LOUD! Not my kind of place but had an interesting menue of great burgers. The beer was a bit above average. Service that day sucked (she forgot my beer)! Different but not my style. Rock on!

This the place where I’m considered a regular. They lose a point for ambiance, only for the d-bags that come in and ask for myriad pale lagers or blueberry martinis. This place is brutal and dark, but awesome. The burgers are the real deal, be it the Yob, the Kuma, the Slayer, the plague bringer, there’s something for everyone. I appreciate the neighborhood (and kuma’s is around the corner from hot doug’s, for a bar food nirvana), glad it’s here and not 8 blocks east. This place is always crowded, but we always find a way to get seated. Big Black has gone so far as to ask a patron to take their jacket off of an unused chair and moved it over by our group. Bonus points for being one of the few places in the city for Surly. Double bonus for only carrying PBR as the only pale lager. Triple bonus for playing excellent metal movies, i.e. apocalypse now, samurai films, etc. Know that.

Holy crap this place is the most metal of restaurants. I absolutely loved it. The burgers are mind-blowing and named after metal bands to boot. I had the Dark Throne, with chipotles and goat cheese (excellent inside metal joke) which is perhaps the best burger I’ve ever put in my mouth. The music is killer and the ambiance would make Corpsegrinder proud. I actually only went here because my friend insisted it was the greatest burger joint ever, so when I actually looked at the taps my head spun around. Surly Furious on tap was the highlight of my morning there, though the Bear Republic, Great Lakes, and Two Brothers brews looked pretty good too. I was there at noon on a Wednesday and got the last table. Evidently this place gets full very often. I worship Kuma’s Corner. I can’t recommend this as a must stop in Chicago for the beer enthusiast, but for burger-loving metalheads, this is Valhalla.

This place was jam packed on a Tuesday night !?!?. I found out from the guy at the door that they were featured on a local channel’s restaurant review program, so the week night crowd should vanish within a couple of weeks. Small place and difficult to get around in, but that will change. I hope the rudeness of the staff will, too. Their menu has foods that my restrictive diet won’t allow, so I won’t be eating here. Still, they have a fine beer listy both on tap and in the bottle, so I just may be back.

I visited Kuma’s for lunch on my way out of Chicago after a quick business trip, and I was pleasantly surprised. I would describe Kuma’s as a “heavy metal burger bar.” All of those words fit in the description: there is definitely a heavy metal theme evident in the décor, music, and staff; they seem to specialize in burgers; and they have a nice beer selection. I had a Ska Brewing True Blonde Ale and a Julius Echter Hefe (expertly poured into an appropriate glass by the bartender). They also had Racer 5 on tap and Schneider Weisse and Great Lakes products in bottles. All taps were craft beers and all bottles were crafts/imports (they may have had Pabst). I had the “Kuma burger” (any entrée with the establishment’s name on it is what I order), which was a giant bacon cheeseburger with a fried egg on it. It was decent, but the pretzel roll it was on smelled of maple syrup which turned me off (I had a touch of the flu, which may have played into this). Also, my fries were good, but a bit cold. I asked for some mayo for my burger and fries, to find out they had 4-5 varieties of mayonnaise (chipotle, horseradish, etc), which is a turn-on for me. The neighborhood is not a trendy one, but wasn’t scary either. The place is literally 2 minutes from I94, so was very much on my way home. My experience with the food wasn’t great, yet I’d still recommend the place.