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| - I've been to the Harmony several times before, but last night was the first time I've been there for live music, and also the first time I tried their famed Walnut Burger.
First, you should know that the Harmony is indeed a bar. If you go expecting an upscale "gastro-pub" experience of chic bar food, then you will be disappointed. There are no waiters, and you seat yourself. You order food and drinks at the bar, and a food runner brings out your order when it's ready. Its got a dive bar atmosphere, and the interior is pretty run down.
After fighting for a table due to the crowd that was rapidly accumulating in anticipation of that evening's band, my friends and I perused the menu. It contains primarily stereotypical bar food (burgers, fries, onion rings, etc), but there are a few exceptions. There are several vegetarian options, including veggie nachos, so if you're a non meat eater, you would probably find lots of things to order at The Harmony. Most notably, The Harmony offers a walnut burger. I'm told they're famous for it, so I ordered the walnut burger with blue cheese and a side of homemade potato chips with "Bleu Cheese Dip". (What can I say, I really, really love Blue Cheese!) It took awhile for the food to come out, so we drank beer while we waited. Our table of about 10 people ordered 3 pitchers to share. I am not sure what all of them were, but in honor of the WI bar experience, I stuck to PBR. It was as good as PBR can be.
Onto the food: The blue cheese walnut burger came topped with a creamy blue cheese sauce in addition to blue cheese crumbles, rather than plain blue cheese crumbles like I had been anticipating. It also came with onion, lettuce, tomato, and mayo. The lettuce and tomato were exceptionally fresh and ripe looking. I was really impressed, especially by the tomato (it was actually red!). I bit into it and was immediately transported to blue cheese heaven. It was fantastic. I will qualify this praise with the statement that the reason I loved this burger so much was largely a result of the copious blue cheese flavor. I am not sure the walnut burger itself was why it tasted so great. The chips were also awesome. They arrived piping hot. Some were crunchy and others were chewier. It was clear that they were made to order. The Bleu Cheese Dip they came with was similar to what came on my burger, and as a result, was amazing.
We ate as the band played and just reveled in how fun the whole experience was. By the way, the band was great! It was a Rockabilly group called The Fast Clydes. If you like that style of music, I couldn't recommend them more. They had a ton of energy and knew how to work the crowd. I had a blast.
All this said, there are a few things that I think The Harmony could improve upon. First off, the tables in the main dining area are plastic. They're the exact same tables that you played beer pong on in college. I feel like The Harmony excels in spite of its dive bar atmosphere, and not necessarily because of it. Therefore, if they invested just a little bit of money to spruce up the interior, I think they would see a return. The Atwood area is still rocking that hippie vibe, for sure, but more and more, I am noticing newer and more upscale establishments. To me, that says that there's probably a market for it and the times, they are a changin'. Also, I don't mind ordering food and drinks at the bar. However, I think The Harmony would benefit from offering table service, at least during shows on Friday and Saturday night. I have only ever been to The Harmony with a group, and it sucks to have to walk away from the conversation to get another beer, a process which can take 10 or 15 minutes if it's crowded. All-in-all, these drawbacks are minor, and I'll be back at The Harmony many times this summer!
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