The Black Sheep

To start, I tried calling between 11 and noon to make a reservation. The phone tree was a little annoying, and when I finally managed to navigate to the proper place, no one picked up and I got an answering machine. I opted not to leave a message and take my chances.
We were seated immediately on walking in and the lead waiter who sat us was very hospitable. So apparently not making a reservation on a Friday evening isn’t a big deal. Chef/​owner Tyler came out and chatted with us, which was awesome. We introduced ourselves as we were excited to be there and believe in the vision he has. Super nice guy; pleased to meet him.
We ordered a salmon cranberry feta salad and the burger.
The salad: the greens were underwhelming. I think it was all spinach. There was also very little salmon for what was supposed to be an entrée salad. But the dressing was very tasty, and I liked the cranberries and feta. In it’s current state, I probably wouldn’t get the salad again, but the idea had promise.
The burger: cooked as requested (medium). It was also a little underwhelming, but generally tasty. I would’ve liked a little more of the aioli. It said chipotle, but I didn’t really get any heat. The homemade bun had great flavor but was just a little gritty.
Although my review of the food makes it seem rather ho-​hum, it was pretty good overall and I still give the experience overall 4 stars because we love all the locally sourced ingredients and the vibe of the restaurant. I think we’ll be back a lot and try some of the other dishes!

Warm, inviting atmosphere with 60’s — 80’s music which was out genre. The service was good, perhaps even a little too fast. My husband enjoyed his Manhattan. Now onto the food. Nice varied menu with vegetarian, pasta, salmon, steak. The Thai mussels were very flavorful and spicy, which I enjoy. The falafel crêpe seemed to be missing the goat cheese and had Cole slaw… which was a little weird but the falafel was tasty. The side salad with house vinaigrette was excellent. We paso had chicken fettuccini Alfredo; very flavorful but a little thin. I do not like a heavy sauce but this either had too much sauce or needed to be altitude thicker but the flavor was spot on. This is a place that is proud of their local fare and in house creations and they should be BUT the bread served with oil or the mussels was shockingly unappealing — dry, crumbly, no flavor other than yeast… on this staple they can do better and should.

When this place first open up, the food was really good but somehow the quality and taste has gone down. A week ago, a colleague and I went there for lunch and everything looked and tasted different. I ordered the spinach artichoke dip and the steak bacon burger. Both were so awful I couldn’t eat it. The spinach artichoke dip used to be creamy and serve with pita read. It was one of my favorite dish there. However, this time, my spinach artichoke dip was very dry and served with thick home made bread. Both my colleague and I tried eating it but we couldn’t finish half of it. Furthermore, my burger was god awful. The homemade bread was so thick they carved some of the bread out of the bun before serving it. When I tried to eat my burger, the bun was breaking apart like a dried biscuit. I couldn’t swallow it so I just tried eating some of the meat and the bacon to make the best out of my money. I will never go back there again.

I can’t even begin on how to understand how this place has 4 stars and every review seems to be good. I was really hoping this place would live up to the hype but sadly it did not. The pot stickers are not potstickers, the «bisque» soup is not bisque it looks more like dog food. Do. Not. Go. Here. Ever.

Exceptional food, however be prepared to wait a very long time for food/​drinks. I was here on two occasions and it took us 2 hours before we left. However, as I mentioned above, the food is incredible. If you have time to spare, this is a must see in Whitewater!

I came here for dinner with 5 other people and as soon as I walked into the door, I thought the restaurant was so cute and rustic. We were seated and I don’t think there was anyone else dining in when we got there, but the waitress was extremely slow. It took over 15 minutes to get water and the drinks that we ordered, if not longer. When we ordered our entrees, it took about 35 – 40 minutes for the food to come out.
For an appetizer, we ordered the Spinach and Artichoke Dip with warm Pita and it was so delicious. The dip was so creamy and rich, which went so well on the pita bread. I definitely recommend this!
I ordered an entrée with Salmon and Potato Pancake Mac and Cheese. The problem with this menu description is that it didn’t mention the entire plate would be Mac and cheese. When my entrée was brought to me, I didn’t see the salmon. The salmon was shredded throughout the Mac and cheese and that’s not at all what I thought the dish would be. Unfortunately, I wasn’t in the mood for having a meal of Mac and cheese with specs of salmon, so I had to send it back. I instead ordered the Salmon with Mashed Potatoes. This dish was wonderful. The potatoes were so buttery and the filet of salmon really was cooked exactly how I like it, medium well. The portion size could have easily fed two people.
I would like to come back here again, but the slow service needs some improvement. As far as the food goes, if you order the right thing, it’ll be sure to please.

Visited The Black Sheep this afternoon after reading great Unilocal reviews… had a late 2:00 lunch on a Wednesday … Beautiful atmosphere … Place was quiet, but service was lackluster! Our cocktails took considerably too long considering we were one of the only tables in the place. Ordered the Munster grilled cheese sandwich and chorizo Mac & cheese … Both arrived lukewarm … Simply not impressed!

Three stars, about all I can give this place. First off the place is certainly very cute I enjoyed the ambiance very much, very anthropologie. I visited this place with my mother in law, were from Chicago and we have a lake house up here, so we visit every month. Our server was Taylor, she was a very pleasantly polite girl however she didn’t seem to know the specials without looking at her pad, and she didn’t know the things they were out of which is something you should be figuring out before each shift. My mother in law ordered the baked salmon and mashed potatoes and I ordered the portobello and polenta with «sautéed greens» (hate seeing that in a menu l, be specific I don’t like your guessing games, kale, spinach, Swiss chard, collard greens? What?) it was spinach lol
The ticket time was longer than it should of been for what we ordered and we were the only people in there this evening, we waited about 30 – 35 mins.
Hers, she said was pretty good but it was served with the skin on, which with salmon you don’t do, especially if your broiling or baking it, if you can’t eat it don’t put it on my plate, and on top of mashed potatoes, that now has a scale in them.
Mine, the polenta was over seasoned the portobello was perfect cooked though, and spinach was decent. There was like an olive oil, balsamic puddle that was all separated and just not good, and way too much of it that just muddled up the dish, could of done without. We also got the spinach dip which was just way to thick with cheese for my liking, had hardly any spinach either, I also got the tomato soup which tasted like a bland marinara sauce with what tasted like bits of raw garlic but didnt actually taste like garlic ironically enough. It was also too chunky for a tomato «bisque» which I thought was funny she called it that, and in the menu and on their board they called their mushroom soup a «mushroom bisque» I don’t know if they are trying to sound fancy but their chef should know better, inform your staff your not serving a tomato or mushroom «bisque» as a bisque is a rich creamy shellfish based soup. Just saying. I guess I’m just a bit more critical being a Chicago chef, this is a decent place for your «everyday» person I guess

Good. The menu doesn’t have much variety. The foods are very comforting. I had the mac and cheese with sweet potatoes hash. Customer service was good I had a limited time to eat before I went to work, I had enough time to finish my plate.

Loved my experience here! They have unique dishes based around what’s in season and have a great variety of drinks.

This is a great place to get something a little different. This is not your typical Wisconsin Supper Club, thank goodness! The menu changes every season to allow the chef to utilize fresh, local food. Chef Tyler is very innovative and does his homework. Every dish I’ve tried has been delicious.

Great food, reasonably priced. I did note, however, that the stall in the men’s room had a waste basket next to the toilet. Inside the open waste basket was soiled toilet paper. Inside the bathroom was a fly. Imagine where the fly might want to go. I had seen this basket next to the toilet thing in Cancun, Mexico, so I wondered if this was some sort of cultural PC junk since this is a college town.

Love this place. A bit on the pricey side but definitely the best place in Whitewater to grab a great dinner. Tyler does a great job.

I just tried the fried green tomato sandwich which will be appearing on the new seasonal menu. It was really unique and
amazing!

If in doubt have the burger, well that’s always been my belief but wasn’t massively impressed by this one. Essentially two thick slabs of a heavy bread on either side of a so so burger, the onion jam or some such was good but not enough and the fries were old and over cooked. Dinner was however saved by a fabulous plum and cherry crumble, now that was worth every mouthful.

Visited on a Wednesday night with a party of five (and no reservations).
Adorable décor (exposed brick, high ceilings, chalkboards), great summer drink menu, locally sourced ingredients.
Service was friendly (chef checked in with us, too) but a little slow. Drinks were great! I had chicken with blue cheese and red pepper served with potatoes. Others had the market steak, salmon, and ravioli. Plating could have been better. Portions were generous. Taste was just okay.

Excellent food. The butternut squash ravioli is amazing. Lovely service. The chef checked in with us too. This place is a gem! Highly recommended for a nice dinner with friends or a date.

I would give this place 3 stars, but they really hype you up and I just expect better from a place that acts so hip and yuppish. The food is ok. But that’s it.
Our server was ok. She did her job and things were timely, but she was not engaging at all, didn’t make much effort to recommend anything, and always left our table in an awkward silence.
The vanilla lavender lemonade is one reason I would come back here again and again. it’s just amazing.
I had a spinach and bacon salad, which would have been amazing had it not been ruined by an overly sweet dressing. A bit of sweetness is fine with spinach, but the pickled beets already had that covered. I have no idea what sort of sweetener is used in the dressing, but it is beyond the normal sweetness that comes with balsalmic vinegars or other simple ingredients. It tasted like honey almost, and there was just too much of it.
For my entrée, i had a grilled goat cheese sandwich, which was again just ok. The goat cheese itself was very tasty, but the fresh greens clashed awkwardly with a grilled, melty cheese sandwich. It also had some sort of sauce on it that was too sweet. i’m not sure if Black Sheep is attempting to play into the Standard American palette with the copious sweetness of their sauces or what, but it was too much for me. The fries i had on the side were battered, which I found a little odd. it wasn’t bad, but the batter didn’t add enough flavor to really be worth the extra time and effort. Why not just season your fresh local potatoes?
The chef Tyler came to our table, and I mentioned the overly sweet dressing, but he commented that the server should have said it was sweet. Seemed odd to me, as my issue was not the sweetness, but the overwhelming amount of it in the salad as a whole. I felt he was deflecting the issue onto the server or my own interpretation of the menu and my palette.
This was my second time back to the Black Sheep, and I really keep hoping it will be worth it and live up to its own hype and fancy décor, but I’m not sure it will ever meet my expectations. This is really good food if you’ve never had really good fine dining before. It’s even really good food for upscale pub faire. But when you advertise all of your local seasonal ingredients and set up the expectation for really fine food, it just falls short with such heavy-​handed flavors.
Perhaps I will give it another go sometime, as I do like the presence of a locally sourced fine dining restaurant in otherwise casual Whitewater. I keep hoping they’ll live up to the good name they have made.

Recently popped in for my third visit to Black Sheep and unfortunately, there were a few setbacks. Don’t get me wrong, Black Sheep is the ONLY restaurant in town worth visiting for a quality dining experience. Indeed, aside from Randy’s and Cozumel, there isn’t much to choose from. Trust me, I know, having been a «part-​time» resident of Whitewater since 1989. Anyway, enough about me. I’d avoid the spinach-​artichoke dip as it is too thick and there aren’t enough pita wedges to get to the bottom. (An absurd $ 3.00 charge for extra pita is enough to keep me away from that starter). I had the lamb ribs (which are seasonal) and would not recommend. Too much sauce overwhelmed the polenta and masked the meat which was fatty. She had the chicken marsala which was fine. I do like how Chef Tyler stops by to say hello.
I like the overall atmosphere and feel of Black Sheep. Nice craft beer options too.
I was Black Sheep to succeed and hope that it will in a college town not known for fine dining.

What a great find. We were in Whitewater looking for a quick bite and I’m so happy we ended up here… thanks fellow Unilocalers!
The food was amazing. You could tell it was made with lots of love and fresh ingredients. Between my mom and I, we shared a cheese plate, the spinach and mushroom quiche, mushroom bisque and the arugula and brat salad. Everything was deelish. No complaints!
The only reason I gave it 4 stars was because we were really looking forward to having some Bloody Mary’s. It was a Saturday morning and they just sounded so good. But when we got to the restaurant our server told us they were out of their mix. Major bummer.