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[title]A quick update for those not keeping close track: The Affinia hotel is now MileNorth, A Chicago Hotel (yes, the name has a comma in it), and C-house, the Marcus Samuelsson restaurant that served as an unlikely venue for emerging talent (Found's Nicole Pederson, theWit hotel's Toni Roberts) is reopening this week as Ferris & Jack. Though it sounds like a bourgeois baby store, the name refers to the Ferris wheel and the Cracker Jack, both of which, per the press release, debuted at Chicago's 1893 World's Columbian Exposition.
In keeping with multi-use hotel concepts like the Hard Rock's new Chuck's Manufacturing, Ferris & Jack is many things wrapped into one. It's primarily a Midwest-themed restaurant serving breakfast (think Chicago neighborhood–themed "skillets" like the "Rogers Park" with refried beans and chorizo), lunch (an appetizer trio of mini sausages, a Chicago-style hot dog) and dinner ("Magnificent Meatloaf," bacon-wrapped scallops). But it's also a "marketplace" offering to-go lunches and Starbucks coffee as well as a bar stocked with shared plates, craft beers and what else but a signature cocktail made with Midori, Malibu rum, vanilla schnapps and whipped cream.
Ferris & Jack (MileNorth, 166 E Superior St, 312-787-6000) soft-opens this week and officially opens May 1.