Moonshine reaffirms its "Meh" status

Anybody who lives in Chicago's Wicker Park neighborhood undoubtedly knows where Moonshine is, due in large part to its expansive sidewalk patio that turns into a mecca for people-watching, beer drinking, and general tomfoolery every weekend day.  It's insanely popular, with the whole patio filled up more often than not, although for the life of me I could never understand why.  Eating there several times when I lived in the 'hood affirmed their status as a loud, obnoxious sports bar with food that in no way justifies the price nor the experience.  Yes, serving drinks is mason jars is just sooo precious, Moonshine.  True, your huge sidewalk patio is rare and admittedly a great spot to check out the WP action.  And, clearly, you've passed the WP yuppies' muster, judging by how many of them fill your seats every weekend. But there are so many better places to while away a Sunday afternoon.

Then I read a few months ago that Moonshine had hired a new Chef and had started a brewery, now offering a selection of 10 or so house-made craft beers and a revamped and expanded menu.  Perhaps it was time to give this stalwart of the Wicker Park yuppie bar scene another chance at being decent.

We went for brunch and, among the three of us, had green eggs & ham, corned beef-hash (made with house-made corned beef brisket), and some biscuits and gravy, accompanied by a selection of their beers.  First, the drinks.  While this hops-head liked the IPA well enough, it had an overtly plant-like aroma that bothered another at the table--not from drinking it, mind you, just from smelling that greenery constantly.   The "extra" ordinary ale was liked, although perhaps not deserving of the first adjective in its name, and the Chicago-style pale ale was probably the favorite of the group--slightly sweet and fruity backed up by hoppy bitterness.  Nothing wowed us here, but on special at $6 for a tallboy, worth the price.

Then came the food.  The menu is different than I recall, though not drastically different style-wise from any other American-food type place: lots of burgers, sandwiches, appetizers and flatbread pizzas.  There seems to be a bit of a Mexican/Southwestern trend to the place, especially on the Brunch menu, which includes huevos rancheros and a breakfast burrito. The "green eggs" were simply eggs scrambled with New Mexico green chiles and accompanied by ham (or the meat of your choice--we got sausage), bread and potatoes.  Nothing special here, although no complaints either. The house-made corned beef was good, but made into hash was overly salty--to the point where it became difficult to eat.  Likewise, the gravy gracing the biscuits got raves, but the biscuit itself was tough, dense and heavy--not light and flaky like a good biscuit should be.

Overall, it is better.  I sincerely appreciate that they're trying to improve and making a lot of their offerings in-house rather than sourcing them to food service places or macrobreweries.  They just still have a lot of work to do, seeming as they do right now to be pretty inconsistent.  Like, why spend all the time brining and corning your own brisket, when whomever hashes it up hasn't mastered the salt shaker yet?  Why scratch make sausage gravy when your biscuits would sink in pudding? (Admittedly, biscuit-making is probably much more difficult to master than making a simple white gravy.)

Yes, it's better than before. And, having spied lots of gorgeous, glistening, pretzel-roll held burgers being brought out of the kitchen, perhaps we should give them another chance.  But when you have a table-full of customers wishing they'd gone somewhere else for a similar meal, you aren't likely to get another chance out of them.