South Side restaurant makes Food & Wine’s 2025 Top 15 list

CHICAGO (WGN) — A Hyde Park restaurant and bar has received national acclaim in the food industry, ranking as one of the best eateries in the US.

Award-winning magazine Food & Wine named Virtue one of the nation’s top-15 restaurants in its 2025 Global Tastemakers Awards. Virtue, located at 1462 E 53rd St., on the city’s South Side, specializes in American Southern cuisine.

“Chef mentor Erick Williams and then-rising star 2022 F&W Best New Chef Damarr Brown cooked together for years before they opened Virtue in 2018, which brought Southern cooking and warm hospitality to the South Side,” the magazine wrote. “They’ve both won James Beard Awards and a Bib Gourmand from the Michelin Guide for their soulful dirty rice and gizzards, stoneground grits with blackened fish, and salads scattered with crispy pig ears.”

The magazine also named Williams a 2024 Food & Wine Game Changer for his work in the community concerning the next generation of Black chefs and entrepreneurs.

Food & Wine’s top-15 list includes:

• 1.) Burdell’s, Oakland, California 
• 2.) Canlis, Seattle, Washington
• 3.) The Musket Room, NYC
• 4.) Lowland Tavern, Charleston
• 5.) Emeril’s, New Orleans
• 6.) Mr Tuna, Portland, Maine
• 7.) Yang Ban, Los Angeles
• 8.) My Loup, Philadelphia
• 9.) Myriel, Minneapolis
• 10.) Stissing House, Pine Plains, New York
• 11.) Nancy’s Hustle, Houston, Texas
• 12.) Penny, New York City
• 13.) Sunny’s, Miami
• 14.) Virtue, Chicago
• 15.) Oyster, Oyster, Washington, DC

Nationally, Chicago is no stranger to good food, and the magazine agreed, ranking the Windy City behind New York as the best to enjoy food and/or a cocktail. Among the top five were Los Angeles, which ranked third; Austin, Texas, ranked fourth; and New Orleans ranked fifth.

Click here to read Food & Wine 2025 Global Tastemakers award winners.

Virtue opened in 2018.