**** (4 stars)
If you don’t like little fishes such as sardines and anchovies you should stop reading now.
Still with me? mfk is definitely all about the style of fish you would find in the Basque region. It’s a lot like the pinchos we had in Bilbao. Nearly all of the plates are sized for sharing, so expect to order two or three per person, depending upon size and appetite.
The best items we tried were the ceviche and the aguachile. Both incorporated really fresh raw fish. Croquettes were also good.
The fideos was a good pasta dish, but it’s hard not to end up with very soft pasta when it is this thin. The dish we liked the least was the tortilla espanola, which had nothing to do with tortillas. It was basically a very fishy salt cod omelet.
The Basque cake was voted one of the best desserts in Chicago, but we didn’t find it all that special. Actually it seemed kind of dried out, but maybe that was just our piece.
Pricing is reasonable. There is a limited selection of wines, but they are perfect matches for this type of food.
Service isn’t at a fine dining level, with servers shuffling your used utensils from dirty plates to fresh ones, but it is adequate.
As others have noted, it only takes one loud person to make this very small restaurant very noisy.
mfk
432 W Diversey Pkwy
Chicago, IL 60614
(773) 857-2540
http://www.yelp.com/biz/mfk-chicago-2