Over the last 15 years or more I've been to this establishment maybe 4-5 times; each time I go, I…read moreremember why it's been years since my last visit and I tell myself it wasn't worth it to return when there are so many other options available. This place is incredibly expensive for what you get with regard to the food and the service (or essentially lack thereof). At this time, full simple sandwiches are $12-14 with no sides included (think typical ham and turkey with cheese, tomato, and lettuce with mayo on it that you can make at home), and soups are nearly $8 for a cup and $9 for a bowl. The sandwiches (and "Mexican" fare) have fresh ingredients, but are very mediocre and bland tasting given their simplicity--not remotely worth that price. The high pricing isn't to cover wait staff/cleaning staff or maintaining the facility itself. Orders are taken at the counter and you await to hear your name called to get your food yourself, then rid of all your waste yourself before leaving. The entire dining room was dirty with crumbs on all tables, chairs, and the floor. The trash was full, and the bathroom toilet and urinal both had unflushed waste in them. The place was not busy as it was later afternoon; there were plenty of staff available to keep an eye on the dining room to ensure, at the very least, that the tables and chairs were clean and the trash wasn't full. The building itself is old with a lot(!) of unfinished and inaccessible areas, basic/old tables with cheap "decor". So for over $52 today my spouse and I had two very basic sandwiches, two bowls of semi-warm soup, and two large drinks in a dirty basic dining room after ordering and retrieving the food ourselves. With that price, you'd think the place would be minutely updated and certainly should be cleaner, there would be wait staff, and the food would have much more flavor with much more to it. There are several other places in Monticello to get great tasting food with included sides, cleaner facilities and wait staff, all for less than the price of a basic sandwich that you get here. I love to support small businesses and the staff were certainly friendly so I feel a bit guilty for this review, but this needs to be said about this incredibly overhyped place. This time I won't forget why I infrequent this establishment and won't be back.

Thanks to Yelp, I found the Brown Bag Deli in Monticello while there for visit to Allerton Park one…read moreSaturday, and enjoyed our lunch there. First off, there is a bit of a wait for your order, but trust me, it's worth it. We were there at a prime Saturday lunch hour and the wait was a bit long but I have to tell you, these are REAL 'sandwich artists' that work for this great little place, and they take great care with your order. Plenty of sides to choose from, drinks and homemade pie for dessert, too! I do not order Tuna Salad out bcz I'm always disappointed but I took a chance here at the BBD, and wow did I enjoy my meal. White bread, Tuna Salad, onion and pickle...SO DELICIOUS!!! I was very full after eating the sandwich too. Hubs had the Dagwood Special and totally enjoyed it. Bypass the fast food across the street and visit this great little diner in downtown Monticello. You will be happy you did!

The running joke of the ice cream machine not working started at this McDonald's. Jokeread more

The service is terrible especially for DoorDash drivers. Waited an additional 20 minutes after the…read moreorder was supposed to be prepared.

I've worked in monticello for decades, we stopped going to this DQ after it was sold as the new…read moreownership group is absolutely horrible. We ordered tonight for the 1st time in a good 5 years online with the app. It charged my card, were told at the window it would be 5 minutes, then came to my car and said they cancelled the order, wouldn't tell me why but they cancelled it. I verified my card was charged. Going to pick my family up a pizza and I will never go back there as the idiots running the show have not changed at all.

Just got a hot dog and the bun must have been left over from WWII. Let's do better than this DQ…read more For almost $4 I expect a fresh hot dog bun!!!

My sister and I stopped here on a road trip from Iowa to Kentucky. We like to use Yelp to find…read morelocal establishments to eat at. The food was average. It was tasty but average. The french fries were actually really good. Very large portions of french fries. My sister and I could've shared one order. I had the grilled cheese sandwich and my sister had the chicken sandwich. The crust on the chicken sandwich was perfect. The grilled cheese sandwich was just average. The people were really nice. I don't have any regrets about stopping. They have a large variety of shakes, drinks and a great burger menu. I'd recommend to stop here if you're in the area and you like burgers. It is a smaller establishment. The ambience is just average too. Nothing fancy nor gross. Just average.

Placed a to go order while we were in town visiting family. They have been saying they love the…read moreburgers so we decided to get burgers and fries for dinner. I got the mozzarella burger with grilled onions, mayo and mustard with salt. I was nervous bc I was the only one that didn't order a double burger but the single was enough. Love that the burger hangs out beyond the bun. There was a good amount of cheese and onion. The salt was just right. Mayo and mustard were good too. Sometimes you just don't get enough but I found it to be the proper amount. Ordered the family size fries and they fed 5 of us with leftovers. The fries were pretty good and crispy too considering they went on a 20 minute journey in the bag back to the house. Would definitely eat here again.

Ordered a $10 chicken salad on white bread....i got chicken salad on two pieces of white…read morebread....no lettuce, no tomatoes no nothing. I should have known as I was the only one in the place at lunchtime today, July 16, 2024. I should've gone to Subway.

This place is mid. We stopped coming back from Chicago since it had good reviews…read more The lady at the counter was nice. Our food took a pretty long time to come out considering we got sandwiches. When we did get our sandwiches, one was completely wrong. We decided it wasn't worth waiting another 15-20 minutes for a new one. The sandwiches themselves were fine. Nothing amazing, nothing terrible. Personally I didn't love the environment. If you don't like nonstop Christian music and groups of women loudly cackling in the corner, this probably isn't your place. They did have cool snacks in their store and the desserts looked good but we didn't try any. Edit to add the bathrooms were really clean and they also had Narcan in both the men and women's which I think is a really cool way to keep an eye out for your neighbors.

Best catfish I've ever had! Light and crispy! I don't know how they do it…read more Friendly staff. A real Midwest atmosphere.

Fantastic fish dinners. I had their catfish filled dinner with fries. Very good at a great price!!read more

Meh. Expected more. The meat was dry and the taste was uneventful for as long at the line was...read more

I have been there 2 times in the last week. New owners have changed the food…read more Hamburgers the first time had a weird flavored bun. Steak sandwich tonight was cubed steak not ribeye like the previous owner used! It was tough and hard. Not good. We won't be back! Milkshake was delicious, haven't changed.

Amazing food, great prices and wonderful workers. We live down the road and eat here awful.read more

After seeing this restaurant pop up on commercials as the best burgers in central Illinois 100…read moretimes on a Cardinal Cub game, I decided to give it a shot and see if there was any validity to their claim. There was not.... Pulled up and ordered a double cheese burger with everything and a French fry and large Coke. Their pricing is way more expensive than any other independent burger joint and they nickel and dime you pretty hard on the items. 70 cents more for lettuce and tomato each, which I understand and that's typical for most restaurants anymore. $4.35 for a French fry that was old and tasted like it had sat under a heat lamp for an hour wasn't worth it. Their large drink was a medium and it was like $4-5 too, but the coke had the worse metallic taste to it like the lines were serious dirty. Was undrinkable. So you are looking at $20 before tax just for a "combo" which they don't offer... Let's get to the sandwich- it wasn't special and for $9.35 for just the meat, cheese and bun wasn't worth it either. They put condiments on the bottom bun which made it a soggy mess and when I went to pick it up, it was like wet dough because how soggy it was. Pretty sure it was one single slice of cheese and the burgers weren't thin and crispy but seemed like they try to make them like that, but I am guessing the size of each patty was 5-6 oz each maybe, so that is more meat than other typical independent restaurants. It almost tasted like charred or burnt and just wasn't special. Would I return? No, it's not worth the drive or the price for their products because everyone of them Had issues and was the most expensive "combo" I've bought at a tiny local burger joint.

We were so glad to find a Portillo's on our vacation. We had visited them in Florida a few years…read moreback and really liked the food. This one in Champaign was just as good. I got the Italian beef with sweet & hot peppers with the gravy on the side (I don't like my sandwich falling apart on me) and french fries. My husband got the hot dogs, which came dressed with a dill pickle, tomatoes, and hot peppers, and a side of onion rings. We also splurged with the yummy-looking desserts (strawberry shortcake and lemon cake) in the cooler near the register. Everything was so good. The beef (which there was plenty of!) had so much flavor even without the gravy. The bun it was on was hearty enough to hold it. The hot dogs tasted good quality. The fries were good (not at all greasy), and the onion rings had such a good flavor, not overly breaded. The desserts were a perfect ending. The restaurant was very clean (including the bathrooms). There was someone cleaning something (including the walls) the entire time we were there. I wish we had one closer to where we live here in Ohio!

I'm giving it 2 stars instead of 1 because even after they screwed up our simple order, at least…read moreone employee came to the table to try to rectify the situation when she knew I was absolutely fuming. All I can say is it'll take a miracle for Brendon, the manager in training, to Ever be a decent mgr. As I was stating my disdain over the ridiculous errors with our order he kept saying, "I gotcha." over and over and each time I had to tell that no he didn't or we wouldn't have had the issue to begin with. I seriously had to say STOP SAYING THAT, you're not making it any better, so just STOP!! How difficult is it to make a burger as the customer requests with lettuce, tomato, mayo and catsup? After ordering my beef sandwich, double dipped with sweet peppers I ran back to the counter to ask one of the workers to please cut the beef sandwich in half, to which he said, of course in such a way as why yes, of course anyone would want a large beef sandwich cut in half. Our number was called, we bring the order to the table and the beef sandwich is not cut in half. I'm talking the LARGEST size they make. Instead, they cut the burger in half and screwed up the toppings. No catsup, but onion instead, tiny piece of tomato, so much mayo it was dripping out of the bun. The only thing they really got right was the lettuce. When I took my beef sandwich up to get it cut that's when the real fun began. They wanted to make the beef sandwich over without even asking me if it was dipped or not, etc. I said, no just cut it in half. I could go and on about the ineptitude and how it took me to a fever pitch of anger, but maybe, just maybe the mgr will read this and see why a simple order could be screwed up so badly and RETRAIN his staff. I was offered cake as restitution and a refund. I just wanted to eat my food as ordered and not hear anymore I gotcha's from Mr Don't Got it. I later learned Thursday is training day. So do yourself a favor, don't ever go there on Thursday. You'll encounter a mess of epic proportion and be sorry you didn't take my warning. I know I'll never return no matter the day. It's not worth getting angry and upset. This encounter ruined the experience to the point I didn't even want to eat my food. BTW, if you double dip a beef sandwich, the bread shouldn't be dry. The mgmt here stinks to high heaven and Dick Portillo who founded this 50 some yrs ago in Chicago would be appalled.

Every single time I go there they NEVER disappoint. Food is always very good, atmosphere very…read morepleasant

The contrived Pinterest-board presentation almost makes up for the complete lack of flavor. Almost…read more I ordered 7 items. The onion rings weren't seasoned. They weren't even salted. One of the fried green tomatoes was smaller than my thumbnail. I was genuinely excited to see how they'd incorporate Mediterranean flavors into a burger instead of just turning it into another chicken sandwich. I thought, I'm ready to be impressed. Show me how you're going to bridge a balsamic glaze into a burger & make it work. They didn't. It didn't work. It was trash. Apparently, the secret ingredient in everything I ordered was balsamic glaze. If I'd ordered 100 McDonald's chicken nuggets & put my own balsamic glaze on them, I would've had a better experience. The only thing I ordered that was actually seasoned was the steak fries. I paid an extra $10 for the entrée-sized portion, & those were genuinely tasty. I absolutely would not say they were worth $10, though. Great presentation. Terrible execution.