Chicken-N-Spice Demolition: 'It's Kind Of Sad, Like An End Of An Era'

JOLIET, IL — Fourteen months after the original owners of Joliet's beloved Chicken-N-Spice restaurant had their retirement party, D Construction got to work on Thursday, tearing down the Chicken-N-Spice building. By 3 p.m. most of the demolition work was finished.

The Chicken-N-Spice demolition will allow Joliet Junior College to add more parking lot space. The restaurant property on North Chicago Street was adjacent to JJC's Culinary Arts Campus.

Ricardo, a Joliet resident for 33 years, sat on a stone bench across the street to film Thursday's demolition of Chicken-N-Spice.

He called himself "a customer of Chicken-N-Spice the whole 33 years until they closed. Used to live where Senior Suites is now, used to be the downtown inn, a residence for single men. Used to come over here almost every night to eat, show up about 10:15 p.m., knowing that whatever wasn't sold by 10:30 p.m. they would give it away, so I'd have more chicken than I could eat," Ricardo smiled.

"I'd have some to take to work with me the next day."

Ricardo said he still lives in downtown Joliet, and he was walking by on Thursday when he saw the heavy equipment toppling his favorite old Joliet restaurant.

"I know they were going to knock it down," he told Patch. "It was already in the paper they were going to knock it down. Seeing it being done is like kind of sad, you know, it's an end of an era. They were here for a long time. Good food."