White Palace Grill may not have changed much over the decades, but its surroundings certainly have. Like nearby Jim’s Original – which also traces its origins to 1939 – it’s one of the few remaining vestiges of the port-of-entry Maxwell Street market area. It’s even older than the legendary Manny’s, two blocks away, which moved to its location on South Jefferson Street in 1964.
The White Palace Grill Is an "Oasis" of a 24-Hour Diner in a Changing South Loop
Kathleen Hinkel
April 7, 2026
The White Palace Grill has been serving regulars like Ron Humphrey for decades, even as its South Loop neighborhood has changed around it. Credit: Kathleen Hinkel for WTTW
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For a certain type of person, appearing in an episode of the hit show The Bear makes something a Chicago icon. Pequod’s, Margie’s Candies, Grant Achatz, Genie Kwon, Kevin Boehm: the showrunners know who and what in the restaurant business are valued in this town. But regulars at White Palace Grill, a 24-hour diner located at 1159 S. Canal St. in the South Loop, know there’s more to being an institution than appearing on a TV series – even if White Palace Grill will notch that accolade in the upcoming final season of The Bear, which filmed at White Palace this winter.
Longevity helps: White Palace Grill opened in 1939. So does continuity: the diner has only had three owners over its nearly nine decades of existence, having been purchased by current owner George Liakopoulos from near-original owner Arthur Bookman at the end of the millennium. Timelessness – an appealing way of saying a stubborn resistance to change – also might play a role, especially as independent diners slowly fade away. Even if White Palace Grill has bowed to some pressures – for instance swapping chicken for veal parmesan and offering online to-go ordering – it still has formica tables at its booths, coin-operated gumball machines by its door, and an exhaustive menu featuring everything from waffles to ribs, club sandwiches to omelettes, all at relatively low prices. The most expensive item by far is a steak for $31.99.
A location just outside of downtown near expressways and a door that never locks, 365 days a year and 24 hours a day, means White Palace Grill can be a lot of things for a lot of different people: students from the nearby University of Illinois at Chicago eating between classes, late-night revellers from the West or South Loop forestalling hangovers, early morning commuters, blue-collar workers on lunch break, nostalgic retirees, pre- or post-game Bulls or Bears fans.
“It’s Chicago’s meeting place,” says Joe Liakopoulos, who helps his father George run the business. “You truly get all walks of life. We’re open to everybody. We welcome everybody.”
All photos by Kathleen Hinkel for WTTW.
Once known for its outstanding view of the skyline, thanks to a difficult-to-develop railroad lot to the north, the White Palace Grill now stands amidst corporate behemoths that moved in as the University of Illinois at Chicago expanded and the South Loop became more residential.
But the diner still has regulars from the old days. 73-year-old Gregory Hill often ate at the White Palace as a teenager after seeing movies; for his last meal in Chicago before leaving to serve in the Vietnam War, he went there with a girlfriend. Now, 55 years later, the Marine Corps veteran still has breakfast there twice a week.
Gerry Romme, “91 and still going,” is another veteran, who requested to be photographed in his American Legion Post 42 hat. He frequently travels the 12 or so miles from Rogers Park for the “nice portions” and “good quality” at the White Palace Grill.
As old-school diners fade away, people like Romme or 23-year-old Red from downstate Illinois have to travel to visit them. The Palace Grill on the Near West Side, known as a place to spot both Blackhawks fans and players, is just the latest casualty, closing after some 85 years following a fire in 2024, and has now been put up for sale.
What became the Palace Grill was opened by Jack DeMar, who was related by marriage to Arthur Bookman, the White Palace Grill owner who sold to Liakopoulos. Bookman started working at the White Palace Grill after serving in the air force, then bought it and owned it for more than half a century.
Bookman also ran a chain of Huddle House Grills throughout the city before eventually selling them off, keeping only the White Palace Grill. “It’s a landmark,” he told the Chicago Reader in 1999. He died weeks after leaving the business.
Liakopoulos renovated and expanded the diner, nearly doubling the size and adding a mural by Scott Jackson that features famous Chicagoans such as Muddy Waters, Oprah Winfrey, Jane Byrne, Richard M. Daley, Michael Jordan, Harry Caray, and Mrs. O’Leary’s cow. (Daley’s father Richard J. Daley is largely responsible for the transformation of the neighborhood, having bulldozed a sizable portion of it to build the Dan Ryan expressway.)
Liakopoulos kept the retro feel and brought back the beloved milkshakes, which Bookman had taken off the menu to great lament in the ’90s. Two are enjoyed here by Vivian Williams, left, and her cousin Chandrika Collins, who was visiting from Missouri.
While the White Palace was closed for renovation, one regular told the Reader that he stopped eating breakfast: “There was no other restaurant where the waitresses knew my order the minute I sat down.”
Liakopoulos had plenty of experience with diners when he bought the White Palace in his 30s. His father Odysseas came to Chicago from Tripoli and found work painting bridges before joining a relative in opening a 24-hour diner in the South Loop. At age of 9, George started working at a different South Loop diner that Odysseas owned.
He operated the Golden Apple at Lincoln and Wellington Avenues for years before handing it off to someone else while keeping the building. And he reopened one of Bookman’s Huddle House Grills as the Hollywood Grill at North and Ashland Avenues. He still operates the Hollywood Grill, its neighbor The Hat, Griddle 24 in River North, and Panchos by the Harold Washington Library, in addition to the White Palace Grill.
While George has seen neighborhoods change and property values rise around his buildings, he has resisted selling to developers or big-box stores, and credits Mayor Richard M. Daley, a onetime regular, with helping to protect the White Palace Grill as large corporations moved in. George’s son, Joe, has picked up his values. “It’s an honor to be a part of this history,” says Joe. “You go in the diner, you’re frozen in time.”
“Diners, and places like them, promote democracy, bind us together and allow for cultural continuity to occur,” wrote a Roosevelt University professor to the Tribune in praise of the White Palace Grill after the paper published a story on the diner. “If you want good, old-fashioned comfort food, you come to a diner,” says Stephen Almandarz as he dines with Lauren Almandarz, his wife of 54 years.
“A diner, especially that one, it’s an urban oasis,” George says about the White Palace Grill. “It provides a sense of family and belonging. You’re going to be taken care of.”
Some of the people taking care of you are literally family, like the Liakopouloses or the Alexanders. Z Alexander and her daughters Jo and Mika work the late-night weekend shifts together.
“It’s your kitchen away from home,” says Dee Tyler, who came to White Palace with her friends after a Cardi B concert at the United Center. “And everybody’s nice,” adds Janine Pierce. (White Palace is popular with the late-night crowd.)
Brenda Sherman and Dilcia Claros have both worked at the White Palace for a couple decades. Sherman, who takes the 5:35 am Metra train from her home in West Chicago to work every morning, appears in the upcoming episode of The Bear filmed at White Palace Grill in February. She was also there when Guy Fieri featured the diner in the second season of Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives. (The films Backdraft and Mad Dog and Glory also filmed at White Palace Grill, in the early ’90s.)
Fieri showcased the short rib dinners and veal parmesan, but another popular dish is the housemade meatloaf, one of the $15.99 dinner specials, which also include liver and onions, Greek chicken, and a country-fried dinner.
“We have dependable food, basic food,” says George Liakopoulos. “This is not gourmet food. A diner feels like home.”
Diners at the White Palace Grill seem to agree, no matter the time of day. “It’s the comfort,” says Nadine Russell, another late-night customer who found her way to the White Palace with friends after the Cardi B concert. “A diner is a family-oriented thing.”
