wasn’t much better in terms of timing and since I cannot compare it to my non-arriving coffee order from dinner #1 I can only assume that my espresso order would have been cold as well. Cold. Not warm, not kinda not warm. Cold. The pot of coffee brought for my father was thankfully hot -though lacking in any steam when poured. How in the hell does a $250.00 a head restaurant with this pedigree get freaking COFFEE wrong? I don’t know. But they did.
In summary I would call both experiences significant let downs. Eating at Next is akin to being at the base of a great mountain who’s top is shrouded in fog. You know there is greatness there but you cannot quite see it. It is inexcusable for this food to be so heavily over seasoned. I can see a dish, or a component of a dish, where finishing salt has a heavier pinch one plate to the next. But I don’t think that’s what’s going on. Most of this food - if not all of it - appears to be sous vide and I’d bet heavy money that the protein is all brined prior to sealing in the bag. Perhaps they’re missing a rinse step - or cannot rinse due to the delicacy of the presentation. Whatever it is, seasoning was a recurring issue for me at both meals and all 8 diners vocalized concerns over it. Food temp is also a big issue. This should not be the problem. I know that sole is likely perfect at xxx degrees - and - in both meals my sole was so delicate, so perfect that they have found that temp - but if you don’t eat it first it quickly degrades and cools off and you can taste a difference as you work around your plate. This issue repeated itself at both meals across all courses.
The kitchen has shown some wonderfully compelling techniques. They are artisans. Each dish really is beautiful and is so intricate and well executed from a design standpoint that you cannot help but really enjoy your food with your eyes. But both meals fell so far short of their potential due to seasoning and temperature that I will have a very difficult time stroking a check for the amount I did for these meals in the future. The abysmal wine service on Dinner #1 became a laughable event for us. It was far superior on dinner #2. So much so, I’ll just call dinner #1 a mistake that has been attended to by the staff.
George and I asked ourselves if we’ll be back for the next menu. Odds are we will but at this point its more because we can afford it and want to be a part of the novelty of the restaurant - it is NOT because we were blown away by the food.
I’m curious and don’t know the Chicago food scene at all but after two experiences like that why in hell do you end saying you’d go BACK? There’s simply no way I’d return after two meals like that unless people indicated it had fixed those issues.
I agree with everything Chris wrote except it was cherries on the terrible dessert.
George
I’m curious and don’t know the Chicago food scene at all but after two experiences like that why in hell do you end saying you’d go BACK? There’s simply no way I’d return after two meals like that unless people indicated it had fixed those issues.
Exceptionally fair point Rick. George and I discussed this several times during the night. I hope that as more folks go and as more people note the serious flaws that they will be attended to. Thankfully, in this town there are some pretty well connected folks who can affect change that I know through personal relationships. I assure you that comments are working their way up the chain and getting to Dave (chef), Grant A and Nick K about what is being said.
When I get notice that those changes have been looked at and made - I’ll go back.
So, to restate this differently - I have confidence that they will change and I wouldn’t blindly run back at the next menu change. I’m sorry I didn’t express myself very well there.
I agree with everything Chris wrote except it was cherries on the terrible dessert.
Right. fixed. Thanks Jorge
Ok, whew… I thought you’d gone soft on us there…
No no. Never. 
Is the kitchen set up like 1906 in Paris, too?
No Jon.
Consommé is by definition clear: Consommé - Wikipedia
I, too, wonder why you’d go back. Is sadomasochism a new manifestation of haute cuisine?
alan
I think the reason we would go back as you can see the potential here, you know the pedigree. Seasoning and temperature can be worked out, wine service will be polished and hopefully expanded. The restaurant has been open maybe 6 weeks and it has been full. They change menus every 3 months which could be a good thing or a bad thing depending on how you look at it. Right now Next is packed with those that want to dine and the hottest ticket in Chicago. When the hype dies down Next is going to have to rely on the quality of its food, wine and service instead of the hype…then we will truly see what type of restaurant it is.
Right now they could serve chicken nuggets and they would be full every night.
George
If you all have an extra ticket, please let me know, I’ve been striking out.
Great and detailed reviews. Thanks, Chris. I appreciate your thoughts a lot.
What a baller…Next two times in 10 days…
I can see why a restaurant like this might be a dicey proposition early on. On the other hand, if they’re going to reinvent themselves every three months (or whatever the plan is), it may always be a dicey proposition.
Everything about Next is risky. From the ticket system to beverage service it is all unique. An interesting experiment for sure.