Lakeview

Last updated on October 6, 2024.

Lakeview is a neighborhood on the North Side of Chicago. It’s a heavy residential area with a string of good restaurants and a baseball team you might have heard of.

History of Lakeview

Lakeview was historically a camp and trail path for the Miami, Ottawa, and Winnebago tribes. The area was first settled by Europeans in 1837. Conrad Sulzer of Winterthur, Zürich, Switzerland, was the first known European resident. Immigrants from mostly Germany, Luxembourg, and Sweden followed.

Lakeview became a township in 1857 and the town hall was at present-day West Addison and North Halsted. It included all land east of Western Avenue between Devon and North Avenue. The township was absorbed by Chicago in 1889.

Wrigley Field

Iconic Wrigley Field is the home of the Cubs and one of the symbols of Chicago. It opened on April 23, 1914, as Weeghman Park and has written its place into baseball lore ever since. It seats 41,649 people and was designated a National Historic Landmark on September 23, 2020. I’ve been to several events there besides Cubs games. I’ll elaborate and add more pictures as soon as I have a chance, but for now, information on this post is limited.

On the lower concourse are the plaques of Chicago Cubs players enshrined in the National Baseball Hall of Fame. Outside the stadium at Gallagher Way, visitors can admire statues of Cubs legends including Fergie Jenkins and Ernie Banks (1931-2015).

Where to Eat in Lakeview

I’ve been to a handful of places in Lakeview, mostly during my time living in the city. For this post, I’ll only include restaurants I’ve visited since 2015. I’ll add more if I eat in the neighborhood on future trips home.

Las Tablas

When I was home from Colombia, I wanted to take my family to experience an authentic Colombian meal. The best place to do that in Chicago is Las Tablas.

Las Tablas has been around since 1991 and has two locations – 2942 N. Lincoln Ave. in Lakeview and 4920 W. Irving Park Rd. in Portage Park. All of my visits have been to the Lakeview location.

With a lively atmosphere, friendly service, and colorful interior, Las Tablas brings the spirit of Colombia to Chicago. The reasonably priced menu is also enticing, bringing together traditional Colombian dishes from several different regions of the country. If you’ve never experienced Colombian food before, Las Tablas is a great place to start. I guarantee you’ll enjoy the unique flavors Colombia has to offer. Just bring an enormous appetite and get ready for a fun meal.

Our Dinner at Las Tablas

After taking a while to decide on several mouth-watering choices, we finally put in our order. For dinner, two of us ordered the bandeja paisa, a traditional Colombian mishmash of steak, chorizo, chicharron, beans, plantain, avocado, rice, and a fried egg. Always delicious, it’s got food coma written all over it and is something you have to prepare yourself to eat.

One person ordered the entrana (char-broiled skirt steak) and another had the pollo relleno (chicken breast stuffed with spinach and cheese). Both were very happy with their meals.

For starters we ordered empanadas and I asked the waiter to bring us a large order of ajiaco (a traditional soup from the Bogotá area) to share. Everyone raved over both, but especially the unique flavor of the ajiaco.

Drinks at Las Tablas

There’s a huge variety of alcoholic and non-alcoholic drinks available at Las Tablas. We all shared a pitcher of sangria. On previous visits I had a refajo, which is Colombiana soft drink mixed with beer. Fresh juices are also on the menu including ones I never expected to find in America, such as lulo and guanábana. On another visit, we tried the mojitos, which are considered to be among the best in Chicago.

Map of Lakeview