One time we took a family bike trip down the south end of the lakefront and exited around Hyde Park, looking to grab a bite. Somehow we found ourselves in what advertised itself as a bagel shop but was somehow also a barbecue sitdown restaurant… but most of all, it was one of those restaurants where there’s a weird funereal pall hanging over everything and the staff seems like they’ve just awakened from their tombs to welcome you, forever and ever and ever… If you’re from Hyde Park, you’ve already guessed that we’re talking about the legendary Orly’s at 1660 E. 55th, which somehow lasted thirty years, morphing from deli to barbecue to Cajun restaurant at different times, despite the fact that it was apparently impossible to find anyone who ever ate there a second time. Or maybe that’s just the jaundiced view of the blog Hyde Park Progress, who chronicled the changing concepts of the spot here (be sure to read the comments for the full whackdoodle flavor), sparking an ongoing war with owner David Shopiro. (Here’s a more empathetic account from 2009.)
Orly’s, at that point reconcepted as The Big Easy, entered the broader consciousness briefly in 2010 when it hired a chef named Jennifer Gavin, fresh off the TV show Hell’s Kitchen (which apparently counted as celebrity chef-dom then), to revamp its menu, only for Shopiro to fire her almost immediately for allegedly being more into celebrity than his restaurant (apparently she was talking on the phone and didn’t hang up immediately when he wanted to speak to her). Otherwise it was just Hyde Park’s little secret of a crazy aunt in the attic, until it closed at some point in the recent past. Now something else seems to be coming to the space, and according to Hyde Park Progress, whoever it is seems keen to let customers know that it’s a clean break with the past, judging by the sign in the window: “Re-Opening Soon Under Sane Management.” [HPP]
