Poag Mahones - Loop

Pinche Turkey Burger

My Crew took me out for lunch yesterday for Boss's Day.  I have an awesome team of guys and I really appreciated it!.  We decided to take a little extra time to sit down and enjoy our lunch, so we headed to Poag Mahone's in the Loop. 

I had the Pinche Turkey Burger, which is out of sorts for me.  But I have been eating a lot of junk lately and tried to go healthy.  It was good, my own fault allowed it to be under cooked a bit, but overall, it was tasty.  It comes with avocado, tomato and chipotle mayo. I got it with a side salad, which was really good too and one of the guys with me got the crinkle cut fries and they were really good!

The draw back was the FOOD BILL.  $12 for a burger .... OUCH!!!  It was good and all, but not worth $12 considering it was rather small.  Poag's get an A for atmosphere, service and taste, but the FOOD BILL gets a C-. 

Not sure they care though, from what I read in their menu ... Poag Mahone translates to kiss my ass in Gaelic!  Still, a decent place if you don't mind dropping a little extra cash!  I've had the regular beef burgers there and they are awesome. 

Americana Submarine

Hot Dogs

My usual Hot Dog lunch joint in the Loop closed down, heart wrenching, I know after two years of devotion.  The Works on Franklin is no more ... [Moment of silence].

So my quest to find a new Dog joint is on!  Yes, I can default to Luke's, but it takes 20 minutes to get a dog in there at lunch time because it is so packed.  So, I decided to venture outside of my comfort zone and seek out a new spot.

I ran across Americana Submarine on Clark and van Buren, which at first looked like a bodega with subs and dogs.  Now, in my travels, I have learned that sometimes these places are surprising, so I gave it a try.

Well, the first thing I notices was the $6.99 price for 2 dogs, a tiny bag of chips and a small fountain drink.  Hmmm.....well, I'm in for the haul.  To say the least, I was disappointed. 

The Dog, a Red Hot Chicago sausage was good and cooked right.  The tomato and onion were fresh cut and everything else were good.  BUT!!!

The kicker was that the (non-poppy seed) buns were so stale the ends were hard.  Totally un-steamed, despite pulling them out of a steamer, which I determined was for show.

I really wanted to like these dogs, the fresh cut veggies and ample peppers, even had the celery salt.  I really did, I tried.  But in the end, the crappy buns killed it for me.  I can't say I recommend this place for a hot dog, but you never know, maybe the Subs are better.  They seemed to have some regulars ordering those!  But, Im not much of a sub sammich kind of guy.