Post #190434 by bigbrotiki on Mon, Oct 3, 2005 11:38 AM

What a loss for Chicago downtown...now it's all white collar pub wasteland down there. I will just head straight to River Grove when there next time.

Especially painful because this is the second oldest T.V. location left, from 1957. Well, the bar area had been renovated, but the Beverly Hills Traders (1955) is even less of what it once was.

Among my fondest memories of the Chicago Vic's, one is from when I was on my research trip for the BoT, in the late 90s:

S.F. headquarters had called ahead and announced me as a VIP- Me and Jeff Berry were not only compted on dinner and cocktails, but after dessert I pointed at the original Coffee Grog mug I had used and said "..and I'd like to take this one home". The waiter looked slightly taken aback, went over to the manager (both old timers), whisper whisper,...and came back with a box and paper to wrap it in! Sort of a Tiki dream-come-true (especially back when T.V. was generally giving you the haughty treatment).

This did/does NOT happen at every Tiki location I documented...i mean it SHOULD, jeez! :D

The second favorite was that Thursday evening at Exotica 200(3?), when I got there with Naomi and the whole gang was there, we owned that whole section, it felt like home away from home. Sigh. Sniff.

[ Edited by: bigbrotiki 2005-10-03 11:51 ]