The Clove

-Grubbing in Chicagoland
Excellent Indo-Chinese (and more) in Glenview

The Clove is a relatively new South Asian restaurant in the Northern suburbs but it also has a bit of history in the North Shore area. It opened in Glenview last summer but the guy behind The Clove used to run now closed The Red Hot Chili Pepper in Evanston which I visited Pre-Pandemic. 

Recently Opened in Glenview

The menu is split into two - there’s an Indian-Nepali and an Indo-Chinese menu. This is fairly common but what’s not is having two separate kitchens (and cooks) for each menu. The Clove is located in a large strip mall so there’s a nice amount of space inside including a full bar which along with the food is 25% off on Mondays. The Indo Chinese food at The Red Hot Chili Pepper was the best I’d had in Chicagoland so I had The Clove pretty high on my list but it took some time to find myself out that way. Well that recently happened not once but twice in the span of a week so I got to try a pretty nice portion of the menu and as I suspected it would be - the Indo-Chinese food here is excellent.

Gobi Manchurian

Indo-Chinese food is a blend of Chinese style cooking techniques with Indian spices and chiles. It comes from the Chinese community that was living in India back when it was said to be created in the 1970’s by Nelson Wong, the same guy said to create Gobi Manchurian. There’s a set of dishes you’ll see at every Indo-Chinese restaurant whether it’s in India, Pakistan, or the suburbs of Chicago and Gobi Manchurian is perhaps the most popular of them all. Crispy fried cauliflower is wok tossed in a spicy soy-garlic sauce but despite the name it has nothing to do with Manchuria in China. It’s said to be invented in India in the mid 1970s at China Garden in Mumbai. I’ve had my fair share of Gobi Manchurian over the years and the version served at The Clove sits at the top my list. First off it’s a dry version so it’s not gloppy from a sauce and it’s got a really nice spicing to it while the fry job is also done well. Resulting in a crisp and tasty product. I would highly recommend starting with an order. 

Dry Chili Chicken at The Clove

Chili Chicken is another dish you’ll find on every Indo-Chinese restaurants menu. It too comes served wet or dry depending on the spot but at The Clove they do both. Again I’m a dry guy when it comes to Indo style chili chicken. This can be traced directly to Yueh Tung in Toronto where they serve a legendary chili chicken that I still think about now and then (fyi the Indo-Chinese food in Toronto aka “Hakka Chinese” is as good as it gets). To me dry is better because it’s crisper and tends to be more intense as dry is the preferred way in places like Mumbai. I’ve been searching for something similar to the version served at Yueh Tung for years now and the chili chicken at The Clove is the closest I’ve found up to now. This is in big part due to it being dry when most spots serve it wet but it’s also got great flavor from the ginger and chiles, speaking of which if you order it hot they bring the heat.  

Manchow Soup

Just like its American-Chinese food cousin, Indo-Chinese is popular to eat in large groups. Usually you order for the table and get a few apps plus entrees and sides. Manchow Soup is another one of those standard Indo-Chinese dishes. The soup has a few defining features including a soy-based broth, strong use of garlic and ginger, and lots of chili flavor. It’s thickened with cornstarch and packed with cabbage, carrots, mushrooms, and a variety of other vegetables plus chicken, tofu and other stuff depending on the recipe. Supposedly the name has no meaning other than to sound Chinese. The Manchow soup at The Clove is flavorful and filled with a ton of crisp vegetables leading me to believe it’s made to order as they wouldn’t be that crisp if it was made ahead. The only thing missing was the crispy noodles on top that typically come with Manchow but all the crunchy vegetables made up for the lack of crunchy noodles (note: they were included on my return visit). 

Hakka Style Noodles at The Clove

The Hakka noodles at previously mentioned Red Hot Chili Pepper in Evanston were among my favorite noodles in town and they’re just as good at The Clove. They get a ton of wok hei in the flavor. You can add chicken or tofu but I like it as it is as it already comes with a ton of crisp veggies. I haven’t gotten to try the fried rice bc I can’t pass on the Hakka Noodles but I’m guessing it’s just as good if it’s cooked the same way with lots of wok hei given off by an extra hot wok. Momo Dumplings aren’t Indian-Chinese but the Nepali and Tibetan style dumplings pair well with the rest of the Indo-Chinese food here. I don’t think of Chicago as a great Momo town but the chicken ones at The Clove are as good as I’ve had in the city or suburbs. The wrappers are thin and soft and the chutney is on point. 

Chicken Momo Dumplings

On my initial visit I was with my wife who really likes Dal Makhani and any type of seafood curry. I'm also a fan of these things so we got an order of the Dal and decided to try the Goan style snapper curry alongside it. The former was good but not great, though it tasted even better the next day. The latter was really good. The coconut based gravy had a sneaky hot spice to it and the fish was perfectly cooked making them the perfect match for each other in the same way The Clove is the perfect match for Glenview. The space is large and clean while the food is fresh and flavorful. 

Dal Makhani and Goan Snapper Curry

The Clove Indian & Nepali Cuisine
1827 Waukegan Rd
Glenview, IL 60025
(847) 999-0862
Website

Pakistani Sandwiches

-Grubbing in Chicagoland
Five of a Kind: Pakistani Sandwich Shuffle

Middle Eastern and South Asian tea and coffee houses have really taken off in the Chicagoland area where we have large populations with connections to both regions. So I read this is part of a broader shift in U.S. beverage and social culture. This trend combines immigrant cultural influence with changing American tastes, community-oriented spaces, and evolving preferences around tea drinking. Tea has shifted from another drink to an experience, this as alcohol sales continue to slide. I’ve noticed quite a few of these places in the western suburbs where there’s already a good number of South Asian restaurants. I also noticed a good chunk of them were Pakistani and also offered sandwiches and such which is much more up my alley than tea so I set out to check some of these spots out and in doing so got a little more familiar with Pakistan’s interesting sandwich culture. 

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Chai Ho Jai (Naperville)

Chai Ho Jai is a casual South Asian Tea Room in Naperville. It serves flavorful chai drinks and desi style comfort food - a mix between traditional Pakistani/Indian street flavors and café style snacks. It opened to big crowds back towards the start of 2024. I visited one Sunday afternoon and it was packed with families. Chai is the big draw especially Karak Doodh Patti Chai, Mumbai Cutting Chai, and a Pink Kashmiri Chai brewed with spices like cardamom and saffron. I’m not a big tea (or coffee) guy but you know I’m always on the prowl for good food so I stopped in to try a Special Anda Wala Bun Kabab. This is a Karachi street food classic made with a dal patty (Split chickpeas) in a whipped egg coating and seared on a tawa and slathered with green chutney with heaps of red onion, tomato, cucumber in a toasted white bun. I don’t have a ton of previous experience with Bun Kebab but this one was similar to a Vada Pav which is a potato patty sandwich in India. Sometimes Bun Kebab is made with beef but the ones here are vegetarian. I also noticed how every table had paratha which they list as a signature item. It’s flaky and buttery and popular to eat with fresh sugar and raw honey. 

Bun Kebab and Parotta at Chai Ho Jai
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Niwaala Street Food (Lombard)

Next we head off to Lombard to Niwaala Street Food. The first of three spots in the area. It’s not a tea house but places like Niwaala are becoming common in cities across the States. They mix South Asian and Americanized dishes. Picture quesadillas, sandwiches, and wraps filled with popular South Asian flavors. They have options like a chopped Chapli Kebab sub and a smashed Chapli Kebab slider. I tried the ladder as I love the disc shaped kebabs popular near he Pakistan and Afghanistan border and would gladly return to try something else next time I’m in the area. I was intrigued with the Makhani sub which is described as “ground beef drenched in our house-made butter chicken sauce, white cheese and onions”. I picture it as some sort of chopped cheese and Sloppy Joe hybrid. 

Chapli Smash Slider at Niwaala Street Food
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Addah (Lombard)

The idea of Addah began on Devon at Usmania which is owned by the same family. They dreamed of a spot that brought the lively streets of Pakistan and India to the Chicagoland area. The menu is made up of popular tea drinks and street food favorites from both South Asian countries. Halwa Puri, Haleem, and falooda are most commonly mentioned in the Google reviews. I visited a year or so ago when they first opened and tried a few of their sliders which seemed popular based on what others were ordering that day. I think they may have expanded the menu since then but I was particularly impressed with the Hunter Beef Slider which comes with fries for $4.99. Hunter beef is a Pakistani style of cured, salted meat, similar to corned beef or pastrami, with roots tracing back to British colonial era in the Indian subcontinent. The Hunter Beef sandwiches I’ve tried over the years have been a bit different from spot to spot. At Addah it’s made from a stringier cut than typical corned beef but it basically melts in your mouth while giving off a ton of flavor from the spices. 

Hunter Beef Slider at Addah
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Cafe Bethak (Lombard)

Last stop in Lombard is Cafe Bethak. This Pakistani style halal cafe serves chai along with snacks and sweets. It’s a relaxing space where families can sit and sip tea and just kind of hang around for a little bit. They even have a little play section with toys for the kids. I stopped in here for their Chicken Club Sandwich which is a double decker sandwich made with pan seared chicken plus omelette, cheese, mayo, lettuce, and tomato. Club Sandwiches like this are very popular in Pakistan but they’re never made with bacon for obvious reasons. I returned here to try the Viral Paratha Smash Burgers which are big in Dubai and starting to make their way onto menus in the states. The Tribune listed it among their favorite dishes of 2025 but the extra compact previously frozen patty was a big letdown. 

Chicken Club Sandwich at Cafe Bethak
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Halal Smash Burger & Phillies (Chicago)

For our last stop we head into the city where Halal Smash Burger and Phillies has two locations. One is up north in West Ridge while the one I visited is in Lincoln Square. Smash burgers, cheesesteaks, chopped cheese and spicy fried chicken sandwiches are all very American as is the idea of a guy from Pakistan serving them up. As the name suggests they do smash burgers and Cheesesteaks here but I stopped by to try a Zinger Burger which is what they call a spicy chicken sandwich in Pakistan. The history of the Zinger Burger traces back to when KFC put a spicy chicken sandwich on their menu in Trinidad & Tobago. The Zinger as it was called was very well received and started to appear in other countries too but none of them adopted it quite like Pakistan did. KFC opened its first Pakistan location in 1997 in Lahore and the Zinger quickly became one of its most popular items, but it didn’t just stay a KFC product, it became a category of sandwich in of itself. A Zinger in Lahore is as common as a Chicago style hot dog in Chicago, they can be found all over. Same goes for the States where fast food grills like this are often ran by people from Pakistan. The Zinger is straightforward from spot to spot in that it’s a typical spicy chicken sandwich. So it depends on the quality of the chicken and breading and spicing and most spots that serve these seem to do a good job with all three things and that includes the version I tried at Halal Smash Burgers and Phillies on Western. 

Zinger Burger at Halal Smash Burgers & Phillies
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South Asian Food on Devon (2025)
Samosas on Devon (2023)
Bundoo Khan (2022)
Kababish BBQ (2022)

See ya next time @chibbqking