Welcome back to the Pop 5, featuring Chicago's best places to do anything and everything. Last week, we listed our favorite hot dogs in Chicago, and this week, we're still talking about our favorite savory spots, focusing on a slightly more expensive meat. Chicago has a wealth of amazing steakhouses, but the five below made the cut as our favorites.

  1. Super-sized steakhouse Mastro's (520 N. Dearborn St., 312-521-5100) is nothing if not opulent. Smoking martinis with an $18 price tag, incredible service, a piano bar, and some of the best prime red meats in the city, Mastro's is also an experience worth having . . . if only to remember the good ol' days of excess.
  2. Gibsons Steakhouse (1028 N. Rush St., 312-266-8999) was once the venue of performances by famous artists Barbara Streisand and Frank Sinatra. Gibsons took over and successfully maintained that very same grandeur that filled the space back in the '70s. The resto provides fine dining and an upbeat atmosphere and serves large portions and infamous entrees like the dry aged bone-in rib eye. Prepare yourself for one hefty meal.
  3. Rahm Emanuel, Kanye West, and Charles Barkley have been seen dining at Chicago Cut Steakhouse (300 N. LaSalle St., 312-329-1800), where you can up your iron intake with one of Chicago Cut's USDA prime steaks — dry aged for 35 days and butchered on site.
  4. Meat is an obsession at David Burke's Primehouse (616 N. Rush St., 312-660-6000), so much so that chef/owner David Burke raises his own meat, tending to his Black Angus Bull and her offspring to ensure that the dry-aged beef served at his steakhouse is as savory as ever. Primehouse serves up mean burgers and steaks that are well worth the pretty penny.
  5. It may be less than a month old, but Michael Jordan Steak House (505 N. Michigan Ave., 312-321-8823), which opened in The Intercontinental on Aug. 23 (Jordan's fave number), is already wowing with chef James O'Donnell's nine perfect steaks. Options include 28-day dry-aged 20-oz. prime Kansas City strip, a 10-oz. center-cut fillet, and MJ's Prime Delmonico, a 16-oz., 45-day dry-aged steak with balsamic ginger-vinegar jus.

Source: Chicago Cut Steakhouse