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| - After reading positive reviews from Phoenix Mag, here on Yelp, and from a friend, we decided to give Avalon a shot. Despite the fact that OpenTable showed they had open reservations 8:00, we arrived just before 8 to be told it'd be a 5-10 minute wait. 15 minutes later, we asked the hostess what was going on, and she said, "Oh, okay, I can seat you now" and walked us back to a dining room with about 5 open tables. I understand that restaurants seat based on server and not based on open tables, but making patrons wait with so many open tables is just bad business. As it would turn out, waiting is something we'd do a lot that evening.
After sitting down, we waited 5 minutes for the waiter to come over to ask about drinks. He brought our waters and then disappeared for 15 minutes. We had to flag down one of the hostesses to ask for some bread and to get our server so we could order. In the mean time, I noticed that another table sat down and waited about 10 minutes for their server to even show up at all, but at least once she did she got them drinks and bread immediately.
The first thing we noticed on the menu was that the chef had changed (it turns out the original chef left right after the new year). Once we did get our server, we ordered the organic greens salad, shrimp fettuccine carbonara, lamb osso bucco, and side of sauteed spinach.
The salad was a joke. For $8 you get about 8 bites of salad (the dressing is nice, though), plus they split ours in the kitchen, so we each were served a plate with about 4 bites. I don't care if it cost $3, you shouldn't serve anything that ridiculously small. The carbonara was quite good, with the added touch of lemon lightening up a typically heavier dish, but the osso bucco was pretty bland (although here the portion was huge). The spinach side was as small as the salad. Typically sides are enough for two to share, so if they're going to serve these petite sides, they should explain that to diners. The best dish was actually the dessert, banana bread pudding, which makes sense since the original chef was the former pastry chef for Sam Fox's restaurants.
After our dessert, we waited 15 more minutes from the time we asked for the check until our waiter returned. He apologized and said they were short staffed, but it was clearly just an effort to try to get a better tip.
The service was really a deal breaker for this place. And all of these problems could have been avoided if the hostess had just explained that they were short staffed and what the wait for a table (and good service) would actually be. That said, even if the service was perfect, I don't think the food was as exceptional as what I've had elsewhere for the same price, with the exception of the dessert. I don't see this place lasting long if these problems continue
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