"We tried the Avenue Club for dinner Monday night. We had never been there before and were initially delighted by our experience.
We were greeted by a friendly hostess who welcomed us to the restaurant, gave us menus, and told us about 1/2 price appetizers and cocktails all day. We started getting excited as we looked thru the drink menu and saw the variety of Old Fashioned they offered. The appetizer menu also looked intriguing with a relish tray, onion dip, fried pickles and more. The atmosphere was modern, clean, airy, and seems like a great place to hang out for drinks.
Our waitress arrived. She was fun, perky, and helpful. We each ordered an Old Fashioned derivative. We also ordered the Whitefish Spread and Cheese Curds to start. Our drinks came out and they were delicious. Certainly Old Fashioned but with twists. Our waitress was great about checking on us and making sure we had everything we wanted.
When the Whitefish came out, it looked pretty cool. A mound of whitefish on a tray with Ritz crackers, radishes, and toasted bread. Unfortunately it was basically a cold, flavorless, grainy mash. We had tried whitefish spread recently at Everly and loved it. This sadly, was not at all similar. I did like the presentation and the price was great, but it was not particularly tasty. Very disappointing. The cheese-curds also had an interesting presentation. They looked like giant tater-tots. Unfortunately, again the flavor did not live up to the appearance. Wisconsin is known for their cheese-curds, but these just didn't have the flavor of texture. I did appreciate that they were different, but unfortunately in this case different was worse.
For dinner we had the Walleye and the Mussels with Fries. The walleye itself was delicious but it was served with a pumpkin puree which didn't pare well. The mussels were also delicious. The broth was rich and salty and I drank it down. It was served with a chunk of thick crusty bread. The fries were a let-down. They were not particularly crispy and kind of clumped together.
In general we loved the atmosphere, we loved the service, we loved the drinks and we loved the value. Unfortunately several of the dishes just weren't up to the rest of the experience. I wouldn't refuse to go back, but it won't be on the top of my list."
