David L.
Yelp
Went early on a Sat night, "we're only 9 days into opening." Read the Eater review and wanted to give it a go.
The positives: the atmosphere is really inviting. Evoking an upscale brew pub like something you might find in Park City or Whistler. The beers that we ordered were all tasty and on point. The attitudes from the hosts to the wait staff to the managers were great. Everyone seemed really excited to be part of something new and fresh. You can order from both menus which is a huge plus.
The cons: the service though positive had some gaps. We noticed that there were a LOT more people on the floor than you would expect for that size of a dining room, I can only attribute this to the grand opening and some folks shadowing. But almost all of them were hanging around the POS machines or near the bar rather than attending to guests. So yes, immediately after our food was served, we couldn't find our server for a good while (aka like 20 min). Then I finally ordered my 2nd beer, and waited another 22 minutes (I actually timed it) before it was served..... I was on my last slice of steak at that point and was looking for my server to let her know that I actually wanted to cancel the beer order, but she came with the beer, so might as well. Though the prices are right where you would expect them to be, the con for me is the pricing for the steaks. It is REALLY high, especially when compared to the rest of the menu. I understand the concept, that they were using a local collective to source their steaks, but honestly, it just wasn't tasty, especially for that money. At $79 - a 16 oz Prime New York plus tax and tip comes out to just over $100. I'm not a steak snob in the least, but I have been to a few fine establishments in Seattle and around the world and that pricing is on par with getting a dry aged prime steak. This steak honestly didn't taste like anything special... sadly, it tasted like a steak I could have bought at Safeway. I didn't try the other dishes at the table, but the consensus was that the food was "good, not great." This leads to the last con for me. We were a party of 4 and there was a mandatory 20% tip added to the bill. I would have tipped the 20% as I always do, but making it mandatory really put a bad taste in my mouth. Especially given the service struggles. I think if a restaurant is instituting a mandatory 20% tip, you should just go ahead and bake it into the price of the food and say that you pay a living wage as is the trend these days. I've only ever seen a forced 20%.... when it for parties of 6 or more..... in Vegas.
I really wanted to love it, but I couldn't. For $350 for a party of 4, seemed a little overpriced and really not up to standards you would expect. And yes, we only ordered 3 beers, so a lot of that bill is food, yeah, we had a good sample of the menu. I'm sure over time, the service issues will certainly work themselves out. But not sure the taste will improve..... unless there's a revamp of the menu.
Rooting for you.