Sarah S.
Yelp
My husband, a couple of friends and I were headed to a Sunday night concert at SDSU Viejas Arena recently, which I'd never been to, and our friend suggested we go to Eureka! for dinner beforehand. I'd been to the Carlsbad location before and had enjoyed it, so we all agreed.
We arrived about an hour before doors, and there was a line of a few parties ahead of us and a few more soon arrived behind us. For a party of 4, we were quoted a 1.5-2 hour wait which was pretty insane considering there were a few empty/emptying tables in the (albeit small) restaurant, but it became quickly evident that lack of staffing was probably the biggest issue. We asked if we could sit at the bar, to which the hostess told us we were welcome to if we could find a spot.
We decided it would be fastest to get in and out if we split up, so our two friends sat at one end of the bar while my husband and I snagged two seats at the other end. We had to clear off and wipe down our own counter space, as it still had the remnants of whoever was there before us. It took a solid 7 minutes before the bartender even made her way to us to give us menus, and another 5-7 minutes before we were able to place our drink order.
My husband settled on an old fashioned, I ordered a vodka martini. I asked whether they had bleu cheese olives (negative), so regular olives it was. When our drinks arrived I couldn't help but laugh at mine - I'd never had a martini served in anything but a martini glass - it was delivered to me in a tulip glass. Even the stranger next to me leaned over and asked, "is that a.... martini??" Both my husband's cocktail and mine were just "meh," on the next round he ordered a beer and I opted for a seltzer.
We ordered our food, the Eureka! American for me ($14.85) and the Fresno Fig ($16.50) for my husband, neither of which come with any side. While we waited we had a front row view to observe the operation behind the bar, which was really chaotic and disorganized. We had people bellying up behind and beside us trying to place a drink order, and the bartenders would inform them - in a tone that made it clear they had very little patience left - they needed to proceed to the outside bar on the opposite side to place a drink order. Many of the patrons were visibly irritated and confused, I assume because they'd been waiting at their table to place a drink order but as we noticed from the jump, the staffing was inadequate so they decided to take it on themselves.
Our burgers were just okay - nothing special and my husband insisted even after turning his burger open-faced that there was little to no fig marmalade or much of any of the other ingredients he was looking forward to. My burger was pretty straightforward, but came at the wrong temperature - I requested medium-well and it was medium-rare, but based on the chaos and understaffing we had witnessed all night I wasn't about to complain.
We paid our bill as quickly as possible, and got the heck outta there. Definitely not a great experience and if I knew then what I know now, we would've picked an entirely different restaurant to dine at, even if it weren't walking distance to the venue like Eureka! is. If I were to dine here again, it would be only if I had 2+ hours of time to kill so we didn't have to rush amidst chaos, and maybe we could actually be seated WITH our friends and better enjoy our experience.