Restaurant Review: Marvin’s Food & Fuel
Time and time again, we return to comfort food to soothe the unfortunate reality of a continued shutdown due to the pandemic. One spot playing heavily on the comfort and nostalgia aspect is Marvin’s Food & Fuel.
Located at 954 West Fulton Market in the West Loop, this casual neighborhood joint opened in the late summer, serving up familiar comfort food with a menu created by chef Mitch Cavanah of GT Fish & Oyster fame.
Marvin’s Food and Fuel currently offers TV dinners to go. These are not to be confused with the TV dinners sitting in the frozen section of your local supermarket. There’s no rubbery steak insisting on staying ice cold in the middle no matter how much you nuke it, nor is there some strange blend of ingredients labeled as pudding sitting in the corner of the tray.
The TV dinners available for pick up or delivery at Marvin’s are freshly prepared classic choices that you can heat at home. The turkey dinner features roasted turkey breast with brown turkey gravy, herb stuffing, and baked apple crumble. Their meatloaf dinner consists of BBQ beef meatloaf, whipped potatoes with Parmesan, and chocolate chip bread pudding. The Lasagna TV Dinner with ricotta and beef Bolognese, roasted cauliflower with pine nut gremolata, and berry crumble rounds out the current options available. Each dinner costs $15. You can order from the website Toast here.
Of course, Marvin’s Food & Fuel offers much more than their TV dinners. The menu is stuffed with an array of comfort cuisine perfect for getting through a when-will-this-be-over pandemic winter. Highlights off the sandwich menu include the char siu pork sandwich with daikon sauce, pickled jalapeno, and garlic aioli. Their take on the skirt steak sandwich, featuring provolone, spicy giardiniera, and horseradish cream, is a standout bursting with flavor. The pulled mushroom sandwich with Jax’s BBQ sauce and pickled red cabbage is one of the best lunchtime meals you can grab on the quick in the West Loop. And finally, Marvin’s burger with double smashed patties, American cheese, caramelized onions, and Marvin’s special sauce is a tour de force for burger lovers.
You can easily get by with the options on the starter menu alone. Particular standouts are the potato latkes tots with a smoked salmon dip, the grilled chicken wings with a Thai chili glaze, and the housemade pastrami platter with sauerkraut, mustard trio, and rye bread.
Despite the cold weather, the spiked ice cream drinks on the menu are well worth the extra chill thanks to the cool sweet mixtures in favorites such as the creamsicle with orange liqueur and vodka, chococo-loco with coffee liqueur and crème de cacao, and the pina colada with coconut rum and a blend of aged rums. Each ice cream drink offered at Marvin’s can be made without alcohol as well.
Marvin’s Food & Fuel is open Wednesday through Friday from 4 pm to 11 pm, Saturday from 10 am to 11 pm, and Sunday from 10 am to 4 pm.
ERIC KAPLAN AND DEAN’S TEAM CHICAGO
