Melanie S.
Yelp
Blackbird Public House has taken an absolute nose dive in the past few months. What started as a great neighborhood spot has fallen into the trap of significantly raising prices while the quality and portion of food significantly declines.
It started with the loss of their signature steak salad, which was exceptional. The server (who was new) explained that the chef (who was new) was looking to reduce costs and the steak salad was too expensive to produce. I could add steak to an existing salad for $8, though (at last visit it was now an absolutely ridiculous $12 to add).
I've experimented with adding different proteins to salads at exorbitant costs and just can't make any combination worth the price. The salads themselves are in the $15+ range and probably cost $3 to make. They will serve salads with 1/3 of the ingredients advertised and still charge full price. I wasn't informed there would be adjustments, it just came out with almost nothing on it. Please see the photo of the salmon salad, which was mixed greens, 1/3 of an apple, a two strawberries, and a sprinkling of cheese plus $7 for salmon, making this a mid $20 salad. The cost value just isn't there. If I hadn't added salmon, it would have been nowhere near a full meal and I honestly can't believe they had the gall to serve it. Adding protein, especially at an upcharge, should not change the quality of the salad itself.
Next time I visited I tried their salmon because I couldn't stomach paying over $20 for eight bites of lettuce again, and on the salmon salad I found the salmon was cooked well. I also landed on the salmon after switching from my original order of a burger once they informed me they were out of ketchup (?!?!), brussel sprouts, and soup ("we haven't had soup for weeks..."). So salmon it was, except they actually originally told me they were out of salmon but once she went to the kitchen to check they ended up still having some. I can't remember how much this was but somewhere near $20. It was swimming in butter, had two cherry tomatoes haphazardly thrown in, was incredibly dry and overcooked (ordered medium rare), and the zoodles were soggy after sitting in their butter bath. Another disappointment.
Lastly, every single time I come here (monthly) there are different servers with the exception of one bartender. Everyone is always new and doesn't know what's going on, and the staff turnover indicates a bigger issue. Even with the service industry the way it is, it's abnormal. We came for a monthly meeting on a Tuesday, and despite bringing in 15-20 people worth of business on what is historically a restaurant's slowest night, they always acted inconvenienced that we were there (minus the long-term bartender, who was an absolute delight).
I am so glad that we have moved our meeting elsewhere, as none of us could really support spending more and more money each month when they raised their prices for declining food and service. I can't imagine they will last much longer under the current philosophy.