My wife and I dined here tonight and our verict is "meh".
The restaurant is located on Route 120 in far northwest Lakemoor, west of Volo and east of McHenry, so you need to make quite a trek if you live in Chicago (as my we do). We drove up to the area in the afternoon, had lunch at Lindy's Landing in Wauconda, walked around historic Woodstock and went over to the restaurant for our 6:30 p.m. reservation.
First the dining room is is desperate need of a refresh - the metal-framed chairs and tables look like they came from a diner, the wooden column near our table had three noticeable gouges and the artwork (which is for sale) is kitschy. I was looking forward to an Escoffier-inspired classic French meal, and the food was generally solid but not great.
My wife had the "mushroom cigar" appetizer, i.e. sautéed mushrooms wrapped in a phyllo-like wrapper, which was earthy and good. My appetizer was the tomato and onion tart - a pizza-like topping on a light pastry foundation, which was just OK (the pastry was quite light and nice but the topping was unmemorable).
The complimentary romaine salad were very good - kind of like Caesar salads without the anchovies.
Our entrees were solid. My wife had the braised lamb shanks with flageolets were very well-prepared: The meat was delectable. I enjoyed my veal kidneys Dijonnaise - the brown sauce was nice, the kidneys themselves were deeply-flavored and chewy and the onion custard and potatoes lyonnaise were solid and nice additions.
The trio of desserts off a cart on a cart ranged from good to OK - we shared slices of an apricot tart, flourless chocolate cake and a Napoleon (which was the best of the three).
Service was mediocre. Our waitress acted like she should be have been working at a T.G.I. Friday's...wait, I have had friendlier, prompter and more attentive service at a T.G.I. Friday's. The other servers kept trying to fill our water glasses after only a sip or two. My cappuccino came halfway through our dessert even though I ordered it five or more minutes prior to ordering dessert.
The best thing is that the restaurant is priced relatively reasonably.
Le Vichyssois
220 Rand Road
Lakemoor, Illinois 60051
(815) 385-8221
http://www.levichyssois.com/