Review
For starters the Eagle offers a full-loaded walleye Fish Fry for nine bucks. Yeah, you heard that right, nine stinking bucks. And this isn't some corner-cutting, fly-by-night operation either. Everything is done by hand and made to order.
The kitchen is quick and often times the fish comes so swiftly it's hard to believe - we're talking under three minutes here. Sometimes the walleye fillet is on the small side, but hey, we're talking nine bucks here, it's probably not going to be a 12 ouncer. The small-eye is the perfect size for lunch and features flaky, moist meat with a sweet flavor. It houses a light breading that varies in spiciness from Friday to Friday - sometimes heavily-seasoned, sometimes not. Either way, it pairs well with the consistency of the fish and is bolstered by a delicious tartar.
This sauce is simply superb with a creamy texture and a zesty finish. It's a great, homemade blend with something unique that's tough to put a finger on.
No matter how fine the fish, or savory the sauce, the highlight of the Eagle Fry has to be the house-cut French fries. The meal comes with mashed potatoes by default, but make sure to ask for the fries, it's well worth it as they are truly outstanding and everything a fry should be.
A homemade slaw looks plain, but packs a serious horseradish blast. Kapow! The roll also packs a wallop on occasion and this rendition was a big, fluffy bun with a wonderful taste. It was clearly fresh and an excellent addition this Fish Fry.
With so much going for it it's hard to not want to come back to the Silver Eagle every Friday. Overall, we highly recommend this Fish Fry and think it's about as well as you can do for $9.00.
Monona's Fish Fry of record as far as we're concerned can be found at the Silver Eagle Bar & Grill. While the building itself looks like a revamped Hardee's once inside it feels like anything but. It's a clean and spacious bar with plenty of light and a pretty ambitious menu. The Friday specials are also notable and incredibly affordable considering what you get.
While there is a cod special, the real deal is the $8 walleye plate. Yes, you heard that right, eight stinkin' bucks! Sure, you only get one fillet, and it's on the smallish side as far as walleye is concerned, but it's still a great deal. Historically, the Eagle used a spicy beer batter which, while tasty, was too thick and masked the fish. This time around things were different, and way better if I do say so myself. The updated coating was much lighter, and more of a breading than a gooey batter. It was nice and flaky with a good amount of spice to pair with the walleye essence. Overall, it was very nice for the price and will definitely be worth coming back for.
By default the Fish Fry comes with mashed potatoes, but seasoned veterans know to ask for the house-cut fries instead. These fries are simply superb, served with plenty of seasoning and fried until they are nice and crispy (which is tough to do). They are a Straight A spud, no ifs and or buts about it.
Next in line was the tartar sauce which was good, but far from perfect. It was a little dilly, and pretty plain, but not anything to complain about. The roll also didn't draw much criticism as it was served warm, and was doughy and sumptuous.
Last, but not least, was the Silver Eagle slaw which was cool and creamy, with a serious horseradish punch. Kapow! Take that taste buds!
For $8 you really can't do much better than the Fish Fry we got this time around at the Silver Eagle. The fish was delish, the fries were practically perfect, and the rest of the items did what they needed to do. Overall, we highly recommend this Fish Fry and think it puts Monona on the map as far as food is concerned.
We were to be five deep this Friday and when Paco and I arrived before the rest we were blown away to find the only open table in the place with exactly five chairs at it. It was a small miracle and hinted at great things to come. Now, The Silver Eagle is a pretty sizeable place, and the whole show was tasked to one ultra-diligent waitress, who not only noticed our arrival and got us drinks as soon as she could, but came back as soon as our friends arrived and returned to the table time and again as appropriate throughout dinner. She was really a marvel, and we all appreciated watching her execute her craft.
Adding further to our list of small victories were the Friday specials at The Silver Eagle. While the $9 cod special might not be anything out of the ordinary, the similarly priced walleye is. Each plate featured a slightly smaller than average walleye fillet served piping hot. The bounty came roughly 20 minutes after we ordered, which is a little long, but when the place is this busy you take what you can get. The fish was delicious, almost surprisingly so. It featured a light breading which had some spice evident. It was very good, pull-apart flaky and complimented the light and flaky walleye perfectly. All in all, it was superb and simply a fantastic value at a mere nine skins.
I was also able to get my hands a chunk of the cod, although at that point I was a few beers too deep, and the fish a few minutes too late for me to make a fair judgment. Word on the street was that it was "good" and a fine value for $9.
A limp, but delicious pile of homemade fries were stacked up alongside the fish and practically stole the show from it. The well-seasoned spuds came in a generous portion and were simple delicious. They were far and away some of the best we've had recently, and could easily hold their own with some of the fancier "frites" in town (a la Graze, or jacs).
The tartar was also user friendly, although somehow forgettable. All I know for sure is that every last drop got consumed so I assume it was tasty, but the intricacy of the Eagle sauce escapes us. Thick? Creamy? Zesty? Not known, but presumed. Like the tartar the slaw was good, but also somewhat forgettable. From what we remember it was a standard blend, but appeared to be homemade.
Not forgettable in any way, and adding a change of pace was a delightful little warm pretzel roll. Not only was it cute to look at, but also really tasty. It had a wonderful fresh crust, and was a welcome respite the plain old dinner roll which we are all t0o accustom. A little pat of room temperature butter also didn't hurt its appeal.
What can we say? It looks like we waited too long to return to The Silver Eagle. Everything about this visit was a huge step up from our lunch back in 2009, and we are totally blown away. Overall, we highly recommend the walleye at The Silver Eagle; it's an all-around fantastic deal, and possibly the best fish Monona has to offer. The Eagle has landed, and from the looks of it, it brought a walleye in its beak.
I just wanted a quick and tasty lunch and every trip I'd made to the Monona mainstay has been just that - great fish, no BS, in and out. For some reason things just didn't add up today, sure the food came fast, but everything else was wrong in some way.
The walleye fillet was much larger than what I've come to expect at the Eagle, but was over-fried. What is usually a medium-thick batter seemed to be doubled-up and virtually consumed the fish. It was way too crispy and had absolutely no flavor. It was not appetizing in any way and had fryer basket indentations all along one side. WTH?
I thought just ordering the fish would yield me the Silver Eagle's house-cut fries, but the plate came with mashed potatoes instead. The large scoop was covered with a bevy of shredded cheese, but even so, was boring and flavorless - certainly nowhere near as good as the fries I've enjoyed in the past.
The tartar was also a bit of a letdown being thinner that I recalled it being and having more dill. The batter on the fish was simply too much, and no matter how hard the tartar tried it failed to quell the batter beast.
Even though the walleye was way off the biggest disappointment on this outing was definitely the coleslaw. The previous incarnation was practically perfect which really makes me wonder how the latest rendition came to be. This stuff was nothing less than awful. It was some kind of orange goo with chili pepper added to give it a kick. It simply didn't work, and was likely one of the worst slaws I've ever laid my lips on. Ick.
The plain old roll was a plain old roll, and slightly crushed (which is apparently the norm at the Silver Eagle).
I'm not really sure what to say other than this visit to the Silver Eagle was a huge disappointment. Everything missed the mark in some way and the whole experience left me somewhat soured. Overall, I would not recommend the Fish Fry I had this trip, and I will think twice before I come back again.
We fell in love with the walleye at the Eagle on our second visit back in 2011 (our first visit was cod in 2009 and was just so-so). The walleye was plentiful, delicious, and incredibly cheap which is win-win-win in our book. We vowed to come back time and again and stuff our faces with fantastic freshwater fish until they gave us a reason not to. Well, that reason came in 2012 when the batter changed dramatically and the sides regressed as well. We decided at that point it was best to just go our separate ways and take some time off. We took a couple years, cooled off, but eventually returned in 2014 only to find it to be better than ever. We were back in love, but in classic Eagle fashion it wasn't meant to last.
On this most recent visit things fell off again, and even worse than before. The walleye used to be one fillet, but this time it was two. More fish, that's gotta be a good thing, right? You'd think so, but when the fish is lower quality and pre-breaded that is never a good thing. Add in the fact that it had a slightly fishy flavor and lacked the papery, well-seasoned breading it was worse for the wear. All we could think was what the hell happened here?!
Unlike the inconsistent fish, the house-cut Eagle fries have made, and continue to make, the grade. They are plentiful and salty and executed perfectly. This is how all places should play their potatoes.
When a place can do fries this well tartar sauce should be an afterthought, but the Silver Eagle just can't stay consistent. One time it's think and creamy, but the next it's mildly runny with too much dill. As far as texture goes it's acceptable, but at least one standard deviation above the mean as far as dill goes.
A snorer of a slaw was pretty bland and basically 100% cabbage. It lacked any sort of pop, but luckily, some baked beans came with it and had a bunch of burger and three or four different kinds of beans. We couldn't tell if they were from a can, but regardless they were a welcome addition.
While we do get sick of the regular dinner roll the atypical roll here was a step back. Perhaps ours were just stale, but they were really tough to chew through, to the point where we had to gnaw through.
Honestly, we're just not sure what to make of it all. We have a real love/hate relationship with the Silver Eagle as they just can't seem to maintain a level of excellence. This time around their Fish Fry has morphed again into something we just don't feel confident recommending. Overall, we wouldn't recommend this Fish Fry, and the inconsistency just makes it a little too risky for my tastes.
The bar itself is actually really nice and clean. Even though it is in Monona and smoking is still allowed I didn’t walk out smelling like an ash try or feeling half drunk which is certainly a plus. There are actually two fish options for lunch: Beer Battered Cod and Walleye; today Cod was the fish of choice. It took about 10 minutes for our food to be ready which we easily killed with a couple glasses of the Cow.
The fish was served very hot and was quite good. The beer batter was firm but not overly crispy which added a nice contrast to the flaky Cod underneath. This was good beer battered fish, no two ways about it. The French fries were substituted with mashed potatoes topped with shredded cheese. They were good but I would still rather have the fries. The tartar sauce was a good blend of mayo and relish but did have a fair amount of dill in it. It was acceptable but not ideal.
In addition to the fish and potatoes a side of coleslaw was served along with a dinner roll. The roll was actually pretty good, although a little firm and dry but the slaw was really soupy and kind of grody.
Sometimes bars think they can just have a bartender sling to food out as well as tend the bar which can really lead to some lackluster service. The Silver Eagle has a waitress who roams the bar specifically for food orders, and she did a great job of getting them on the table as soon as they were out of the kitchen. Overall this was a fine lunch time Fish Fry and I will certainly not hesitate to stop back sometime. Next time maybe I’ll try the Walleye…
The bar looked inviting so I grabbed an open stool and went from there. In no time I had a Spotted Cow and steaming hot plate walleye in front of me and got to work. Since it's only nine bucks the portion isn't gigantic, but even so, the meal is still a great value. The single walleye fillet is long and thin, and coated with a delicious, medium-thick beer batter. The generously seasoned batter works really well with the fish even though it is on the thick side the walleye is on the thin side - true animal magnetism.
As fine as the fish is, the real star of this show are the Silver Eagle's homemade French fries. Finding fries that are cut in-house is a rarity (especially at sports bars) and these shoestring-style spuds are expertly fried and simply superb. They are every bit as good as some of the fancy frites you find at more expensive restaurants downtown.
A thick tartar tails the walleye, but does have a little more dill than I'd like to see. Regardless of this dill-ema, the sauce improves the palatability of fish and I took almost all of it down.
Rounding out this excellent Fish Fry is a side of creamy coleslaw and a regular dinner roll. The slaw is a perfect example of what a creamy slaw should be and really packs a punch. The roll comes in on the opposite end of the spectrum, and I almost didn't come in altogether (it had to be requested when I noticed a butter packet with no purpose). It was sub-Wilson's.
You're not going to find many lunch hour Fish Frys as satisfying than this one. It's a great deal for a premium fish and comes with all the fixins you expect. Overall, we highly recommend the walleye Fish Fry at the Silver Eagle Bar & Grill. It's definitely the best Monona has to offer.