From the President:
I was not very excited when Sheena chose Elaia. I had heard that it was overrated and was not really looking forward to dinner. In my opinion, it turned out to be an excellent choice and I tried to get everyone I knew to go back with me as soon as possible before they changed their menu.
Elaia and its sister restaurant are connected by a passway. Elaia is actually located in an old house and Olio is what I remember to be some sort of automotive service business. There is very little parking on their lot so your choices are to either park on the street or to allow their valet to park your vehicle. It is very unclear where guests are supposed to enter the restaurant. Luckily, when I arrived the hostess was right there at the entrance to let me know where to go. Others were not so lucky. Olio serves as the bar for Elaia and it is wonderful. The staff there was pleasant and I thoroughly enjoyed my drinks before dinner. In fact, after dinner I wanted to stay because they were playing Michael Jackson and that is always a charmer for me. The restaurant itself was nicely decorated. We did not love the art but the piece by our table was definitely a conversation piece. The furniture was nice and I loved that they offered the small stools for the ladies' purses. The stools for the purses did become a bit of an issue, however, more on that later. Diners gave Elaia 4 spoons for a good atmosphere.
I thought the service was pretty good but there were some difinite issues along the way. It is clear that Elaia intends for your dinner to be an experience. We were told at the outset to relax because we had the table all night. I enjoyed a lot about our service. At each course, a description of each item was presented to the table. I thought that was a really nice touch. However, generally, diners were displeased with how long the dinner took. Holding to the course presentation really caused the dinner to drag. Ther also seemed to be a general sentiment that the waittress assigned to our table was a bit condescending and at at times expressed outright displeasure with some of the concerns of our diners. The first complaint I heard was that hostess who led us to our table was upset that one of the diners went up the stairs before the hostess did. When one diner questioned his wine, the waittress stuck her nose into his glass to give it a good sniff. While I understand that this is part of evaluating the wine, it is a bit inappropriate to then return the glass to the guest. The waittress then spoke to the sommelier and they agreed to give the displeased diner something different. That, however did not quite make up for the fact that most of the table felt she should have taken the glass with her and offered a different choice right away. It was like an investigation into his claim which I do not expect at a fine dining restaurant. There was confusion as to the 1/2 glass - full glass pricing on the menu. The confusion could have been solved with a simple lable at the top of the wine list identifying what the price represented. The waittress was very clearly argumentative and annoyed at this point (characteristics that I do not expect to see from employees at this type of a restaurant). The last issue was with the purses. As I mentioned above, the staff was nice enough to offer us these lovely cork stands so that no one's purse had to be on the floor. I thought that was a really great touch. However, at one point, one of our diners was engaged in a conversation and instead of interrupting the conversation to invite the woman to place her purse on the stand, the gentleman simply picked up her purse and placed it on the stand. Other diners were shocked and appalled that anyone would touch a woman's purse without permission. I personally had no issue with his action but it was a problem for about 1/2 of the diners at our table. Diners gave Elaia almost 2 1/2 spoons for somewhat disappointing service.
The food, however, was ABSOLUTELY excellent! I had the whitefish croquettes with black garlic puree. They were so delicious that I ordered another dish of croquettes. My duck felt a little plain without any sauce but when I sent it off at the end of our meal, a friend tried to stop me so that he could eat the remainder because he enjoyed it so much. I think I would have enjoyed it if I had just thought to ask for some lemons to add some additional flavor. Some more of that black garlic puree would have made me very happy but I did not think of it. I ended up taking the olive oil cake home the next day and it was simply wonderful - moist and full of flavor without being too sweet. Every element of each of our courses was obviously carefully prepared and I cannot say enough about the quality of the food at this restaurant. The only complaint I heard from any of the diners was about the small portion sizes. I have to say that I am shocked that diners gave Elaia only 4 spoons for good food.
I really want to give this restaurant 5 spoons but I cannot ignore the service issues. This was the best food I have had in a long time. The chef and I seem to have a real agreement in the importance of the level of acidity in the food. I cannot wait to return for another delicious meal. Overall diners gave Elaia 3 spoons as a fair restaurant.
Everything took too long. The duck leg was great but not a great value for the price. I was disappointed in the overall experience. It seems the restaurant is trying too hard to distinguish itself. For the kind of money you are forced to spend, there are too few options and the portion sizes for the options available were too small. I would not go back until and unless they restructure the menu to offer more options.
ReplyDeleteFor a large groupo meal, they kept up at the beginning, but things got slow at the end of the meal. I really enjoyed all of my courses. The atmosphere was nothiing spectacular, but warm and inviting. I really like this restaurant, and found the slow service this time an aberration, hopefully going back with fewer people will improve service.
ReplyDeleteThe hostess and waitress were unnecessarily pretentious and at some points even rude. It is a nice restaurant, but at the end of the day we have to be realistic - we are in St. Louis inside a rehabbed house, not in New York on Columbus Circle. We were also at dinner for more than three hours. Each party had to request his or her check individually. It was unnecessarily extended. That said, the sommelier that frequented our table was pleasant. I loved the white fish appetizer and cod main course. The olive oil cake dessert was also a good choice. The first and second course (salmon and tuna or tuna and salmon - I cannot recall) were uneventful. The portions were small for the pricing and ingredients. I have no trouble paying expensive pricing for truffles or caviar, but I do have trouble paying a lot for cod and corn or tuna and apples. Overall, I was underwhelmed.
ReplyDeleteThe hostess was very good and efficient. I found her to be extremely pleasant. The sommelier was also very good and seemed well-informed. Unfortunately they were not staffing our table for most of the night. Our waitress was pleasant enough at first but that did not last long. I found several things she did and/or said to be off-putting. Then, one of the people at our table said he thought his wine tasted strange, and asked if tht was normal. She then proceeded to swirl his glass of wine and stick her nose in the glass to smell it. Heartily. After she finished she gave it back to him and said she wasn't sure. I found that to be very inappropriate and rude. He did not complain and continued to drink his glass of wine. But as a former server, I know that you never smell a diner's wine and give it back to them. Later in the meal I noticed that a lady in my group ordered a "full" glass of wine, then a "half" glass. So I asked her about it and we compared the pour I had just received my "glass" without distinction. I ordered 3 "glasses" throughout the night. The pours were the same as my co-diner's half glasses. So as we sat there we both agreed that I had surely been poured the half glass as I never specified which I wanted and the pours were the same. I looked at the menu again and commented that I didn't realize there was a half/full price option. I thought the full price was a cheap bottle of wine. As someone who has an extensive wine purchasing habit, I'm familiar with ordering wine and the cost of good wine. I still thought I had ordered 3 glasses of wine at $8.50 each. When the bill came, I saw that I was charged $17 each. Normally I would chalk this up to my error, but because the wine pours were the same and small pours, I decided to say something. The waitress was obviously mad and was extremely short explaning that she'd told us the difference in the beginning. Well, I missed that part of the meal. Any why didn't she ask which I wanted when I ordered? At any rate she stormed off and later the sommelier came over with a new bill and we had a nice little conversation. I eat at a lot of nice restaurants all over the country. Extensive wine lists are not foreign to me. I would recommend that this restaurant do like others and list the oz of the pou above the price column or not "1/2" "full". Someone at the table commented on how rude the server was when I brought up the issue and how she seemed to take it very personally. I especially told her that I did NOT want to be difficult, but that was of no consequence. She is obviously a good waitress. I would like to think she was having a bad night. Service was also extremely slow. Extremely slow. Our dinner took 3 hours, during which time there were long lulls in the service. Had it not been for the other table attendants (hostess, sommelier and server assistants), this would have been unbearable. Our waittress was very disappointing.
ReplyDeleteThe portions were extremely small. I ordered the lamb and got two small squares with some beans and tomatoes. I am still hungry after spending $100 on dinner. There were these little peppers that gave it an amazing flavor though. It was very tasty, I just wanted more of it! I don't enjoy spending $100 per person on dinner and then feeling like I need to go to the drive thru on my way home. Everyone's food looked very good.
It was a little dark in the restaurant but I loved the vibe. The decor was interesting and well throught out.
I thought the food was very good. The service was almost terrible. The attitude of the waittress was ridiculous. I have been to Olio, but this was my first time at Elaia. I cannot say I will be back.