Oliver & Bonacini

On my actual birthday, we went to Oliver & Bonacini. I was debating here or Joey's, but I suppose O&B would have been more classy so we came here. To my surprise, it wasn't what I was expecting. My visit was quite disappointing. 

Typical bread, nothing special.

My brother ordered the mushroom soup as an appetizer. ($4.50)

I'm actually curious how they made this soup considering no cream or butter was added. It had a really rich mushroom flavour and you could taste the shredded bits of mushroom, prefect for mushroom lovers. I liked it, I would suggest giving it a try.

I ordered sweet potato fries to share ($7)

I suppose this was actually the dish i enjoyed the most. Crispy with good spices. Expensive for a batch of fries though I would say.

I ordered the Black Angus Beef Brisket. ($25)

Sounds fancy huh? But it was disappointing. The brisket meat was actually dry with so little taste. I think there was sauce but it wasn't captured in the meat. However, the stuff under the brisket tasted much better than the beef (I actually don't know what it was..) It was squiggly lumps of some kind of carbohydrate, went well mixed with the greens and sauce. 

My brother ordered the roasted Portobello burger, came with a salad ($15)

It was alright, nothing special in my opinion. I think the portobello sandwich I had at California Sandwiches was much more tastier. 

My dad ordered the bacon and cheddar burger, which came with fries ($14)

Nothing special, just a normal burger.

My mom ordered the shrimp & scallop linguine ($17)

Tasted like normal tomato pasta? I didn't taste any wine in the sauce, not to mention you rarely see any sauce. Nothing special as well. 

Food: Alright

Service: I did not like our waitress. I wouldn't say she was racist, but she didnt seem to give us the best service as if she believed in the stereotype of asians paying minimum tips. When we told her we won't be drinking tonight, you could already sense the change of her attitude and service. 

Price: Expensive, but it actually wasn't as pricey as I expected it to be. The price seems to be similar to dining at a Moxie's, or possibly a bit more.

Atmosphere/decoration: It was a loud setting. I was expecting more of a quite atmosphere, not as fancy as I thought.

Overall: I was disappointed. Either i was just being picky with high expectations, or the food actually wasn't that great. I did not have a favorite dish that night. There wasn't a wide range of selection in the menu either, or maybe the food just didnt appeal to me. After mentioning about it my visit to a few friends, they actually told me the standards and quality of their food has went down. And you would think fluctuating meal standards don't happen to big classy restaurants like this one. I don't think I would pay another visit here.

Oliver & Bonacini

2901 Bayview Avenue (inside Bayview Village)