Foods from Elgin Cafe
Comments
2008 Sep 24
Lateapex, the Lord Elgin is our favourite hotel to stay in when we are attending an event downtown (like Canada Day - much easier to stay at a hotel than to fight the traffic home!). We've never been for dinner but breakfast/lunch has always been excellent. I agree the service is a bit ditzy though.
2008 Sep 21
Went here lat night before the opera. Le Cafe in the NAC was full so we made reservations here instead. But I do not think we will do that again. Despite the prestige of the hotel, the restaurant is small and definitely would not fit the 'fine dining' I would have expected. From the vinyl seats and photocopied cover of the plastic menus, it is more 'family oriented' I would say except for the prices. They seem to try to be upscale looking at the menu, but fall very short.
The server was pleasant but had absolutely no knowledge of wine. She picked up our glasses in order to pour them whcih is a no-no and then recorked the wine after the first serving???!!!!! We had to pull out the cork and pour our own wine the rest of the dinner.
I started with the Goat Cheese Crusted Spinach Salad (Goat cheese crusted in almond praline, served on a bed of baby spinach, topped with apple cider and cranberry vinaigrette $9) but the presentation was odd with a fluorescent 'mush' vinaigrette that was tasty though hard to get past the industrial look of it. My husband had the fried calamari which was the worst we have ever had. There was 3x more batter than calamari and it was very rubbery.
The mains were better but just average and not quite worth the hefty prices. I had the pork chop whcih was $26 and he had the duck breast for $29. They reminded me of upscale home cooking and not fine cuisine.
The whole bill after dessert and cappuccino (on the positive they have good coffee), was $148 and is way overpriced for this quality. We will never go back for that reason alone. It is one thing to go there for a light meal if you are expecting that kind of quality in food and service but I can get much better value at most downtown restaurants.
Curious to hear other's thoughts if you have been there.
The server was pleasant but had absolutely no knowledge of wine. She picked up our glasses in order to pour them whcih is a no-no and then recorked the wine after the first serving???!!!!! We had to pull out the cork and pour our own wine the rest of the dinner.
I started with the Goat Cheese Crusted Spinach Salad (Goat cheese crusted in almond praline, served on a bed of baby spinach, topped with apple cider and cranberry vinaigrette $9) but the presentation was odd with a fluorescent 'mush' vinaigrette that was tasty though hard to get past the industrial look of it. My husband had the fried calamari which was the worst we have ever had. There was 3x more batter than calamari and it was very rubbery.
The mains were better but just average and not quite worth the hefty prices. I had the pork chop whcih was $26 and he had the duck breast for $29. They reminded me of upscale home cooking and not fine cuisine.
The whole bill after dessert and cappuccino (on the positive they have good coffee), was $148 and is way overpriced for this quality. We will never go back for that reason alone. It is one thing to go there for a light meal if you are expecting that kind of quality in food and service but I can get much better value at most downtown restaurants.
Curious to hear other's thoughts if you have been there.
Dita
The seared salmon sandwich and the avocado sandwich are really good!
Avoid the martinis though.
This place doesn't seem to have a trained bartender.