The Woodhouse Restaurant — Restaurant in Grabill

The wood house is an absolute hidden gem.

Owned by a local traditional family, staffed by a mix of ultra modern eclectic young people and members of the family that owns the place....

It is just not possible to get a better value, and it's a unique dining experience.

Because of tradition for example, furniture and decor are very humble, very traditional yet of the finest materials.

No linen tablecloths here, but everything is scrubbed to a true shine.

The menu is a combination of local favorites which means incredible value...

And some spectacular feature items that while locally might be considered quite expensive,. Compared to fort Wayne restaurants even the most expensive things on woodhouse menu is a genuine bargain.

The woodhouse soup is an interpretation of a traditional German recipe, a thick heavy cheese potato mixture that is just a delight on the tongue.

Be sure you ask them to double bake the bread... It is good Bread but they tend to serve it a bit lukewarm.

Brad is complimentary with even the most humble meal along with whipped butter.

They're specialty fish is an incredible bargain whether you buy it all you can eat or in their signature fish sandwich.

It is fried, but not oily or greasy.... Certainly as healthy as fried food can possibly be.

The house red is poignant and refreshing. Very much a traditional German table wine if you like the wine at Catholic or Lutheran Church you will love this red.

It's an early crowd, if you come at 7:00 you'll be nearly alone....

If you want to dine surrounded by large families.... Many with three and four generations at the same long tables....

Come early, 5:00 or 5:30.

They offer chairs, booths, and traditional country long table seating with real Church benches.... The folding benches used by traditional Amish and Mennonite for large gatherings and celebrations.

Right across the street is one of the best hunting stores in Allen county.

If you come before 7:00 you can visit the traditional equivalent of Sam's club at grabill country sales less than an eighth of a mile away due north of the restaurant.

The biggest shame about this place is I'm confident in 5 or 10 years it'll take a reservation and probably a week's wait just to get in.

Anyway hidden gem, 8 miles from 469 and US 37....

What's...

If I could do zero stars I would. If you're looking for overpriced food, very poor service, and an owner that would rather argue with his paying customers than make the situation right, then The Woodhouse is for you. Went there a couple of months ago with my wife and my mother. We all had an equally horrible experience. They close at 8:00 and we got there at 7:00. Apparently, according to certain people online I've recently encountered, an hour before close is way too late to go to a sit-down restaurant. Yeah, ok. 🙄🤷‍♂️🤦‍♂️ Our waitress seemed very annoyed at any questions we asked about the menu options. She also flat out ignored our table when my wife tried multiple times to get her attention because of an issue she had with her food. My mother and I both got the Gma's Meatloaf, which was severely over salted. My wife got the Smothered Chicken, which was supposed to come with gravy, cheese, mushrooms, onions and bacon. Needless to say, it didn't come with any of those things except for the cheese. When we finally got the waitress's attention she brought the owner over. He proceeded to negate my mother's complaint over the meatloaf being salty by stating, and I quote, "we've never had a complaint about it before", as well as, "it's made from locally sourced meat." Well there's a first time for everything sir. How that makes my mother's complaint of it being way too salty not true is beyond me. Then when my wife explained what happened with her smothered chicken, his response was, "Oh, we ran out of bacon." Yeah and everything else except for the cheese, I guess, because that was NOT smothered chicken. I feel like if you don't have a majority of the ingredients to make a dish properly, then maybe you should say something to the customer before just bringing it out. All in all, he had a very smug attitude and did not even offer to give us a discount of any kind, and it was not cheap. I would recommend if you're looking for a good place to eat at a fair price, then avoid this place like the plague. The food, the service, and the atmosphere are all very poor, and you will pay an arm &...

Honestly... if I could do 0 stars I would. I grew up locally and was excited to hear of a new place that was in the old Grabill Inn. My family and I went there for dinner for my brother's birthday and between the 7 of us... not a single one was pleased with anything.

Service: the server was a teenager that clearly had no training and didn't care about working. We couldn't find her half the time. No refills on drinks, missing 2 sides from 2 orders, and when she brought the bill she asked "cash or card" (after we had to ask someone else roaming around the dining area to find our waitress). When my grandmother said she would pay cash, the waitress wasn't even going to give a receipt. As she was about to just say how much was owed for the bill we told her to print the receipt. Once she did... she stood at the end of the booth and waited while my grandmother counted out money to leave for the bill... I've never in my life see a server do that. My mind was absolutely blown on how rude she was being with impatience to get the money for the bill. She was probably the worst server I have ever had. (Understanding that lack of training was most likely a major factor in this, we still left her a decent tip)

Food: Growing up in the area, good food isn't typically hard to come by. However, there was not a single edible item that got delivered to our table. Meat dishes were severely overcooked and dry, mashed potatoes tasted instant and not homemade (along with the gravy), French fries tasted like McDonald's fries that had been 3 days old, and whatever the brown butter noodles are.... I had to spit it out it was that bad. The disappointment was so great. I would have rather gone across the street and got food at Dairy Sweet.

Unless this place trains their staff and gets a new cook... we will not be...