I unfold a lime-green napkin and lay it across my lap. In the low light, the chairs appear to be a cross between pink and orange. The stereo unobtrusively plays what I’d call electronic dance music. The server is fetching Prosecco from the bar. I feel the word “stylish” coming on.
Inspired by its location at the corner of Kilbourn and Water, Kil@wat fills the second floor of the former Wyndam Hotel, now remodeled and renamed the Intercontinental Milwaukee Hotel. The restaurant is the hotel’s showpiece for dining – not fine dining, mind you, but “on the high end” of casual dining, explains restaurateur and (in this case) consultant Marc Bianchini, who created the menu. In January, a Las Vegas chef came on board to implement it.
My first night here, I spent too much time trying to “get” it. The menu (divided into sections that sound like spa treatments – “Spark,” “Synergy,” “Flow” and “Ambient”) is intended to be “comfortable, edgy, fun,” says Bianchini. Give up your traditional way of ordering – i.e., appetizer followed by entrée and dessert. Order a bunch of apps. Share an entrée. It’s a freedom we’re not used to having. How very unMilwaukee.
There are familiar names on the menu – mac and cheese, pot pie, pork chops – but they just might not look like you’d expect. I’ve chosen to have fun with the menu, and you can, too. That includes mentally discarding dishes you’d probably never order again – like the carnival squash Napoleon which, between the goat cheese, puff pastry and plum compote, is a pile of oversweet mush. Despite it, I hope the concept flies here.
The fun starts with the Thai meatballs, a handful of marble-size beef balls served with a spicy chile sauce ($3). They may be small, but they pack concentrated flavor.
And the mac and cheese (sorry, cheese and mac) is not what you’d expect. This is mascarpone and fresh mozzarella inside two firm pasta shells the length of your thumb, with a subtle blue cheese-truffle sauce ($8). The dish is not going to fill you up. It’s more of a taste. Two other appetizers are high-wattage: Kobe carpaccio (wafer-thin slices of buttery Kobe beef with a citrus truffle mayo, $11) and crab and potato tots – six little logs with a creamy filling and crunchy, corn flake-like crust. The ranch dressing and chipotle ketchup on the side give it a last-second lift ($9).
Salads aren’t just a pile of greens. The closest is the marinated Portobello mushroom with Gorgonzola on a heap of mesclun greens dressed with tart balsamic vinaigrette ($9). The salad I like best has three distinct parts – sweet golden beets, a slice of floral-like herbed goat cheese and a pile of bitter frisée ($8).
Chops are work. Meat served on the bone is simply like that. But these lamb chops (from Franklin-based Strauss) are worth the work – twins with an easily removed layer of fat along the bone. And the knife slides through the meat, whose mild flavor lets the thyme-laced puréed parsnips and tart cranberries speak for it ($34). The striped bass is guarded. I peel back the skin to find the juicy, oily fish with its curious combination of capers, apples and tomato verbena broth ($22).
There are also entrées for the diner who wants to choose it all. Protein, sauce, starch or vegetable. You might learn that seared yellowtail fish goes well with thick horseradish cream ($27), and a 16-ounce rib-eye has a richer finish with a red wine reduction ($33). The side dishes are on the money – above all, hazelnut-topped Brussels sprouts and puréed sweet potatoes permeated with rosemary.
The only dessert that nailed it was the roasted pineapple with vanilla ice cream. The warm fruit, though difficult to cut with a fork, tasted like a smooth vanilla-rum cocktail ($7).
Kil@wat is “so Chicago,” a friend of mine exclaimed after a meal there. My first thought was, “This is like Vegas.” A flashy, big-city feel customized for Milwaukee. Which might be the kind of jolt this city needs.
Kil@wat Restaurant, (Intercontinental Milwaukee Hotel) 139 E. Kilbourn Ave., 291-4793.
Hours: L Mon-Fri 11:30 a.m.-2 p.m. D Mon-Sat 5:30-10 p.m.
Prices: appetizers $3-$13; soups/salads $5-$11; entrées $12-$34; desserts $6-$7.
Service: improving.
Dress: up or down.
Credit cards: M V A DS.
Handicap access: yes.
Nonsmoking restaurant and bar.
Reservations:suggested, especially weekends.
