Venue Review: Morton's The Steakhouse SouthPark

Morton's of Chicago makes big impression

By Helen Schwab, food critic
The Charlotte Observer

Let's cut to the chase. The only question about Morton's of Chicago is: What exactly do you get for all that money?

By now, everyone who can read knows about the place, famous for giant steaks and equivalent tabs. And by now, everyone who can hand over a gold card without glancing at the bill has been there already.

So I'll write for those of us who must save up for a dinner like this. Worth it or no?

Let's quickly clarify the ``it.'' For two steaks, one beer, one glass of wine, one appetizer (split), two salads, two potatoes, a dessert designed for two and two coffees, we paid - including tip - $144.

What makes a meal worth the price to you? Pound-for-pound food quality? Perfect service and luxurious atmosphere? Is it the sum of small niceties? Or is what really matters the singularity of the experience - the knowledge you can't get this anywhere else?

You can't.

The steaks - we tried the 24-ounce porterhouse and 14-ounce double filet mignon for one at dinner - are the best I've had in Charlotte. They are USDA Prime, Midwest grain-fed, aged 2-1/2 to 3 weeks. The filet was remarkable, even to look at: a couple of inches tall, at least, beautifully charred outside and bloody red within. The porterhouse had the ruggedness you want, though even when you know you'll get - and want - a little fat, it's hard to trim it off without your brain jeering ``$29.95! $29.95!''

Beef plates include a watercress garnish - and nothing else.

If there's a single dumbfounding price at Morton's, it's the $3.95 tag for a baked potato. It is truly baked, with good strong Idaho flavor, and it is truly big at 1 pound. You can also have potatoes Lyonnaise (sauteed with butter and onions) or skins (the only truly awful item we had: slabs of soft potato drenched in butter).

A few well-chosen salads, nicely done, range from specials like beefsteak tomatoes with bleu cheese to a wonderfully garlic-y Caesar and run about $5.

Vegetables - steamed broccoli to marvelous sauteed spinach - are about $4 to $6.

So you're in the ballpark of $40 for a steak, salad, potato and vegetable. General manager Peter Grills says the average dinner check for food ( not including wine) is $41, so generally, people skip appetizer, or vegetable, or dessert.

A New York strip sirloin is offered, along with prime rib eye, tenderloin brochette and a 48-ounce porterhouse for two. Other dinner options: chops of veal or lamb, swordfish, fish of the day, Maine lobster, shrimp and chicken (this is a whole chicken, and it's $15.95).

All these are wheeled to your table by a server, who describes each in some detail, and can give quite a bit more if pressed. (For example, I asked - I had to - if the lobster, presented live on a platter, draws that duty all night, or if the kitchen rotates display lobsters. ``We shift them in,'' our server replied. ``They get weak.'' The current model was apparently offended, since it grabbed the back of the platter with its tail and tried to hurl itself backward onto the floor.)

Both this server and one at lunch were articulate, confident enough to recommend strongly (''Don't get the steak sandwich'') and agreeable to special requests. The only complaint here was a host who hurried past us several times as we waited for a lunch table (10 minutes, despite a reservation, at 1:30) without so much as a nod, though he chatted with larger parties. He did recover and ask how our meal was, in a perfectly warm way, some time later.

It was very good, as a matter of fact, and I'd recommend it for those who can't swallow the dinner bill. Try the gorgeous tenderloin medallions al forno, or steak salad. Sandwiches, pastas and other salads can be had, too.

Desserts at both meals continue the larger-than-life theme. Best was a perfect raspberry souffle; also excellent were a wedge of practically solid chocolate and an imported-from-Brooklyn cheesecake.

If I were a regular, I'd chafe at a few details. One plate for a split appetizer. No butter knife. A server crumbing the table onto the floor. A table bumped by passersby, and pepper mills banged down beside one's head. (For both these reasons, ask for tables other than the ones crowded in along the half-wall dividers.)

Morton's setting is big but not stuffy, comfortable but not precious - except for those pig lamps which, by the way, are available for sale. Wine storage is attractively built in, and wood prevails everywhere else. It's broken up by LeRoy Neiman sports prints, the Wall of Fame (mostly national celebs now, with locals to come, though Mayor Vinroot and Junior Johnson - a regular customer - have already made it), baskets of big peppers and enormous onions and the giant bottles of wine called magnums and jeroboams (Methuselahs to come).

Musically, the place is all Frank, all the time.

So is Morton's good? Yes. Very good? Yes. The place to get an enormous steak and to make a splash with a bill the size of a football stadium? Yes. But is it twice as good as anywhere else in town? No.

Two months after opening, Morton's is still the hot ticket in town. It is nationally known (i.e., your relatives in big cities will recognize the name). It's uptown. It has valet parking (if you park yourself, you might pass identifiable Panthers personnel; team headquarters are in the building). All of which falls under the heading of Making An Impression.

Take someone here and you will. One way or another.

*

Morton's of Chicago

Address: 227 W. Trade St. in the Carillon building, Charlotte

There is another location at 4331 Barclay Downs Drive, Charlotte.

Phone: 333-2602

* * * 1/2

Food: ***-1/2

Service: ***

Atmosphere: ***

**** = excellent; *** = good; ** = fair; * = poor

Notes: Seats about 180 plus two board rooms that can accommodate 6 to 15 each; a quite-complete wine list is offered, along with a good handful of by-the-glass selections

Entree price: Lunch $6.95 to $17.95, dinner $15.95 to $29.95

Hours: Lunch weekdays 11:30 a.m. to 2:30; dinner Monday through Saturday begins at 5:30 p.m. and kitchen closes at 11 p.m.

Credit cards: AE, MC, VI, DC, Disc

Reservations: Requested at all times, though allowances are made for walk-ins

No-smoking section: Yes

Handicap accessible? Level entry; restrooms accessible

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