Jen K.
Yelp
I have been wanting to try the Blue Heron for a few months now, and we finally made it over for lunch this weekend. Overall, I would absolutely go back for another meal.
First impressions: Having never been here before, I cannot speak to what the restaurant looked like before they remodeled, but I found the interior to be clean, well-kept, and very visually appealing. I loved the dark blue paint accents, the booth was comfortable, the fireplace gave great ambiance, and views are gorgeous. (Sidenote, here, I'm hoping to go back this summer and try lunch out on the deck if they allow food service on the wraparound deck).
The food: We began with the Italian sausage flatbread appetizer,which was a generous portion size, that could have been a meal by itself for one person. The combination of flavors was fantastic, we both enjoyed the flatbread, my only critique is that the red onion, which was pickled (not noted on the menu), was very roughly chopped up. This resulted in some small red onion pieces that enhance the flavor of the flatbread, but some very large pieces, up to 1" squared, that overwhelmed the other flavors at times. Oh, I would recommend that if someone is going to add pickled red onion, and use larger pieces of onion, a few dollops of creamy, goat cheese, or similar cheese would offset the acidity of the pickled onion.
For our entrées, I had the Parmesan crusted ling cod with saffron rice and asparagus and my companion had one of the specials of the day, the stuffed salmon with smashed potato cakes and broccolini.
We both LOVED both of our fish dishes. The fish was moist, accompanying sauces enhanced the flavors, delicious stuffing on the salmon. Would highly recommend both.
My constructive criticism is directed to the sides - the saffron rice and the smashed potato cakes.
The rice was buttery but in my opinion was a one note flavor that could have used some brightness/acidity from a sprinkle of citrus juice (orange maybe?) or zest, or even some finely diced grape tomatoes.
The smashed potatoes were under-seasoned in my opinion. They were tasty yes, but some Italian herbs and a little salt and pepper would have gone a long way to bringing in some flavors to the crust to compliment the stuffed salmon.
We did finish with dessert, the seasonal berry cobbler. We both quite enjoyed it, the hot fruit cobbler with vanilla ice cream was delicious. My only thought was the crust covering the cobbler could have either been a little less thick, or a little salt to really pull out the baked buttery flavor of the crust.
We had no problems with the service, the server and manager were both friendly and accommodating. With only the two of them on the front end there were some delays for other customers, but not for us. If you eat at a local restaurant, you need to expect that your service might be a bit slower, but the food and staff more than make up for the delay.
As I said before, I would absolutely go back again!
