5ifty Forks

****Culinary Students, The Art Institute, and a Fun Experience!***
This is a must try and fun experience!
A giant glass wall lets you watch culinary students hustle in the kitchen as they make your food. Fresh ingredients and a three course prefix for $ 20 really makes me a fan. Is the food perfect. sometimes!
~Pasta-​5 Stars
The night I came (last night), the pasta was one of the best Pasta dishes I have had. The noodles are made fresh and prepared perfectly. The texture and taste with hints of garlic and butter were amazing. I was in pasta heaven and nothing could have made this dish more perfect. You can choose your meat (sausage, steak or shrimp).
~Dining Experience 4.5 Stars!
You have to remember that these are students. The dishes do vary from class to class and are different every semester. They also use seasonal ingredients so the prefix does change. The students run both the back and front of the house. They do make mistakes but that is the fun of it. This is a fun and unique experience. Nothing is perfect and no experience is identical.
~Reservations are tough!
This is a class. They run a restaurant for 1.5 to 2 hours the days they are in class. Call ahead and check their Facebook page. Do not just show up here because they may not be open.
Overall, a fantastic experience for any foodie. Kids love to watch the kitchen… and so do I!
4.5 Star Experience. I am a fan!

This student-​run restaurant is located inside the Art Institute just to the left of the main entrance. They change the menu at least every quarter and I assume every day different students are working both in the kitchen and on the floor so, depending on the day you go, your experience will vary. Luckily they hit it out of the park on the day I stopped in for lunch (4.5 stars).
The space itself is nothing special, a dozen or so basic tables covered with butcher paper and some student artwork on the walls. Service was superb throughout my lunch; I was always politely asked how everything tasted after my first bite or two and plates were immediately taken away as I finished. There were only 3 or 4 other customers in the restaurant which probably aided the service being so attentive.
I ordered Zucchini Fries as a starter and a Smokehouse Burger as my main meal.
The Zucchini Fries were fresh zucchini slices deep fried in a corn meal coating with a smoked tomato purée for dipping. The zucchini was cut slender and was very tender and delicious.
The Smokehouse Burger was a thick & juicy beef patty, grilled medium, topped with maple bacon, pickles, grilled onion and BBQ sauce. Perfect flavors — they really nailed this burger. The bun was a bit more dense and «bready» than I like but it kept all the ingredients together. It came with shoestring fries which were the only faux pas of the meal — they were very thin and soft rather than crunchy. This made them too limp to pick them up and dip into ketchup. They had a good taste, however, so I ate them with a fork.
I also chose something off the dessert menu — cookies & milk. The 3 chocolate chip cookies were large and crammed with melty-​warm chocolate chips. It was a basic dessert done well.
Prices were reasonable and I was very pleased with my lunch. I only hope that when I come back I have an equally enjoyable meal. Note: Call first to check their hours as apparently they vary from quarter to quarter.