California Avenue Has Quietly Become Logan Square's Other Dining Street

The storefront at 2528 N. California Ave. opened as Good Fortune in August 2019. It got good reviews and closed in early 2020. It then sat waiting for close to six years. Chef Christian Hunter and Tyrone Redic Jr. reopened it as Hooligan on Thursday, Oct. 1.

The rest of the street has a similar story. Logan Inn took over an old corner store at Armitage and California. Jinsei Motto moved into Testaccio's old space and kept its wood-fire oven. This year's California Avenue openings went into rooms that had a history, a few blocks from places that have been open for years. Together they make a street that stays open from early morning coffee to a late weekend cocktail.

Walking north from Armitage, by the hour

Start at the south end of the stretch and walk north. The addresses climb from 2000 to 2500 N., and opening hours change as you go.

1. Logan Inn, 2001 N. California Ave. At opening, Block Club Chicago listed the cafe at 7 a.m. to 4 p.m. on weekdays and 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. on weekends. The bar runs 4 to 11 p.m. on weeknights and noon to 1 a.m. on weekends.
2. Bang Bang Pie & Biscuits, 2051 N. California Ave. The shop's posted hours are 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. Wednesday through Friday and 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. on weekends.
3. Lonesome Rose, 2101 N. California Ave. Open 11 a.m. to 9 p.m. Monday through Thursday, 10 a.m. to 11 p.m. Friday and Saturday, and 10 a.m. to 9 p.m. Sunday, according to its Logan Square page.
4. Union, 2202 N. California Ave., and Lardon next door. Eater Chicago described Union as a New American restaurant and beer bar. Lardon calls itself an all-day cafe, salumeria and bistro.
5. Jinsei Motto, 2456 N. California Ave. A seafood and sushi restaurant built around a live-fire oven and Japanese oak charcoal.
6. Hooligan, 2528 N. California Ave. Dinner runs 5 to 10 p.m., Thursday through Monday. Tuesday and Wednesday evenings are for private events.

So the street now runs from a 7 a.m. latte at one end to a 10 p.m. dinner reservation at the other. The newest place at the south end stays open the latest. On a Saturday, the Logan Inn bar is pouring until 1 a.m., long after Bang Bang has closed for the day.

Three openings, three rooms that already had a past

Each new arrival found a building with something useful already inside. That's a big reason these places feel finished so soon after opening.

Logan Inn sits on the ground floor of The Logan Square SRO hotel at 2003 N. California Ave. Its owners bought that building and finished rehabbing its 28 rooms in 2024. The cafe and bar went into the corner storefront, a former corner store. Block Club reported that the team spent two years converting it, and neighbors stopped by and knocked on the door to ask what was going on. Co-owner Kiva Wenig and hotel manager Luke Blahnik own the building and both businesses. The lounge is furnished with antiques from Dial M For Modern and designs from Siren Betty, a local women-led company.

During the day, cafe manager Eli Dawson serves maple bourbon cream lattes, black tahini lattes and peach cardamom cold brew. Pastries come from Meg Galus of The Good Ambler, and the sandwiches are Italian-style on focaccia. Eater Chicago's fall preview added that the coffee comes from San Francisco's Graffeo Coffee. At night the room becomes a classic cocktail bar that focuses on creative takes on the martini.

Jinsei Motto moved into the former Testaccio in April. The large wood-fire oven left over from Testaccio's days now shapes the whole menu. Owner and chef Patrick Bouaphanh told Block Club that the oven adds smoke to the soy sauce and chars the vegetables that become sauces for the sushi and meats. Executive chef Eric Blanck helped expand the menu with wood-fired edamame, broccolini, mushrooms and a dry-aged Wagyu picanha. The concept spent 2020 to 2025 inside CH Distillery in the West Loop. The Logan Square room, with a full bar and a patio, is its first storefront of its own.

Hooligan got a room that had been empty since early 2020. Hunter and Redic Jr. first planned the restaurant for Time Out Market in Fulton Market. That plan ended in January when Time Out Market announced it was closing its Chicago food hall, as Eater Chicago reported. Redic Jr. told Eater:

"For six years, it's been waiting for us."

What the new rooms add to the street

The older spots already covered daytime well. Biscuits and pie at Bang Bang, Lonesome Rose's long weekend hours, and Lardon's all-day cafe and salumeria meant the south end of the stretch could handle breakfast and lunch. This year's openings fill the hours on either side of that.

Logan Inn gives the Armitage corner a 7 a.m. start and a late-night finish. Jinsei Motto adds dry-aged fish cooked over charcoal, a format the street didn't have before. Hooligan adds a dinner-only room. Hunter calls it a neo-Midwestern bistro, with French technique applied to Great Lakes ingredients and dishes from his Kentucky upbringing. Block Club reported that he described it as à la carte rather than fine dining, even though the dishes reflect his fine-dining training.

The opening menu, as Eater Chicago described it, shows the range:

• Vidalia à la vinaigrette, made with roasted vidalia and candy onions, garlic, shallots and leeks, and finished with leek oil and crispy leeks
• Chicken liver parfait with hot water cornbread done as a hushpuppy, plus pimento cheese
• Roasted half chicken from Crazy Clucker Farms with a bistro salad and pommes grand-mère
• Caviar service pairing scrambled eggs with paddlefish caviar from a producer near Hunter's Kentucky hometown
• A $199 four-course menu for two that starts with oysters and ends with a shared dessert and wine

Beverage manager Aaron Michael Wells runs the bar. His bourbon-based Burnt Harvest mixes grits, apple brandy and chicory. The wine list has a dozen pours by the glass, and there are two spirit-free cocktails and a nonalcoholic wine. Eater reported that reservations are on OpenTable.

Jinsei Motto still has more coming. In July, Block Club reported that lunch service and a downstairs late-night cocktail bar were in the works, with no opening timeline for the bar. WhatNow Chicago said the same month that renovations were underway. If that bar opens, it would give the north end of the stretch the same kind of late-night option Logan Inn gives the south end.

November has four Sundays without a market

California Avenue's daytime spots matter more this month because of the farmers market calendar. The outdoor Logan Square Farmers Market wrapped its Sunday season on Oct. 25 at 2620 N. Milwaukee Ave. Its indoor season doesn't start until Saturday, Nov. 28, the weekend after Thanksgiving.

Here's how the schedule changes:

That leaves Nov. 1, 8, 15 and 22 with no market at all. When the market comes back, it's on a different day, with shorter hours and at a different address. The market says the indoor season stays open on holidays.

On those four Sundays, California Avenue is open well before the market's old 8:30 a.m. start was over. Logan Inn's cafe opens at 8 a.m. on weekends, Bang Bang at 9, and Lonesome Rose at 10. On Sunday evening, Hooligan serves dinner from 5 p.m. That covers a full Sunday along the street, from morning pastries through dinner.

If you own near California Avenue and want to know how this year's changes on the street show up in what your home is worth, Kimber and Drew at KD Homes know these blocks address by address. Request a Free Home Valuation, and we'll walk you through it.