Back in November 2025, one of the city’s most anticipated restaurants was this close to opening. Hooligan in Time Out Market from chef Christian Hunter, a2023 Michelin Young Chef Award winner for his work at Chicago’s Atelier, and local restaurateur Tyrone
Redic Jr. had already hosted pre-opening dinners in the second floor space of the Fulton Market food hall once occupied by Valhalla. Diners (read: this reporter) couldn’t stop thinking about the distinct point of view of each of the deeply flavorful dishes.
But then in January, Hunter and Redic Jr.’s dream restaurant was no more; Time Out Market announced abruptly that it was closing its Chicago food hall, shocking vendors who operated in the building. Fortunately, this story has a happy ending — or rather beginning — with the opening of an ever-so-slightly different Hooligan in Logan Square on Thursday, October 1.
“It’s been a long time coming,” says Redic Jr., whose resume includes Charlie Trotter’s, Grace, and Celeste. “Not as long for me as it has been for chef, but we’re here.” Hooligan takes over the Good Fortune space at 2528 North California Avenue, which opened in August 2019 and despite good reviews, closed in early 2020. “For six years, it’s been waiting for us,” Redic Jr. says.
For Hunter, Hooligan is a deeply personal restaurant. “With this evolution of Hooligan, I keep coming back to ‘grandmother cuisine,’” says Hunter, who was raised in Lexington, Kentucky, and went on to work at restaurants in the Hudson Valley, coastal Rhode Island, Charleston, and rural Connecticut, where he was named a James Beard Award finalist for Best Chef: Northeast while executive chef at Community Table. “I always want to combine what I came from, which is the food of my grandmother, mother, great aunt, and pawpaw, with the experience I gained through culinary school and working up through restaurants.”
Hunter describes Hooligan as a neo-Midwestern bistro featuring “Third Coast-contemporary” cuisine, in which classical French techniques embrace ingredients from the Great Lakes region. There’s the vidalia a la vinaigrette from the snacks section of the menu that nods to the vegetables Hunter often ate from his grandfather’s garden. For this dish, he takes a classic vinaigrette with tarragon and mustard and pairs it with a mix of roasted vidalia and candy onions, garlic, shallots, and leeks. It’s finished with leek oil and crispy leeks. “It really speaks to what’s coming out of the ground right now,” says Hunter.
His chicken liver parfait marries hot water cornbread, a traditional Southern pan-fried corn cake that Hunter reimagines as a hushpuppy, with pimento cheese, both items he grew up on, and chicken liver mousse. “This is another dish that pulls on some memory strings for me,” he says.
From the large plates section, roasted half chicken from Crazy Clucker Farms — “You can taste the quality, care, and love they put into it,” says Hunter — comes with a bistro salad and pommes grand-mere. There’s a choice of parsley-based sauce persillade or jus. Hooligan’s caviar service also keeps one foot in fine dining and the other in the South, pairing a dip made with paddlefish caviar from a producer near Hunter’s Kentucky hometown with sourdough chips. There’s a $199 four-course menu for two that starts with oysters followed by options from the small and large plate sections as well as a shared dessert and wine.
Beverage manager Aaron Michael Wells, whose background includes stints at Maxwell’s Trading, Coquette, and Celeste, is looking to Midwest and Southern ingredients for inspiration for the drinks. The bourbon-focused Burnt Harvest incorporates grits along with apple brandy, and chicory, while the Last Call combines cognac and Bénédictine with toasted buckwheat, coffee, and cultured cream. “That same passion that chef has towards pairing Midwestern ingredients with fantastic techniques is the same philosophy that we’re applying to the beverage program,” says Redic Jr. The tight wine list includes a dozen pours by the glass representing both Old and New World wines. Two spirit-free cocktails are served in addition to a nonalcoholic wine.
With a quick opening top of mind for the duo, finding a space that didn’t need much work was a priority. The 50-seat, 2,000-square-foot space that formerly housed Good Fortune was perfect. “We were able to walk in and make some quick modifications to make the space feel like ours,” says Redic Jr. “Also, we have this idea that we will grow into it, and this space really presented a canvas that we could work with.” The front room features dark blue walls, a royal-blue velvet banquette, and a dark ceiling. There’s a bar on the left side. Blond hardwood floors and tan leather barstools provide a pleasing contrast. Custom modern light fixtures give a soft glow to the space. While the front room relies on the bustling bar as its focal point, in the back, it’s the open kitchen that gets your attention.
Beyond his personal approach to the food, Hunter also expresses himself in his restaurant’s name. “Growing up, I always felt like the food of my childhood was looked down upon in some ways,” he says. “Hooligan is my pushback against what the standards of quote-unquote fine dining can be, what it looks like and who’s presenting it. We aren’t trying to stand out in the sense of being pretentious or fancy. We are going for authenticity.”
Hooligan, 2528 N. California Avenue; open 5 p.m. to 10 p.m. Thursday to Monday. Reservations available on OpenTable.
