Reviews for L'Etoile Restaurant in Madison, WI
I love the foie gras and pork belly in the first course. The rest are okay but not as great as expected. Unfortunately, I’m... not a fan of the dessert. I felt that the cake, sorbet, and the fruit in the plate didn’t make a good combination. The cakewas mediocre. That being said, I’d still like to try their other menus. The service was great :). Read more
One of the best restaurants in Madison. Amazing food from local sources, Very knowledgeable and attentive sommelier who will... suggest wines from France, Austria, and Germany among others. Michelin star level restaurant with a great view of the Capitol. Read more
Wow. Incredible experience, incredible food and drink. Such fresh abs seasonal ingredients makes going here an otherworldly... experience each time! We got 1 app, 2 main dishes, 1 dessert and a drink each and it was around $170 bill. Extremely reasonablyfor the insane quality. If you went to this caliber of restaurant in a bigger city, it’s a 300-400$ meal EASILY! Read more
Repeat customer who had a brilliant dinner a while ago, returned this week for another experience. The Tasting menu and wine... pairing is a must…expensive no doubt but these people pull off the most magical dish creations with masterfully paired wines. Truly amazing experience. Even the vegetarian tasting dishes were imaginative, beautifully plated, and an explosion of flavors. Allow 2 hours to enjoy the experience. Read more
The staff was very accommodating and welcoming. They are very knowledgeable about the menu and the produce that is used to... prepare the meal. Joe ensured our anniversary experience was top notch and we will be returning to try Graze as recommended. Read more
Destination dining! My friend grew up in Madison and described this as the prom dream date. Now we travel together a lot and... will frequently do what we did tonight. We ordered everything on the starter menu and one dessert item. Starters/appetizers arealways so much more creative than entrées. Let’s face it, there’s only so many ways you can cook a steak or chicken orfish. It is the starters/appetizers and the desserts where chef’s truly shine. Read more
The experience itself was positive: friendly staff, complimentary champagne for our anniversary, and an overall clean,... simplistic atmosphere. If I had feedback to give about the venue, it would be to set the shades to either cover more of thefront windows as the evening begins, or not seat the tables nearest the front windows, as the sunlight there is a bitoverpowering. We chose to have the Chef's tasting experience, which we've done before at such places as The French Room inDallas,TX and Different Pointe of View in Phoenix, AZ, which were both extraordinary experiences, so we had high hopes forL'Etoile given the $145/person cost (which was more than we'd paid for our prior experiences). Unfortunately, we can only say weleft saying "meh". It was a very expensive, mediocre 6-course meal, with a few highlights and some delicious cocktails. Itstarted with a surprisingly good 1-bite, tasty bacon aioli salad that was both flavorful and refreshing. We moved on to a sushiand cucumber dish that, while beautiful, seemed to be a collection of vegetables that didn't compliment well, with an overlysalty sauce. It did have some theatrics with a nitrogen-infused sauce that I couldn't taste because, nitrogen freezesthings. To follow was a lobster bisque and corn mixture that was tasty, if only for the lobster and ravioli. After this was a"surprise" course of a Cajun style rice with caviar and a chicken pate that was spicy and delicious (if not a bit overpoweringwith the cayenne). After this point, I'd have expected the Chef to wow us. Instead, we found that we'd already had the bestthey had to offer. The halibut dish was salty and bland, and the sauce was both not enough and not flavorful. I barely touchedmine, as it was unappealing. I will say that the beets in the dish were better than I expected and probably the best part ofit. To follow was a cut of NY strip steak that was very overcooked and dry, with a clumpy tomato-based sauce that was a bitbland and ov Read more
Got the set menu plus reserve wine pairing. Found the service to be very nice and staff friendly and attentive. The ambiance was... nice as well. As a local from Madison, I think for a restaurant in Madison it’s not bad since there’s not much competitionas a big fish in a small pond for a gastro restaurant / fine dining but I feel like it lacks many elements in quality andtaste. Paid $580 for two people. Worth probably $50/pp at most in terms of quality and taste. I guess if you compare to anyrestaurant at this price point or even half the price in other places in the world, this wouldn’t be able to compare. Almostevery dish was extremely over sauced, over seasoned, over salted. Starter fish couldn’t even be tasted due to how heavy theseasonings were. Tortellini had so much butter and salt that it also overpowered the main ingredient once again. The halibutfish was the only dish that didn’t have the supporting cast of ingredients overpower the main star. But it was justbland. The steak was cooked well (rare to med rare) but once again totally overpowered by it being drowned out by sitting in asalty and rich sauce. Overall I just felt like this restaurant could do so much better and has so much more potential. Thesupporting cast of each dish should empower the main (quality) ingredients, instead it was a missed opportunity and ended updrowning out the main with overly sauced salted and buttered components. I hope this review serves as a wake up call for thisrestaurant and chef. I hope they don’t call it French inspired though much longer because it gives French cuisine a bad name???? Read more