First SDCA Board meeting of 2024 at the US Grant’s Grant Grill

Posted By wpcreative | 1 March 2024

The US Grant Hotel

A survivor of changing times, a grand beauty that has defied the odds as it has embraced a historic past while simultaneously keeping up with the modern age.

I remember the hotel’s signature dining room, The Grant Grill from long ago, a last bastion of old school fine dining, of leather booths, rich wood paneling, and thick linens.

Today, that memory has been gracefully softened with deco nuances, while the wonderful cuisine, storied service, and even the crisp white linens still grace freshly set tables.

The Grant Grill kindly hosted our first SDCA board meeting on Thursday. There was lots of work to be done as the team, and with the guidance of President Kinkelaar, an outlined vision for 2024 came into focus under the motto “Elevating each other.” We look forward to sharing our first steps with all our members at the next general meeting.

Executive Chef, Mark Kropczynski, has taken The Grant Grill’s classic menu into wonderful new territory.

We were offered a tasting of some of their limited run dishes that were playing concurrently with the Broadway performance of CHICAGO at the Civic Theater.

The dishes were themed to the play in different ways. Three stand out.

The pate was the second I had tasted that very day (honestly, not a normal occurrence in my life). Its presentation was far more simplistic than its predecessor, but its flavor and that of the homemade brioche that came with it absolutely blew me away!

While the oysters Rockefeller was the best I had in many, many years!

And thanks to the chef, I now have a newly discovered admiration for sweetbreads (exclusively crafted for our group) purely due to culinary skill!

Enormous thank yous are due! Manager Kimberly Corgan, Chef Kropczynski, and to all your staff, seen and unseen, thank you for your great hospitality. Your pride in service is openly visible, and we are grateful.