A Love Letter to Chicago’s Unconventional: The Bar at Mariano’s on Broadway

Published in the pub July Edition

Beneath the squeaking escalators, adjacent to the grab-and-go deli and sushi stall, lies a bar that looks like a food magazine’s test kitchen. The Mariano’s bar, or “Club M” as it’s known colloquially, is located in the center of the grocery store’s first floor. I’m sitting at the bar as I write this, watching its stone top sparkle underneath the new-age fluorescent lights. From the self-checkout area behind me, the occasional and muffled beeps ring, sometimes accompanied by distant announcements of “deli department, you have a call on line one” in case you forgot where you were. The smell of newly-wrapped bouquets, assembled by flower section employees who don’t seem to want you around, nearly overpowers the smell of garlic potatoes and a single burger cooking on a grill.  I watch people rush through the surrounding hot bar, buying quick and easy meals. A woman takes her time eating a takeout container of sticky yellow mac and cheese that has a high chance of betraying her.

But, while the grocery store is hectic, Club M is where it all slows down. It’s a Friday night, and the bar and its airy seating area are packed. While the Mariano’s bar on Lawrence feels small and a bit upscale, this one feels like a sci-fi movie space bar attended by beings from distant galaxies. A DJ spins behind a cheese and charcuterie board display as a group of college improvisors pick at a container of spicy nuts and chase them down with the cheapest available draft. Within minutes of my arrival, a focused 30-something goes to town on a rotisserie chicken. That’s just a small part of the epic shit that goes on here. An upper level management type clacks away on their computer as if they were at a J.W. Marriot, and a gaggle of gay men—who look like they might’ve been their high school’s bullies—gossip over glasses of rosé. I watch as an older man travels from table to table to perform magic tricks at his captive audiences. They give him polite smiles and tepid claps as he pulls out what may or may not be their card. As a Chicago transplant, certain spaces around the city feel quintessentially Chicago in all its strange and “we are what we are” glory. Club M is no different, serving as a quiet but odd refuge from the chaos of North Broadway.

The drink options are approachable, served by bartenders who are either gay or should be. A list of the draft and frozen cocktail options is half-heartedly handwritten on papers stuffed by the register. Everything is served in plastic cups, an unfortunate part of a wine bar that doesn’t seem to have a dishwasher.  But I feel at home in the weirdness of it all. Where else can you eat grocery store sushi and throw back a glass of reasonably-priced wine? Where else can you take a field trip upstairs to reload on snacks and candy while working on your second glass of reasonably-priced wine? I decide that this is the layman’s Eataly.

In the seating area, by the far window, is a towering tree. I inspect its beautiful aerial roots as the DJ transitions to “The Tide Is High.” It’s a Banana Leaf Fig, a ficus native to the tropical forests of Asia. It’s known to rainforest ecologists as a “strangler fig” because its saplings root onto established trees and eventually take them over. The one in Club M though most likely grew up privileged in a greenhouse. Its beige roots trail down towards its massive grey pot, supplemented by pathos. Easily over 10 years old, it’s obvious someone takes good care of it. Not something I would expect at a grocery store bar—I wouldn’t think the Kroger empire would spend money on this. As I have that thought, I read a sign pitched in the neighboring schefflera, a plant that’s been around since the dinosaurs, that the plants in this bar are taken care of by a professional horticulturist. The schefflera is the same size as the one my mother has had since 1976.  

The seating surrounding the ficus and schefflera reminds me of a mall food court. I think about my nineties childhood, how it gravitated around the food court, how you and your pals could pound all the lo mein your hearts desired from the Americanized Asian food stall and sip on an all-sugar, 1% fruit smoothie from Orange Julius. It was a paradise. Maybe that’s why I’ve fallen in love with this bar: childhood nostalgia, a yearning for a third space. Or maybe I’m just a sucker for some large indoor tropicals.

I think about the dates I’d bring here. Sapphics love whimsy, and a casual date in a grocery store bar is pretty memorable. I’d say things like, “Should I get us a fried chicken drumstick to share?” or, “ Let’s order something from that cheese booth the DJ is trapped behind. Only a full-bodied Manchego and tasteful wine pairing will free him.” 

In Club M, it doesn’t take much to wind people up and get them talking. The gay man to my left talks to me about steamworks and being born in Brooklyn, while a very-Lakeview woman hovering to my right makes a misguided comment about Bad Bunny’s halftime show. She rests her hand on the back of the gay man’s chair and says, “I just don’t understand why everything has to be political now.” 

“It always has been,” he responds. We talk about the anti-war songs of Vietnam, and how being anyone who is marginalized in the U.S. is inherently political. She sips her rosé, thinks for a moment, and goes, “Huh, okay. Well, thank you.” To my surprise, the conversation is over. I wish it could always be this simple, I think to myself. 

The bartenders and patrons are what make this bar so special. Most of the bartenders have been serving here for years. Some of the regulars, of which there are many, have such strong relationships with the bartenders that they hang out outside of Club M. One patron introduces her parents to the bartender. Another patron stops by on their way home to give him hot tea. I learn, while sitting at the bar, that this bartender has attended two of his customers' weddings. I can’t tell if it’s the place or specifically this bartender who has such an impact on people. But considering the bartender’s sweet smile that peeks from under his cap, I think it might be the latter. I watch him as he makes some dad jokes, refers to everyone by their name, and caringly covers drinks with a napkin when the patrons get up from their seats. 

He’s warm but runs a tight ship. One patron, assumingly a regular, with an unlit cigarette in his hand and a thick Chicago accent, starts getting closer to people and mumbling in their ears. Not even a second goes by before the bartender tells him to park it at the end of the bar and not bother anyone. As he does this, a nice woman talks me into getting the garlic cheese from the deli upstairs. I watch her as she eats it straight out of the bag with a shrug, like a legend. As I take the piece she offers me, I think about how every time I come here it’s different. That this place has a beautiful flavor of odd, rarely replicated. I take another sip of my crisp and tropical New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc as I realize I’m not much different than these colorful characters.

Another regular offers me cold meatballs he bought to pair with his Decoy Merlot. “I did this ‘cause I’m Italian,” he explains, even though I didn’t ask. I laugh as he offers me another bite, pulling three forks out of his pocket.