Review: Mesa Grill

Old dude Barry is in town this week. He's a big restaurant guy, and has been talking for two months about how we had to try Mesa Grill, near Union Square, and Sparks, in the 40s on the East Side.

So we hit up Mesa Grill -- a Bobby Flay joint -- last night and we were both only moderately impressed. Solid atmosphere, both for happy-hour bar scene (nice for a Monday night) as well as for keeping the dining room packed until later. And this isn't a small place.

Barry got the lamb and I ordered the Mahi Mahi. It was pretty entertaining watching big restaurant dude get the rap down with our server, who was better than competent, but brought only a get-the-job-done attitude, not necessarily an I'm-incredibly-happy-to-be-here-tonight approach.

If there was one slip, the server did come out and hope to set our entrees down, but our appetizer plates hadn't been cleared away so the food went back into the kitchen for at least five minutes. That affected both of our dishes, each of which was a little on the dry side after sitting under a lamp.

And if you're down in Union Square at night, you can't not stop in the Coffee Shop. So we went there for one and then had a last drink uptown at Wicker Park.

We'll hit Sparks on Friday.