The bar sets the tone at Sepia. The cabinet woods are dark and rich, and look like they belong next to a ping pong table in a particularly cozy rec room. But instead, there are chairs that cradle you and filament bulbs that hang low, glowing bronze and making you look fantastically sexy. The room straddles the heretofore unknown line between the comfortable basement and the come-hither boudoir.
And so you get the sense that the restaurant plays with the familiar and the titillating. The dining room sits under four chandeliers, the chintzy kind you’ve seen countless times in banquet halls, only they’re encased in huge clear drums, giving them a sleek new structure. Two long communal tables stretch the length of the room, encouraging warm conviviality, but then they lead into a semi-private area draped mysteriously, enticingly in dark velvet.
The food is the same way. For every simple, perfectly grilled pork chop, there is a lusciously saline watermelon salad, funky and tart from goat yogurt and beguiling with lime zest. “Ricotta dumplings” sound and look like typical gnocchi, but turn out to be pasta filled with fluffy cheese—an unexpected and delightful texture. And a seemingly simple grilled quail comes stuffed with liver and mustard greens, dressed with a vinaigrette anchored by chunks of pig’s trotter that turn the dish into a carnal experience.
Desserts unfortunately don’t live up to the rest of the meal, but maybe by that time you should be retiring back to the bar to have a nightcap, or home to slip into something more comfortable.
Sepia 123 N Jefferson St., Chicago, IL (312 441-1920; sepiachicago.com)
Pinterest
