Fat Rosie’s

By Naperville Magazine
September 2025 View more Table for Two

By Phil Vettel

Celebrating restaurant numero siete for this festive chain

I’m sitting in the Oak Brook location of Fat Rosie’s, and after a raucous version of “Happy Birthday to You,” sung by the staff and directed at the party at the table adjacent to mine, one staffer turned to me. “We tried to keep it down,” he said, apologetically. Keep it down? Why would anyone want to do that? Why would anyone even try?

Fat Rosie’s, which now has seven locations in the western suburbs (downtown Naperville among them), is emphatically not about “keeping it down.” It’s about celebration. It’s large parties, large portions, loud music (often live mariachi), and flat-out fun.

“Fluent in Fiesta” is their motto. Which includes a roaming photographer, a stack of sombreros to help embellish the photos, and Monday-to-Friday happy hours (excuse me, Fiesta Hours) with discounted appetizers, margaritas, mocktails, and cervezas.

If you’ve ever visited a Señor Frog’s, the tourista-friendly chain in Mexico (and half a dozen locations in U.S. beach towns), Fat Rosie’s goes for a similar vibe. Vibrant colors, jumbo margaritas, tequila shots, and more. Similar energy, no passport necessary.

The concept was created by Scott Harris (Mia Francesca, Davanti Enoteca, Vinny’s Clam Bar, to name a few), the menu tweaked by Dudley Nieto (who has had a hand in more Chicago Mexican restaurants than I can remember). Fat Rosie’s has since been acquired by the Houston-based Mas Mex group, but Harris remains on the Fat Rosie’s board.

The Oak Brook spot, 3011 Butterfield Road, is Fat Rosie’s newest location (there will be more) and perhaps the most interesting, thanks to its outdoor
space.

The covered, three-season patio has fans for hot weather, heat lamps for cool, and overlooks a human-made pond with a fountain (a water element, as they say in real estate brochures). It’s a very pleasant place to dine, though the mesh-wire chairs were not chosen with my aging back (or butt) in mind.

“Oak Brook is a very special project,” says Mas Mex CEO John Iannucci. “It’s our patio of the future; we’ll start building three-season, covered patios in other and new locations. Not all of them; some village rules won’t allow it.”

The menu is predictably large, chock-full of familiar dishes and some nice upgrades. One section is dubbed the Limited Time Menu, and I’d direct you there first, where you might find dishes like the tuna stack—diced tuna with avocado, crispy plantain chips, and a delicious papilla-ponzu salsa (this dish isn’t available now, but I’m hoping it’ll come back.) Ditto for the trio of shrimp tacos, featuring batter-fried shrimp with a hibiscus-habanero glaze. It might be the best taco on a menu with nearly a dozen of them; bring this back, pretty please.

Dishes you’re sure to find, and enjoy, include the guacamole, served in a mini molcajete with diced tomato and plenty of chips (next time I’m trying the morita-pineapple version.) Crisply fried empanadas are stuffed with well-seasoned ground beef and presented over tomatillo-avocado salsa and sprinkled with queso fresco.

And though the grilled Caesar steak salad is technically off menu, you can add steak strips to the regular grilled-Caesar salad easily enough.

The habanero sauce served (on the side, mercifully) with the cochinita pibil (marinated and slow-cooked pulled pork, a classic Yucatecan dish) will most definitely get your attention and then some, though my friend Jeff, whose tonsils are made of asbestos, loved the stuff.

Pork shank was a featured special on my visit, and I urge you to grab it whenever you can. The massive, slow-roasted shank, served on the bone, comes with tortillas, pickled onions and jalapenos, radishes, and charro beans.“That was intended as a family platter,” Iannucci says. “We’ve seen three to four people sharing that.”

If you’re really into big portions, there’s the gordo burrito, a terrifying three-pounder stuffed with steak, rice, beans, pico de gallo, and more, along with fries and habanero salsa. The safe way to approach this is with three sturdy friends, but if you can polish it off solo in 12 minutes, it’s free. “It’s actually one of our most popular orders,” Iannucci says, “and there have been people who have done it.”

We thank them for their sacrifice.

Photos: Fat Rosie’s