Room with a View

Aug. 31, 2005

Wander towards Lake Michigan, a block north of downtown Glen Arbor at the end of Lake Street, and you’ll find the new LeBear Club Luxury Spa along with the revitalized Windows at LeBear restaurant looking out on Sleeping Bear Bay’s boat launch.
This 40-person restaurant on Lake Michigan is white-walled with lots of glass and white-clothed tabletops, offering gorgeous vistas of a waterscape as far as the eye can see.
Executive Chef Randall Chamberlain, who came here from three years at the nearby Western Avenue Grill, presides under the supervision of restaurateur Phil Murray who owns Windows on Grand Traverse Bay between Traverse City and Suttons Bay, which he opened in 1986.
Chamberlain is featuring “American cuisine with a French-Creole influence... we call it inspired cuisine.” He gets most of his salad greens and vegetables fresh from local growers, meats from purveyors in Chicago and New York, and seafood from Boston and New York, as Murray does at the original Windows.
On our first visit about a week after the restaurant opened, we tried several appetizers from the eight listed, which included chilled gazpacho, $5, to barley stuffed quail, $13. We sampled the smoked whitefish paté at $8, which didn’t appeal to us, and the char-grilled lamb chops grilled to order (rare for us) at $11. On our second visit to LeBear, the appetizers included black bean andouille bisque, Cajun bbq shrimp,
duck liver mousse, baked escargot and whitefish patè.
My wife Ellen had the blue lump crab puffs in French bread -- very good -- while I had the house paté, a chicken liver mousse with jelly at $7. Also available were baked escargot and grilled sea scallops, $7 and $9 respectively.
Windows at LeBear offers nine entrees ranging from $34 to $42, including king salmon and sea scallops at $34 and Beef Wellington and lamb chops, both $41. Shellfish Provencal, Lobster Imperial or rack of lamb were among our choices on our second visit to the restaurant at $46.
We also enjoyed two salad choices and three desserts including a Napoleon or strawberry pastry puff at $7, or dark chocolate mousse Olivia at $7.50, which we have had at Windows on other occasions.
For those who enjoy cocktails, the Ketle One Vodka and Tanqueray martinis at $8 were large, with wine by the glass at $7 to $12.50. Our server Andrea was very attentive, along with five others staffing the bar, dining room and kitchen.
We’ve been dining at the Grand Traverse Windows since the mid -’80s when it was awarded AAA Three Diamonds. Windows has also been voted “Best Gourmet,” “Best Place to Splurge,” and other honors by Northern Express readers a number of times. Windows at LeBear should soon begin to get similar accolades.

Located at 5705 Lake Street in Glen Arbor, the restaurant is open 5-9 p.m. daily. Ph. 231-334-2530.