Richard S.
Yelp
My wife and I (locals from Mill Valley) decided to have dinner at the Trident tonight (July 5th).
First, i must say that although the Trident has been architecturally "updated", and is now fully accessible for those who use wheelchairs and scooters for mobility, it has successfully retained its ambiance of the "60's"! Being inside the restaurant brings back many memories of when the Kingston Trio owned the restaurant, and of course, the view can't be beat! And those are probably the reason you should consider going there! The present food and service, not!
We first ordered drinks. Although the restaurant was not at all busy (maybe 10-15 tables occupied), it took our server at least 15 minutes to get our drinks to us. Although I ordered a Scotch & soda with a lemon twist, my drink was served with two wedges of lime! So, I had to ask another server (ours was really hard to find!) for a lemon twist. Other than that, the drinks were fine.
Then we ordered our salad - a Ceasar Salad split, and one order of the Fish & Chips and one order of the Fried Misto (fried Calamari, Cod, large prawns, and a few pieces of Zucchini and yellow squash).
The Ceasar was good, although the white anchovies (2 filets) were layed on top of the salad, not blended with the oil and other ingrediants to ensure their flavor is spread throughout the salad, as the traditional Ceasar Salad was always made). I don't believe it had a coddled egg mixed into the salad dressing, either, which is another traditional part of a true Ceasar Salad. But the Romain lettuce was fresh, and the salad dressing was good.
When the entrees arrived (served, like the salad, by another server), both of us were surprised by thw amount of seafood there was on both plates. Although Tartar Sauce was served ed wirh the Fish & Chips entre, my Misto was served with an Aoli dip, which was good, but I was not offered Tartar Sauce, something I would have preferred. Also, my Misto deep fried seafood looked like it had been battered with corn meal, again, good, but not traditional.
When the server first took our order for salad, I had also asked for an order of sour dough French bread. Although that item never showed up, we weren't charged for it, but my issue is that it was ordered and we didnt get it! I would have liked having sourdough French bread with my salad!
The two entrees were both fresh, good, and large portions, although I would have preferred a different batter for my seafood.
I think, during our whole meal, the original server who took our bar qnd food order only showed up once during the time we were their (except at the end of our meal when I had to ask another server to find ours so I could get the check and pay for the meal.
Also, the young woman at the front desk who seated us, who was very nice, or anyone else, for that matter, walked around the dining room inside and the deck outside to check with the customers to see if their drinks, meal, and service were all OK. Apparently the management didn't train their host/hostess staff to do that. If the hostess had come by our table during our meal, I would have told her that at no time during our meal did our server come by and ask if we would like any drinks (wine, champagne, beeror a second set of the drinks we had originally ordered. At $18 each!!)
Will we go back to the Trident? Probably, although I'm not sure i/we will eat anything, based on the pretty outrageous starter and entre prices the Trident now charges!
For the two of us, with the two drinks and the two entrees, our bill came to an astounding $131.92!!! And that was for two people! Clearly, the Trident owner/Manager dont expect locals from Marin or even the Bay Area to dine there more than once, which is too bad, since as a local, and when the Kingston Trio owned it, I dined there regularly.
How many stars? We'll, I guess I will leave my last review of the Trident's two stars, mostly (1 1/2 stars for the vew, and the 1/2 star for the very poor-horrible service, but somewhat acceptable food)
This is an edit addition: When reading some of the other reviews, I learned that the Trident actually add a surcharge! It wasnt enough that our bill forbthe 2 of us was (without tax or surcharge) $115.00, the owner/manager added a surcharge of $5.75 to our bill! Because of that, my review went down to 1 star, and would have been "0" stars, but Yelp requires at least one star!!
We will find a different restaurant with a view in Sausalito in the future!
