Free House Pub
In a word: Not enough degrees of freedom.
The specs: #00880
902 Parmenter St., Middleton, 53562
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Chris ate the honey ham and sharp cheddar sandwich with a Manhattan.
JM ate the BBQ jalapeño burger with a lemonade.
Marissa ate the black bean and edamame salad.
Nichole ate the black and bleu burger.
The bill was $50ish, or $13ish/person, plus tip.
Chris gave Free House Pub a B; JM and Nichole gave Free House Pub a B-; Marissa gave Free House Pub a B+ (see our grading rubric).
Free House Pub's subtitle is "ale, whiskey, fare," and we'd bet that's in order of importance. The fare was fine, though it all sounded a little better on the menu than it came out in real life. We could choose from half a dozen burgers or salads, and about a dozen sandwiches, including two vegetarian options and three fish choices.
Marissa's black bean and edamame salad with chicken got most of its flavor from the chicken, though the other toppings added enough moisture to make the side of slowly-separating vinaigrette unnecessary. Chris' ham & cheese with bacon was good, but ran out of "oomph" before it was gone.
Both JM and Nichole's burgers were bloody-rare, soaking the bottom buns ahead of their time. The black & bleu was salty, with lots of cheese. The jalapeño BBQ burger was loaded with peppers and had a good flavor, but the tomato slice looked like it was looking back at us with an eyeball of green core.
For sides, we had regular fries and thin sweet potato fries. Here the condiments were fun. There was malt vinegar, smoked ketchup, and a smoked chipotle orange marmalade aioli. Beverages were weak (lemonade and Manhattan) to transparent (coffee, ordered but didn't appear).
Free House has a fish fry which showed promise. All things considered, though, Village Green is more likely to get our burger buck.
I don't love Free House, but I end up going there for work sometimes. My favorite thing on the menu is the vegetarian chili.
Posted by: Amanda | December 28, 2013 at 11:33 AM
Went in for a beer (husband) and something to eat. It was my first time there and I was surprised by how big the place is - but it is rather rabbit warren-ish. Our chips, salsa, and guac were mostly good. There were lots of very fresh chips and plenty of guacamole, but the salsa fell short - the cup held a lot of liquid and the salsa didn't have a lot of flavor. It would be easy to fix this if the kitchen would simply allow tomatoes to ripen - a misstep most restaurants make but could fix if they planned ahead. We split the ABLT (+ avocado). The bacon was perfect and plentiful, the bread held up, the avocado was perfectly ripe, and the lettuce was lovely leaf, but sadly there was more pale, flavorless tomato. The matchstick sweet potato fries were just warm but the deeeelicious smoked ketchup made up for that. I'd go back if only for fried anything with that ketchup!
Posted by: Marsha K | March 12, 2014 at 08:08 PM