Strawberry Moon

I'm a fan of Strawberry Moon. I enjoy the creativity of their cocktails and the waitresses are always attentive. I've been here three times with some girlfriends and each time we have a lot of fun.They are a bit pricey for the Wauconda area, but things are stepping up this way as they seem to be turning Wauconda into a bit more of a resort/tourist type town. Which I don't mind since that means fun restaurants and nice bands at the bars.
The food is lacking, so I wouldn't bother too much with the appetizers. Definitely eat somewhere else (Lindy's or Slyce) beforehand and then end your night at Strawberry Moon.

My girlfriend and I went here on a Friday night. There was no one greeting at the door, so I picked a table and sat down to wait for her. I was flanked on all sides by different groups of "sex in the city (suburbs)" diva girls. Guess this is a trendy place for Wauconda.

Our server was very slow, but she was extremely friendly. She and the bartender went out of their way to concoct martini's for us that weren't on the menu, but catered to our tastes.

The menu is somewhat limited. We had the fondue, which was good, but only came with bread or apples. Mealy apples. I asked if we could possibly get some type of veggie.... broccoli, cauliflower perhaps? Nope... they didn't have any. For a low-carber, I had no choice, which was disappointing.

All in all, I would probably give it another try. It wasn't very busy, so on one hurried us, and the drinks were reasonably priced.

Stopped by here during a week night to listen to their live music (we were specifically visiting to check out a guitarist for our wedding).  I hadn't heard of this place but it's only been open since the beginning of the year, and from the look of the inside it seems it was completely gutted and renovated; the paint and wood still had a tinge of new smell to it.

We sampled a pretty good portion of their menu as we enjoyed the live music for a few hours, my fiancée going for the signature Strawberry Moon martini which tasted pretty good to me.  The beer selection is a bit on the weak side, mostly bottled (possibly ALL bottles as I did not notice any taps behind the bar, but I could be mistaken) but they did have a few good micro-brew options (Dogfish Head 60-Minute, Bell's Amber, Sam Adams, etc).  My only compliant would be since they are bottled beers that they branch out to provide a few more micro-brew choices, but maybe the current clientèle drives the abundance of watered-down macro-brews they have (after all it is a Martini bar).

The food menu is small, but had some good variety to it. We tried the pretzel bites which came with 4 different dipping sauces (horseradish, honey mustard, ranch, and queso) and nice presentation.  Also the pork ribs were fall-off-the-bone moist with a tangy soy-ginger sauce and some steamed veggies on the side.  That dish seemed more like an entree (not in size) as it was a bit odd as a sharing plate.  We finished off the night with the chocolate fondue which, hey how can you mess-up melted chocolate, brownies, marshmallows, and strawberries?

The kitchen seemed a little small (reflective of the menu) so I do not think that much of the items were scratch made (if any), most are probably store-bought but the pork was cooked very well regardless.  Over all it is not someplace I would head specifically for dinner, but if you go for drinks and are hungry they have some good options.

The decor and seating was nice and although there were a few loud groups the music was still easy to hear.  They also used an internal security camera to show the guitarist on the various plasma screens above the bar and upstairs which I thought was a nice touch.

Service was very good and both staff and patrons were friendly.  I am curious if it gets busier on the weekend but I'm not sure if downtown Wauconda has any sort of 'nightlife' on the weekends.  Hopefully they get the traffic needed to stay around as it's a nice little addition the NW suburbs.