Cooked?
Madison Tavern
- resultPass w/ Conditions
- critical violations0
- last inspectedFebruary 26, 2025
- address500 W Madison St, Chicago 60661
Is Madison Tavern clean?
Madison Tavern is currently listed as closed by Chicago Department of Public Health, as of its inspection on February 26, 2025. A closure means inspectors found conditions serious enough to stop service — it is not the same as a restaurant choosing to shut down, and the listing can change once the problems are fixed and re-inspected.
What did inspectors find at Madison Tavern?
These are the violations recorded at the most recent inspection on February 26, 2025, in plain English, with the city's own wording underneath.
- 🧽surfaces not properly sanitizedFood-Contact Surfaces: Cleaned & Sanitized • Bar Low temp dish washing machine not sanitizing at final rinse, 0ppm of Cl obtained on test strips. Instructed manager to provide proper sanitizer concentration at final rinse. Priority violation 7-38-025.
- ⚠️In-Use Utensils: Properly Stored • Keeping spoons in standing water container at bar area, instructed to keep utensils in-use according to health code, ie.In-Use Utensils: Properly Stored • Keeping spoons in standing water container at bar area, instructed to keep utensils in-use according to health code, ie.
When was Madison Tavern last inspected?
Madison Tavern has 15 inspections on record going back to December 17, 2015. The 12 most recent are shown below.
| date | result | score |
|---|---|---|
| January 6, 2026 | closed by the city | |
| February 26, 2025 | Pass w/ Conditions | |
| March 20, 2024 | Pass w/ Conditions | |
| March 29, 2023 | Pass | |
| July 6, 2022 | Pass w/ Conditions | |
| July 1, 2019 | Pass w/ Conditions | |
| February 5, 2018 | Pass | |
| February 2, 2018 | Fail | |
| December 5, 2017 | Pass w/ Conditions | |
| July 25, 2017 | Pass | |
| July 17, 2017 | Pass | |
| July 10, 2017 | Fail |
Madison Tavern vs Loop
Loop runs 44% clean across 3,616 tracked restaurants — 1,566 clean, 332 mid, 1,687 cooked.
Against the 3,616 spots Cooked tracks in Loop, this one comes out cleaner than 0% of them.
Other spots in Loop
How Chicago grades restaurants
Chicago does not use letter grades. Every inspection ends in one of three official results: Pass, Pass with Conditions, or Fail. Pass with Conditions means violations were found but corrected on the spot or under a deadline — the restaurant is open, with homework. A Fail means serious violations went uncorrected, and it usually brings a re-inspection within days. Chicago also flags “priority” violations, the ones most likely to actually make someone sick. Cooked reads Pass as clean, Pass with Conditions as mid, and Fail as cooked, and shows the itemized violations behind each result.
Source: Chicago Department of Public Health via Chicago Data Portal. Cooked refreshes this data daily — this listing's most recent inspection is dated February 26, 2025. Inspection results describe one moment in a kitchen's life, not a permanent verdict.