Fancy Hyde Park Dumpling Spot 'Packed' Closes After Four Months

By Anthony Todd in Food on May 11, 2016 2:07PM

A selection of dumplings at the now-shuttered Packed. Photo by Nick Murray.

That didn't last long. While Packed, the high-end dumpling joint from Chef Mike Sheerin, opened with great fanfare (and some significant lines) back in January, it's already closed up shop less than four months later.

Things were a bit tumultuous at Packed from the beginning. There were food shortages, nasty Yelp reviews (mostly complaining about the high prices, especially for the neighborhood) and serious execution problems. RedEye critic Michael Nagrant, who gave the restaurant just 1.5 stars, found that "a third of the dumplings I tried were raw at the seams."

The restaurant posted a sign outside that attributed the closing to a combination of high ingredient prices and low traffic. Perhaps opening a boutique dumpling spot featuring farm-to-table ingredients and upscale restaurant prices (and no booze) in a neighborhood largely frequented by poor college students wasn't the greatest move?