Cellar Door Provisions

Cellar Door Provisions used to run all day. Now it only opens for dinner, and the tighter format is the better restaurant: a short, frequently changing menu built around a handful of seafood or meat dishes and seasonal vegetables pushed to do real work. Kakai squash gets a squash-based sugo and a hit of vinegar to keep the sweetness honest. Monkfish arrives with morels, onions, and turnip in a broth thin enough to let each ingredient speak. The plates look simple. They aren't.

The room backs the food up rather than competing with it — minimalist, warmly lit, the kind of place that works for a full dinner or just a glass of something from a natural wine list that's been built with actual care. Staff treat a bar seat and a drink as a legitimate way to spend an evening, not a consolation prize.

Consistency isn't perfect night to night, and a menu this seasonal means what you loved last visit may not be there next time. That's the tradeoff for a kitchen this responsive. Back-to-back Bib Gourmand recognition and Beard semifinalist nods for the chef confirm what the plates already argue: this is Logan Square doing serious work without raising its voice.