Restaurant review, The Vintage in Lanesboro

I went to the Vintage on Saturday, June 28 and again on Saturday, July 5, the first time with a small group of friends and co-workers and the second with my mom (dinner and a show was her Mother's Day present). I was impressed both times with the taste of the food and the level of service. It's right next to the Commonweal Theatre. The walls are covered with huge murals that depict life in Lanesboro.

The first time, I had the Chef's Creations pre fixe menu for the night, which began with a beef carpaccio, continued with fava bean dumplings with curry sauce and crispy shallots, then lamb chops, and dessert. I was a bit disappointed in the dumpling with my first bite because it seemed quite bland, but I'd cut off the end of one of the dumplings and eaten it without dipping into the sauce. The second bite had more of the curry sauce and shallots, and tasted like perfection. The lamb chops were quite good and while I know I enjoyed it, I can't remember what it was served with. Should have taken notes, I guess! Unfortunately, they only had one serving left of the rhubarb fool that went with the Chef's Creations menu, so I didn't get to taste it, but I had a very good key lime pie instead.

Last week they didn't have a Chef's Creations menu, although they had a special salad and a special entree. I ordered the special salad, which was chipotle-roasted quail with mixed greens, watermelon and feta cheese. It was on a rectangular plate with the little pieces of quail on one end, the greens on the other, and in between, little cubes of stacked watermelon and feta. It was delicious, although it was a bit difficult to get the quail meat off the little bones. I was very tempted to pick them up in my fingers and gnaw on them but I didn't want to embarass my mother! Mom had the strawberry salad and said it was delicious, too. For an entree, we both ordered the braised rabbit with almond and onion sauce, port wine glaze, a basmati rice cake and baby carrots. The rabbit was fall-off-the-bones tender and easily surpassed the lamb chops I'd had the week before. For dessert I indulged in a dark chocolate torte, while Mom had a blackberry curd mousse tart.

I think this is going to become one of my favorite restaurants.

Review -- Harbor View Cafe and Restaurant, Pepin

A couple of weeks ago on a Saturday night, M, J and I drove up to Pepin and had dinner at Harbor View. It was an absolutely gorgeous day so the drive up the river was beautiful. We got to the restaurant about 5:45 and found that we'd have to wait about an hour for a table. That's pretty standard for a Saturday night at Harbor View, which doesn't take reservations or credit cards. We wandered into the few stores that are still left in Pepin while we waited, then went back to the restaurant and sat in lawn chairs outside.

Harbor View's menu has a few items that are perennial, but most of it changes to fit whatever is freshest and best. They don't print menus, either. Entrees, usually a choice of ten or twelve items, are written up on a big blackboard, with dessert choices listed at the bottom. Bring your glasses! We felt a little like the waitress was rushing us to order, but she may have been trying to make up for the long wait for a table.

J & M both chose the chicken breast with roasted garlic and chipotle sauce, served with linguine. I tried a Moroccan-inspired chicken dish, saffron-braised chicken with preserved lemon, olives and roasted tomatoes. My chicken was fall-apart tender and the saltiness of the olives and preserved lemon was perfectly set off by the sweetness of the roasted tomato. It was a wonderful dish that seems like something I could easily re-create at home, if only I could find preserved lemons (or Meyer lemons so I can make my own). Of course I had to order dessert, as well, and the chocolate buttercream pie was a great ending to the meal.

Harbor View is one of our favorite places and seldom fails to delight, even though the wait can be long.

Door County restaurants

K and I left for Door County on Thursday, May 29. We kind of ambled along the way, so we got to the Square Rigger in Jacksonport just in time for the 5:30 fish boil. K said she's been told that the Square Rigger has one of the best fish boils on the peninsula. Not having tasted any of the others, I can't say, but it does compare favorably to the fish boils I've had on the other side of the state in Bayfield. They make a nice little show out of the boilover, with a little historical commentary.



Friday morning we headed up to Bailey's Harbor for breakfast at the Harbor Fish Market & Grill. I can highly recommend the Tower of Power, eggs benedict with walleye cakes standing in for the Canadian bacon.



We took the ferry over to Washington Island and meandered around for awhile. We hadn't planned to have lunch, wanting to save room for dinner, but found ourselves getting a little hungry around 1:30. We were passing the Farm Museum when K said, "Wait! What's that?" Fiddler's Rest turned out to be a charming little shabby-chic coffee shop/cafe with comfy couches and a big, friendly Black Lab welcoming visitors. We had a very tasty roasted red pepper and tomato bisque with homemade bread and hummus with pita bread. We stopped in at the Washington Hotel to check out their gift shop and picked up a schedule of the culinary classes that they offer. I'm sure it's not an inexpensive place to stay, but it's definitely on my list for someday!


We met a friend of K's for dinner. She works at the Sturgeon Bay Public Library and asked her colleagues there for suggestions. We ended up going to Florian II in Bailey's Harbor, which was a blast from the past. It reminded me of any number of places we used to eat when I was a kid -- standard Wisconsin supper club decor and menu. However, the food was quite good. I had a salmon filet stuffed with shrimp that was very tasty.



Breakfast Saturday morning was at the White Gull Inn, where I overdid breakfast by eating both cherry coffeecake and cherry-stuffed french toast. It was so good that it was hard to stop!



We skipped lunch on Saturday but stoked ourselves for dinner by checking out the posted menus at the restaurants on our list. We stopped at the Mission Grill (http://www.missiongrille.com/) and the Inn at Kristopher's (http://www.innatkristofers.com/), both in Sister Bay, but ended up deciding to eat at T. Ashwell's (https://www.tashwells.com/) in Ellison Bay. The restaurant is in an old house with beautiful woodwork and hardwood floors. No tablecloths (M always wants to know), but very elegant. We began by sharing a morel mushroom and asparagus vol au vent, which was heavenly. I was a little disappointed by my main course, which was halibut over whole wheat pasta with a lobster reduction sauce. The halibut was a little underseasoned and I really couldn't taste lobster in the pasta. K was happy with her filet mignon, though. After consumering a chocolate flourless torte topped with vanilla ice cream for dessert, though, I decided that I would go back to T. Ashwell's again.



Sunday morning we went back to Sister Bay again to have breakfast at the Sister Bay Cafe. This has all the same Scandinavian heritage treats as Al Johnson's across the street, but there are no goats on the roof and, at least when we were there, no crowds waiting to be seated. Strangely enough, K and I had just had a conversation about waffles, and I said that I didn't own a waffle iron and wasn't all that crazy about waffles. However, the cafe had Norwegian heart waffles and I wasn't in the mood for eggs, so I tried them. You could order them plain with maple syrup or with strawberries and whipped cream, but the waitress confessed that the strawberries weren't fresh, so I stuck with the plain ones. They were very tasty and I'd order them again, although I still don't think I want to buy a waffle iron for my kitchen.

Let's get started

Just a quick post to get things started.

We are a group of friends and colleagues who enjoy fine dining, a nice glass of wine and a fabulous dessert.

We want to share our experiences at local and sometimes not-so-local restaurants.