Bonfyre American Grille — Restaurant in Madison

My spouse and I went to Bonfyre for restaurant week since we had a certificate to use for restaurant week. We expected people to be tired and cranky as we can understand that the food business is a tough industry, especially for everyone involved with restaurant week. I have to say we had the best server we've had in a very long time. His name is Alan K. Even though it was crazy busy, Alan was full of energy, genuine, attentive and easy to talk to. We were waiting around a long time to get our dinner, even for it being restaurant week. Alan was so good that we didn't get upset about waiting. The food we had was decent. The fries and the mini deserts are a must and we suggest having those together! I hope we can come and visit Alan again next time we head out to Bonfyre! Even if you don't get Alan as your server, their food is delicious. I personally suggest the lobster ravioli.

Update: this place is always fun to go to! The prices are a bit shocking to see now after we've had the pandemic. The quality of the food was good. We got the Maytag Blue Cheese Potato Chip Appetizer which was phenomenal!!!! I would definitely get those again! The blue cheese and pepperjack are graciously atop some wonderful homemade thick potato chips all served hot. I got the chimichurri sirloin steak and fries. The steak came out perfectly cooked at the requested medium rare doneness. The angle cuts into it wasn't necessary and I felt that made it seem chewier than it needed to be. I don't often order sirloin steak at restaurants because so many places overcook them. The truffle fries were fantastic! I don't get to head out this way often but this place is always a treat. Oh and my husband had the jambalaya. Best jambalaya...

Let me start out by saying this was my favorite restaurant in Madison. But apparently I haven’t been there in awhile. I was so excited to get a plate of truffle fries! I knew it had been awhile but not so long that they were OFF THE MENU!! I almost left but I was dining with someone, so I stayed. It took me several minutes to get over this however. I ordered the cheese curds thinking they wouldn’t be that good, but to my surprise they were the best thing I had that night. They were so crispy I thought maybe they were tempura, but no, it was just regular cheese curds. The cheese was gooey and tasty. My dinning partner loved them as well. I do have to add in this review that the staff certainly weren’t what I was use to seeing at Bonfyre. The hostess looked like she was leading us into a shady bar in the way she was dressed. Really not appropriate for that type of place in my opinion. Then we got a glimpse and SMELL of the man with all the gold chains on. I think he must of bathed in his favorite cologne as we could taste it on our lungs. This is not an exaggeration! We finally asked our waitress about the smell and she replied “oh that must be Buster!”. She said it as normal as she deals with this daily. I’ll tell you, that man almost ruined our meal. And he really took his time as we watched him mostly sit on his phone. I ordered the wood fyre chicken with vegetables and garlic mashed potatoes. The chicken was fairly small and dry for 27.00. The green beans while be good at first had a lot of them that I couldn’t swallow because of the hard outside. The garlic mashed potatoes are always a treat. I had to give this only 2 stars as we also had an array of gnats that joined us for...

We were treated so poorly ☹️ I was there on Wednesday, April 27, for a birthday dinner with friends, the way we were treated was disgusting! The manager, Sterling, came off as condescending and had a weird smirk the whole time. We were there for a while before we were able to order food, & only because we asked the waitress if we could order. She never offered us more water or to refill our drinks & responded rudely when I asked about it.

This was a 16 person reservation. The payment process was explained when the reservation was made, & again after the first part of our party arrived. Our waitress came to our table, about 20 minutes after we ordered our food, to ask how we planned on paying; A couple of minutes later, another waitress came to our table to confirm that we could & how we planned on paying for our food. BEFORE OUR FOOD WAS SERVED.

A waitress claimed that she heard someone at our table talk about leaving without paying. It was a VERY SAD experience!

I was heartbroken because I was excited to go there! I haven’t been there in years & I was one of the first people to occupy the space for a fashion show when the building was first built, then again for a model casting call, & when I joined the YWCA Board of Directors 3 years ago, our welcome party was hosted there. I NEVER EXPECTED...