wow
no love for Crane Alley... great downtown Urbana bar... great food, great pool tables, excellent beer selection... just doesn't carry over the atmosphere of the Blind Pig
no love for Bombay? that place is incredible... one on green street, another on 1st near Fiesta Cafe... great Indian food...
Campus bars are for campus kids. They'll grow out of them once they realize they're crap. But until then, it's what they know. If you're an adult, I recommend downtown Urbana or Champaign.
In Urbana, there a few nice bars to hit: Crane Alley, Embassy, and Iron Post. For food, there is Crane Alley and Siam Terrace. Siam Terrace is great Thai food, fancier & pricier than Thara Thai (although both are great).
In Champaign the bars to hit:
-Blind Pig... best beer selection you will see outside of a couple of places in Chicago. Atmosphere is unmatched Sunday through Thursday. On Friday and Saturday it has become too jammed and plays crap music. No tv's, which is perfect.
-Esquire... you gotta love the peanuts everywhere. Decent beer selection, great local vibe and atmosphere. Always friendly. Get the Asian dumplings next time.
-Mike and Molly's... Great in the summer (awesome beer garden). Great regulars. Great bottle selection. Good live music when they have it. A little bit tucked away, but they like it that way.
-Boltini... not my thing, but it's got supposedly a nice lounge with DJ's and such. Solid mixed drinks (martini's). A bit pretentious and a staff that gets rolled a little bit too much in my book.
-Guido's... this is campus off campus. It's for the college kids that think they are going somewhere adults go. For adults, it's where they go because it's like campus. But they don't want to go to campus.
-Cowboy Monkey... pretty much just a summer bar. They use to have a lot of live music, but I honestly couldn't tell you if that is still occurring.
-High Dive... not sure how much this place is open. Seen a number of great shows there. Best one would have been Flaming Lips about ten years ago.
-Radio Maria... you pretty much just go there for Salsa on Fridays. No one really goes to their bar othewise.
-Soma... attempt at a club. Not fun.
-Brass Rail... a dive that's great for a good time with friends.
-Bentley's... Really not to bad of a place. Most people miss out on it though. And unfortunately it's kinda empty a fair amount of the time.
-Seven Saints... I'm not really sure this bar knows what it is or wants to be
Food
-Radio Maria... Tapas. Great place.
-Kofusion... solid sushi
-Jim Gould's... not really sure why people go there. Seriously, it's not worth the price.
-Jupiter's... great pizza (I think of it as food, not as a bar)
-Cafe Luna... best restaurant in area, tapas
-Escobar... sister to Milo's... awesome
-Sam's Cafe... great cheap greasy spoon breakfast food (during breakfast hours, not post bar)... try their french toast (amazing)
I'm missing out on plenty. But there's a lot there to explore in this town. Most people miss out on a great deal of stuff. If you live between Lincoln, University and Neil... you won't grow much. Then again, it is helpful to find the nice things in campus (Luna was there, Bread Company, Aroma, etc.).
Look around. This town is amazing for it's size.