We never know what to expect when it comes to our Readers’ Choice Food Awards these days — and we love it.

Since we started opening nominations to readers last year, the candidates we get for our Food Awards — which, this year, span from best new restaurants to late-night haunts to plant-based cuisine — are so geographically and categorically diverse, it’s clear that our small team of writers and editors could never cover the same territory as our readers.

This year, nearly 600 of you submitted nominations over a weeklong period in March. From there, we selected five finalists in each category (10 for Best New Restaurant), and nearly 9,000 votes poured in during the final half of the month. Readers showed their support from Chicago neighborhoods such as Washington Heights and Logan Square, to suburban Evanston and St. Charles and beyond.

For those wondering how much a single vote can matter in these competitions, know that just one point separated the winner and runner-up in the Best Steak category. Voters who returned daily to support their favorites made a huge difference as well, vaulting many of our winners dozens — even hundreds — of votes ahead of other finalists.

Read on to learn about our dozen winning restaurants, bars, diners, virtual kitchens and pop-ups. Want more favorites? Check out our Critics’ Choice winners from last month. You can also find all the winners since the start of our annual contest in 2011 in our searchable map.

Congrats to all who earned the recognition with another year of excellence in food, drink and hospitality through challenging times, and thanks to you, our readers, for helping shine a spotlight on all the delicious things Chicagoland has to offer. — Ariel Cheung, food editor

Best New Restaurant: Flippin Flavors

If it wasn’t for a City of Chicago employee, our Best New Restaurant might never have become a restaurant at all.

Co-owner Linda Flippin originally just wanted a commercial kitchen in Beverly to prepare her seasonings and marinades to sell in stores, she says. “But when I found the space, the city told me I needed to sell food with the lease,” Flippin says. “I thought, ‘I’ll just use the seasoning and marinades on sandwiches.’”

Linda and her husband, Brian, didn’t know they were about to open their first restaurant mere weeks before the start of the COVID-19 pandemic. “It was a step of faith,” Flippin says. “But I said, ‘Let’s do it. People still need food. We’ll run the orders to cars or whatever we have to do. We need to keep people employed.’”

The neighborhood quickly latched on to the shop’s freshly made sandwiches, including a turkey hoagie and a Philly cheesesteak stuffed with freshly cooked sirloin steak and gooey provolone cheese. The latter sandwich was so stunning, it was included in our list of the best takeout dishes of 2020.

Since then, Flippin Flavors has continued to expand. You can now find premade sandwiches at Living Fresh Market in Forest Park and at Sip and Savor in Bronzeville and Hyde Park. While the past few years have been challenging, Flippin feels so fortunate that customers responded. “It was truly a blessing,” Flippin says. “The world got to hear about us.” — Nick Kindelsperger

1848 W. 95th St., 773-253-2680, flippinflavors.com

Runner-up: Jinsei Motto

Best Chicago-Style Barbecue: Hecky’s Barbecue

Hecky’s Barbecue might be located in north suburban Evanston, but its style is pure South Side.

“My husband was well acquainted with many of the old pitmasters in Chicago, and, in fact, he worked with a few of them to refine his technique,” says Cheryl Judice, who opened Hecky’s with her husband, Hecky Powell, on Oct. 13, 1983.

Those South Side pitmasters transformed rib tips with fire and smoke into the defining cut of Chicago-style barbecue, and they remain Hecky’s most popular item, Judice notes.

What does it mean for Hecky’s to win the award for Best Chicago-Style Barbecue?

“It’s such a delightful boost following a very difficult time for the restaurant industry broadly, and for Hecky’s too in particular,” says Judice, now president and owner of the restaurant. “My husband passed in May of 2020 from complications due to COVID, and it’s been a struggle to keep the restaurant going.”

But people in the community have rallied around them in so many ways, she adds.

“When things get really tough, to know we can still win awards like this, and that this vote captures what readers think, it’s really quite an honor,” Judice says. “And we’re most appreciative.” — Louisa Chu

1902 Green Bay Road, Evanston; 847-492-1182; heckys.com

Runner-up: Lexington Betty Smokehouse

Best Nonalcoholic Drink Menu: Te’Amo Boba Bar

Mia Wan opened the first location of what’s become a mini bubble tea empire in Hyde Park in 2018.

In a sea of global chains, she started with her lifelong love of tea culture, then focused on organic ingredients, and created a beautiful menu that’s earned the highest praise one can bestow on Asian drinks and desserts: they’re not too sweet.

Te’Amo Boba Bar has grown to five shops in the city and suburbs, including a flagship in Chinatown. They offer far more than milk teas with chewy tapioca pearls. So it’s no wonder that Wan doesn’t pick just one favorite drink.

“I really like our Volcano Tea Latte, dalgona matcha and strawberry lemonade,” says the owner and founder. The Volcano Tea Latte, strong black tea topped with an Oreo cheese foam, has also become a fan favorite. And many early pandemic trend followers will remember dalgona as the virally popular whipped coffee.

What does it mean to Wan and her team at Te’Amo to win the award for Best Nonalcoholic Drink Menu?

“This award holds special significance for us as female entrepreneurs and a local business,” she says. “We are humbled to be in the finals alongside two fantastic restaurants, Esmé and Kumiko, both (of which) we greatly look up to.” — L.C.

2169A S. China Place, 312-857-8993; multiple locations; teamobobabar.com

Runner-up: Esmé

Best Sandwich: J.P. Graziano Grocery

Jim Graziano has loved sandwiches since he was a 9-year-old student in Norridge. While the rest of his class ordered $1 pizza slices for lunch, he would walk next door to buy a sandwich of provolone cheese, turkey, mayonnaise and shredded lettuce.

“To me it was like a fresher, more delicious lunch option,” Graziano says.

Graziano’s sandwich order has changed, but not by much — the provolone is sharper, the addition of hot sopressata and peppers spices things up, and he swapped in oregano and vinegar for the mayonnaise. (Pro tip: His Graziano sandwich isn’t technically on the menu at his shop, but customers in the know can order it with hot or mild peppers.)

Graziano is a fourth-generation sandwich monger. He runs a sandwich shop deeply rooted in Sicilian tradition and the old-school West Loop. He says he feels lucky that all he’s had to do is modernize an already cracked code. “My great-grandpa, my grandpa, my uncle Paul, my dad, Jim — they didn’t realize they were creating a brand, or what we would call a brand nowadays. But they were,” he says.

His team knows their customers, and knows their sandwiches. Customers can walk in, pay and leave, tuna melt in hand, without saying a word. In recent years, he’s been spreading the gospel of Graziano further and further, with collaborations on Home Depot hot dogs and the likes of Tripping Billy and his pizza pop-ups, plus the ability to ship the shop’s giardiniera, seasonings and an Italian beef kit nationwide.

He says his 10-year-old daughter’s sandwich order is a little bland: just provolone and hard salami. But Graziano isn’t worried; she still has plenty of time to perfect it. — Nell Salzman

901 W. Randolph St., 312-666-4587, jpgraziano.com

Runner-up: TriBecca’s Sandwich Shop

Best Plant-Based Menu: Spirit Elephant

If your first glance fails you at Spirit Elephant, look closer: Those familiar circles of crispy calamari aren’t what they seem.

Indeed, each item on the menu is served with a veritable vegetal twist. The meatloaf is meatless, the “chicken” never chirped, and those fried squid rings are really fried king oyster mushrooms.

“You walk in, and you wouldn’t know you’re in a vegan restaurant,” says owner CD Young.

The 100% plant-based restaurant aims to please herbivores and omnivores alike. Bona fide vegans can indulge in an array of ambitious animal-free fare. Meanwhile, those unsure of verdure can stick with approachable meat-adjacent classics, such as eggplant lasagna.

Young can empathize with dubious meat-eaters. Like many growing up in Iowa, she ate beef “six days a week,” she says. But she shifted away from meat consumption as she learned about the health and environmental benefits.

All that goodness sparked an idea: a “destination plant-based restaurant.” Young brought in a creative chef and a “chemist-like” mixologist and opened in January 2020, just as COVID-19 emerged. Business really took off a year later, when vegan social media influencer Tabitha Brown stopped in for brunch.

“It might’ve doubled our volume overnight,” Young says.

Last year, Young opened fast-casual Elephant + Vine spinoffs in Evanston and Chicago’s Lincoln Park neighborhood. At both concepts, the inventive inversions on classic cuisine — like the new No-Veal Milanese that substitutes lion’s mane mushrooms for calf meat — are more than enough to get vegans in the door. But with fun drinks, friendly service and good food, Young insists Spirit Elephant is for everyone.

Sometimes, meat-eating newcomers walk in skeptical.

“But then they leave going, ‘Oh my God, that was phenomenal.’ That’s the point. We’re approachable for everyone,” Young says. “We’re really good food that just happens to be vegan.” — Jake Sheridan

924 Green Bay Road, Winnetka; 847-348-9000; spiritelephantrestaurant.com

Runner-up: Fancy Plants Kitchen

Best Diner: Eleven City Diner

“Hot soup! Hot soup!” call the servers, as they hoist trays of piping Matzoh ball soup through the air above patrons’ heads. People sit at the old-school counter — eating bagels and lox, slurping milkshakes and malts, admiring the shining soda fountain and milkshake machine.

Soft jazz plays in the background, but owner Bradley Rubin’s voice carries clearly. “We roast our own meats,” he tells a customer. “Yesterday’s corned beef and pastrami is today’s corned beef and pastrami hash. Yesterday’s bagels are today’s bagel chips.”

Rubin says he’s fallen in love with the food industry, and it shows. He’s taken a classic Jewish diner and dusted the shelves, oiled the machinery, filled all the empty candy containers.

Eleven City Diner opened in 2006, and many of his staff have been around just as long. “We’re like family,” Rubin says. In fact, on weekends, his 81-year-old mother walks around from table to table, wearing a side-strap Bloody Mary bag (a gift from her son). When customers ask, she recommends the Eleven City French toast — challah bread, covered with bananas and strawberries and showered with toasted coconut.

“The world of diners offers so many different things to so many different people at so many different times of the day,” Rubin says. “Food that speaks to people that want to eat, commiserate or celebrate. I’m not looking to reinvent the wheel.”

Eleven City Diner might take the greasy out of the greasy spoon, but its eclectic sense of charm brings Rubin’s fans and fans of Reubens back time and again. — N.S.

1112 S. Wabash Ave., 312-212-1112, elevencitydiner.com

Runner-up: Irene’s Finer Diner

Best Steak: Gene & Georgetti

Asked to pick the best steak in Chicago, Tribune readers went with a classic.

But while Gene & Georgetti has been serving massive slabs of beef in an irresistible old-school atmosphere since 1941, the past four years have been a particularly challenging time for the River North steakhouse.

In October 2019, a kitchen fire shut down the restaurant for months, which required a thorough renovation. Unfortunately, the restaurant’s grand reopening, originally set for March 26, 2020, was delayed because of the pandemic.

“No one had it easy during the pandemic, but to go straight from a fire to the pandemic was challenging,” says managing partner Michelle Durpetti.

Instead of sulking, Durpetti says her team took the initiative to make the restaurant better. “There were so many silver linings in the moments that were not easy,” Durpetti says. “We got to consider who we were, what we were creating and how we could improve.”

Durpetti says the kitchen revised some recipes and now makes more items in-house, including the pasta.

“I think this is our best iteration yet,” Durpetti says. “There is always more stuff to improve in a restaurant, but I think we are in our best moment right now.” — N.K.

500 N. Franklin St., 312-527-3718, geneandgeorgetti.com

Runner-up: El Che Steakhouse

Best Suburban Restaurant: The Graceful Ordinary

Wife-and-husband team Megan and Chris Curren made a gamble when they launched The Graceful Ordinary in November 2021. They built not in Chicago, where the industry veterans could expect diners to take to their “modern colonial tavern,” but in the far west suburb of St. Charles.

The attention to detail they planned to bring to the dining experience wasn’t often found in suburban restaurants, they felt. But the couple bet that people love great food everywhere and would show up if they operated at the big-city level the duo had mastered.

“We didn’t scale back,” says Megan Curren, who runs the front of house. “We wanted to bring the same caliber of dining to the people of St. Charles.”

They built an elegant dining space that opens onto a riverside patio. They put in a 12-foot, wood-fired open hearth. And they paid careful attention to gracious service to make the place feel like a community meeting spot, in the same way colonial taverns, referred to as “ordinaries,” once did.

The hearth gives fine-dining-trained chef Chris Curren — who previously worked at Fulton Market Kitchen and Seven Lions — a chance to use primitive instincts and wide-spanning control of flavor, he said. He can char a steak, but he can also hang squab over the flames to cook slowly.

“We take ingredients that people know and that they understand and that they like, and we try to do them in a little bit different way than maybe they’re used to,” he says.

As quickly won regulars return, they get more ambitious with their choices, Chris Curren has noticed. They trust the restaurant, he says.

“I think that more than anything, the big difference between a citylike concept and doing something out here (is) ... really the sense of community, the relationships that have been fostered,” Megan Curren says. “That is pretty special to watch.” — J.S.

3 E. Main Street, St. Charles; 331-235-5803; thegracefulordinary.com

Runner-up: Adelle’s Fine American Fare

Most Impressive Cult Following: El Hongo Magico Taqueria

Bernice Vargas-Luna and Carlos Luna had no grand plan to break into the food business; they were just trying to figure out a way to deal with chronic health issues.

“Carlos and I went vegan a couple of years ago,” Vargas-Luna says. “He had gut and intestinal issues. I was diabetic, so I decided to try this change as well.”

While they had to make some big adjustments, they were astonished by how dramatically their health improved. Maybe other people, they thought, wanted food like this. “There’s not a lot of options on the South Side of Chicago to eat this way,” Vargas-Luna says. “If you’re vegan, you don’t just want a lettuce and tomato taco.”

As they developed the menu, they were inspired by their cultural roots, Vargas says. “We went back to some dishes my mother made for me growing up in Pilsen, and we realized that many were not animal-based,” Vargas says. The couple also took a trip to Mexico City, where they were astonished at the number of vegetable dishes. “We were going to the markets and seeing vegetables we didn’t even recognize,” Vargas-Luna says.

The two became particularly infatuated with mushrooms — hongos in Spanish, which led to the name, El Hongo Magico Taqueria. Pop-ups have been the perfect way to spark business, Vargas says, although they also offer pickup and delivery from their North Center kitchen Tuesdays through Thursdays.

“We’ve been able to directly talk to people and cook the food right there,” Vargas-Luna says. “There’s a whole community of people that choose to eat this way for their own reasons.” — N.K.

4131 N. Rockwell St., 773-217-8206, tacoselhongomagico.com

Runner-up: Tripping Billy

Best Next-Gen Asian Restaurant: Community Tavern

Opening in 2015 originally as a French-inspired “boutique steakhouse,” Community Tavern has seen a few reinventions. You may already be familiar with its double cheeseburger, lauded as one of Chicago’s best — it’s the sole item that has remained the same since husband-and-wife team Joey and Brenna Beato took over in 2018.

“People come in from across Chicagoland to try the burger because we’re on a list,” Brenna Beato says. But it gets them in the door, so they can sample the other seasonal, rotating dishes the kitchen creates.

Now the restaurant is devoted to American and pan-Asian dishes, drawing from chef Joey Beato’s background in French, Italian, Japanese and Korean cuisine. Launching this spring, Joey Beato’s latest seasonal menu will include baby carrots with kimchi; and CDK beef udon with baby fennel.

Many dishes are vegan or gluten-free, and Brenna Beato says don’t let the upscale digs fool you: The restaurant does kids-eat-free nights and strives to be a family-friendly space. It’s how they try to do their part for a community whose support kept the restaurant’s staff employed during their early pandemic pivot to takeout.

“We just really need to embrace our neighborhood, our local community,” she says. — Lauryn Azu

4038 N. Milwaukee Ave., 773-283-6080, communitytavern.com

Runners-up: Chef’s Special Cocktail Bar and Perilla Korean American Fare (tie)

Best Sweet Treat: Sweet Freaks Chocolates

For the Murphys of Chicago’s Beverly neighborhood, chocolate-making has always been a family affair. This spring, they’ll be celebrating 10 years of operating Sweet Freaks Chocolates, and also our award for Best Sweet Treat.

Owner Nellie Murphy thinks it’s high time the rest of Chicago recognizes what their customers have long known: Chocolate goes great with licorice.

Sweet Freaks’ signature treat is its cherry bites, cherry licorice dipped in Blommer dark chocolate. Murphy says her dad, Pat Murphy, the mastermind behind all their recipes, loved sweets but hated to bake, so he tried his hand at experimenting with covering different snacks in melted chocolate until something stuck.

“It definitely takes a little bit of convincing and I think that’s why my dad liked it — because you kind of have to sell it,” Murphy says. Now cherry bites are so popular, she says they dip thousands each week for in-store and online orders.

Sweet Freaks also makes chocolate-covered pretzels and Oreos, turtles, caramels and chocolate-covered fruit, and uses Chicago-based Blommer Chocolate for all its products. Murphy’s favorite? The Twisted Caramel bark: “It’s salty and sweet and crunchy — the perfect texture.”

Over the next few months, Murphy says they look forward to bringing Sweet Freaks candies to outdoor markets and home tours in Beverly, reopening the store after some remodeling and continuing to provide something sweet for Chicagoans to indulge in. — L.A.

9927 S. Wood St., 773-610-6320, sweetfreakschicago.com

Runner-up: Brown Sugar Bakery

Best Late-Night Haunt: Superdawg Drive-In

Newlyweds Flaurie and Maurie Berman opened what was supposed to be a one-summer hot dog stand in May 1948.

A brief 75 years later, Superdawg Drive-In has become an iconic destination, with car hop service in Norwood Park. Maurie and Flaurie stand immortalized as hot dog statues on the roof, beacons day and night.

“Everyone else has hot dogs; we have Superdawgs,” says their daughter, Lisa Drucker, now co-owner with husband Don Drucker and her brother, Scott Berman.

Each custom-made Superdawg is tucked into a steamed poppy-seed bun, then topped with mostly traditional Chicago hot dog toppings: golden yellow mustard, neon green relish, chopped white onion, a kosher dill pickle spear and, for a little something special, a green, pickled tomato wedge.

“We sell a lot of shakes and malts too,” Don Drucker says. “Especially late at night.”

A second location in Wheeling closes earlier, because there’s zero late-night traffic, they note.

But on Chicago’s Northwest Side, the lights stay on.

“We have a policy: We NEVER — in all caps — close early. Our lights are on to 1 a.m., 2 on Fridays and Saturdays,” Lisa Drucker says. “When you’re driving down the city streets, and you get to the corner of Milwaukee, Devon and Nagle at night, there we are, all lit up.

“Even after we close,” she adds. “If somebody comes up and says ‘Oh, can’t I still have a Superdawg?’ If we still got ’em, we’ll serve ya.” — L.C.

6363 N. Milwaukee Ave., 773-763-0660, superdawg.com

Runner-up: Redhot Ranch

food@chicagotribune.com

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