Best of Lincoln Avenue - Part 1: Cho Sun Ok

Every week I drive down Lincoln Avenue in Chicago all the way from the northern end at Howard in Skokie down to the Lakeview neighborhood and I have discovered the most amazing places and things that I want to share with you. So the first in my series, the "Best of Lincoln Avenue" is the Korean restaurant, Cho Sun Ok located at 4200 N. Lincoln Avenue.

My friend Esther recommended it and said it is the one of the oldest Korean restaurants in Chicago and her favorite. It's not a Korean BBQ restaurant just a regular Korean restaurant serving all types of Korean food. It's small inside and you actually have to go through the kitchen to get to the bathroom but that just makes it more cozy, plus you can see that the kitchen is run well and the meat is fresh. We were seated in a corner and apparently there are a lot of rules in this place, like you have to hang up your coat and put your umbrella in the vestibule and be careful of blocking the parking in the rear, they have a tv screen showing it inside the restaurant. Rules aside, the food was great and came with many typical side dishes. We forgot to take a picture of the food so here is a picture after we demolished our meals.

I had a vermicelli type dish with beef and it was delicious, I even managed to eat it with chopsticks and some slurping. So overall, I would say that Cho Sun Ok is my favorite Korean restuarant, outside of Korean BBQ which will be addressed in a later posting series on Chicago's Best Korean BBQ, which leaves you smelling smokey and like garlic for days and I love it!

For dessert we went across the street to the Red Eyes Coffee shop and Esther and Cathy split a piece of coconut cheescake which was well-portioned for them to share, and apparently very good. This corner of Lincoln and Berteau makes a lovely combination dinner and dessert option and will be tried again soon.