rev:text
| - LOVE LOVE their fish fry! You can actually taste the "beer" in their breading. I always dine in the stable... the farmhouse is quaint but not my style. I mean where else in Madison can you dine in a stable (it's warm and romantic!)? The stable tap bar has a good assortment of good local beers, and you just HAVE to get their old fashioned brandy with cinnamon stick! They MUDDLE! It's the ONLY place I'll drink an old fashioned with brandy (I'm a whiskey girl) - cuz they do it right. Cory is the ONLY bartender I go to - he is focused, polite, and the best Muddler in town.
As for the main meal: If you like the basic boring Friday night fish fry, this is not your place. The secret is NOT in the tartar sauce. This will NOT remind you of 7th grade with braces, bad hair, fishing poles, skillets, and a family reunion. This is a fish fry that got drunk and rolled around in flour while his "fun" cousin got into a pretzel fight, and the younger scared sister is hiding in butter. I LOVE these fish. We share the combo plate ($19): pretzel crusted PERCH - crunchy, warm, flavorful, eye-widening; BAKED COD - dry, flaky, warm, bland goes perfect with the decadent dill, garlic butter sauce (I use the fish as an excuse)! and BEER battered COD - tastes like beer, hot, wet-flour, heavy breading. EACH one of these is great, but I have to have them all. baked cod with butter 4/5, baked cod without butter 3/5 (on the combo platter: sometimes having a bland piece of fish is ok to go with the other heavy battered items), perch 5/5, beer battered 5/5
PS. Skip the baked potato; GET the parmesan potato casserole - slap ya momma good! 5/5 Coleslaw here is my golden standard: wet, julienned, perfect mayo to vinegar ratio. 5/5
Great ambiance, great tap beer, great people, great food, AT LEAST an 1 1/2 wait to eat. (they have apps - order them and wait). The beer battered cod can be AYCE.
TIP: try the Stone House - 1800s menu = Duck, trout, lamb, veal, and different starter bread = sweet muffins!
|