We first ate at the Chicago Diner in Chicago, Illinois a few years ago before we started writing about all of our vegan adventures and we knew that we were definitely going to have to come back! Anyone who knows us knows that we love this place so let’s not mince words and get on to what we ordered.
What we ordered
Poutine- Canadian style waffle fries topped with melted Teese Vegan Cheese, country gravy & green onions. Add bacon or sour cream +1 ea. Jalapeño +.50. Sooo good! We ended up only eating a part of this and brought the rest home, but they were just as good reheated as they are at the restaurant. The Teese Vegan Cheese is incredible and we hope to find this being used more and more in our travels
Rockin’ Mac Tater Boats- Crispy potato skins stuffed with Mac n’ Teese, minced jalapeño, house-made bacon-style seitan crumbles, tomatoes, green onions, served with vegan sour cream. We liked these, but when compared to the rest of the food that we ate, they just didn’t hold up in comparison. We would eat these without hesitation if they showed up, but we would save the room for some of the better dishes.
Buffalo Seitan Wings- Seitan “wings” with vegan ranch & celery. BBQ or spicy buffalo style. As per usual, we had to order the buffalo wings and we can say these are easily in our top 5 favorite buffalo wings. The sauce is a great combination of heat and flavor to where we both were able to enjoy them thoroughly. Seitan can easily have a weird and chewy texture that is off-putting, but these are made extremely well and avoid those pitfalls. Aaron would gladly go here and fill up on these alone and ignore everything else on the menu!
Cuban sandwich- Grilled marinated seitan, fried yucca root chips, pepperoncini, melted cheese, mayo, and mustard on crunchy ciabatta bread. Aaron ordered this sans-mustard and enjoyed the sandwich as a whole, but felt like there was something missing that could have taken this from a good sandwich to a great one. All of the flavors play well off each other and the peppers really give it a nice contrast.
The Radical Reuben- Corned beef seitan, grilled onions, peppers, sauerkraut, vegan thousand island & cheese, on marbled rye. Similarly to buffalo wings, Hayden always orders the Reuben if it’s on the menu. This sandwich was delicious! The seitan was awesome, especially since usually Reubens are made with tempeh. Paired with the thousand island dressing, the sandwich was a home run. She was only able to finish half of it and even heated up the next day, it was still great.
Spicy Crispy Chicken sandwich- Panko-cayenne breaded chicken style seitan, vegan ranch, lettuce, tomato, cucumber & onion, wheat bun. What’s odd about this sandwich is that we both had completely different experiences. We cut it in half where the two different patties split and each dove in. Aaron, felt like it was a really good sandwich that had good flavor and the right amount of cook on the patty. Hayden, however, felt hers was dry and overcooked and was more along the lines of a hockey puck than a chicken patty. Aaron took a bite of it and agreed that she ended up getting the worse half. However, Aaron happily ate the rest of it.
Restaurant Information
Name: Chicago Diner
Location: 2333 N Milwaukee Ave, Chicago, IL 60647
Price: $
Cuisine: American
Vegan options: Mostly vegan
Dress code: Casual
Leave a Reply