The only thing missing from Michael Kornick and David Morton’s nautical adjunct to DMK Burger Bar is an animatronic one-eyed pirate with a cursing macaw on his shoulder. What it does have is faux salt-blasted planks on the walls, a canoe hanging from the ceiling (are those seaworthy?), and a greatest-hits list culled from classic New Orleans oyster bars, New England clam shacks, and the extinct species of Chicago River fried-shrimp shanties. From a business standpoint it’s shrewd—alongside a trio of four-seater booths, the 18-seat cedar bar rectangulates in front of the open kitchen like a pair of beaver teeth. By the entranceway you can wait for a seat, drinking small, sweetish but potent cocktails or huge-headed Belgian beers inexpertly poured in—gasp!—mason jars.
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A deep Cobb salad might take up some digestive real estate too, with fat shrimp and hunks of crab claw (though the promised salmon and squid was missing from mine). But for the most part raw preparations like the changeable tartare and carpaccio and grilled catch of the day are mere snacks—perhaps meant to whet your appetite for a burger and shake next door.
2956 N. Sheffield
773-687-8177 fishbarchicago.com
