Vin & Vic’s Pop-Up

About a 1 – 1.5: A pizza pop-​up? Yes! A Chicago-​style pizza pop-​up?! Whoo hoo, even better! Located in the Capitol Lounge, this pizza pop-​up is a creation by the Chez Le Commis (underground Arlington supper club) team, Victor and Tom — both are native Chicagoans, so I was super super super SUPER excited! Two kinds of pizzas are offered — deep dish and thin crust. Toppings include sausage, pepperoni, Italian beef, mushrooms, olives, sun-​dried tomatoes, green peppers, giardiniera, and onion. Besides the pizzas, there are also salads (Antipasti Salad and Burrata), Toasted Ravioli, Italian Beef Sandwich, Pork Milanese, and Popcorn Ice Cream. Some dear friends and I came here for the first seating, and we tried: the Italian Beef Sandwich (cornmeal-​dusted soft bread with thick-​cut Italian beef; I wasn’t a fan of this as it seemed more on the bland side; while juicy, it just didn’t have much flavor to it); a thin crust pizza (extremely overly well-​done, it was like a ‘pizza cracker’ — we just had pepperoni for the topping, but there was just way too much oregano (to the point where it seemed like it was a whole jug of it mixed in with the sauce); very hard to chew!); and, a Deep Dish with sausage, green peppers, and onion — this was literally like a Lou Malnati’s style, with tons of marinara sauce on top and extremely wet; the ‘cornmeal’-like crust was very dry and had an off flavor to it; the ingredients were extremely minimal, considering that the sausages and the like were each at a $ 4 additional charge!). I was actually pretty disappointed with the pizzas, as both were just not tasty and inappropriately cooked — definitely not a great representation of Chicago pizzas! T_​_​_​T Service was friendly, but extremely slow, and our server never checked up on us at all — we had to flag him down multiple times throughout our dining experience (for utensils, napkins, plates, and for the check). In addition, the water had an extreme off-​taste to it, but even swapping for a soda didn’t help, as the off-​taste lingered in their beverage system. Reservations are not necessary, as there is plenty of seating within the venue space. I’m glad I was able to check this pop-​up out but I wasn’t a fan!
+Chicago-​style pizza pop-​up
+extremely overdone thin pizzas T_​_​_​_​T
+very dry and marinara-​focused deep dishes T_​_​_​T
+minimal amount of ingredients at a steep additional charge ($ 4)
+extremely slow service T_​_​_​T
+located inside the Capitol Lounge
+limited residential parking around the area — watch out for permit-​only zones