Food: delicious small portions with fresh creative favors. Pricey yes but I'm okay with that if quality is good. Grapefruit hamachi was tasty, soft shell crab salad, oysters, cauliflower was the vegetable of the day. Orange fritter desert.
Ambiance: cozy and historic home. Live music on patio was simply adorable with a separate menu very affordable for casual meal.
So why the 3 star review?
Service.
Waitstaff was knowledgable and brought out all of food in timely manner etc no issues there. But I felt overall that the atmosphere was snobby and unaccommodating. I felt like I was judged immediately as someone who was going to ask for a Rock n Roll and a sake bomb and that I was treated as such. (I understand that this is clearly not the place). Just because I removed my septum piercing 10 years ago and don't have a sleeve, this apparently makes me not sophisticated hipster enough for this establishment.
First young lady who came by our table took drink orders. I asked for a matcha green tea and pointed at the menu to confirm that was what I had requested (I didn't want to get stuck with a green tea leaf beverage which is brewed leaves as opposed to whisked matcha powder). Her response was very snobby "matcha is green tea" (as if I didn't know this) and then "those other teas are brown" (referring to green tea leaves)... Okay... Not a good first impression. But I can move on.
A member of our party asked for hot sake and they informed us they only serve it cold. I get that but taste is a personal preference and clearly they have the capability to warm up a liquid. We asked them if they could do this for us. No. Then implying that we could do this ourselves, we then asked if we could have hot tea and cold sake. The waitress threatened "if I see you heating up the sake, I am going to have to ask you to leave because you are asking to do something that I clearly already told you not to do"
I am usually very forgiving of poor service or bad attitudes. Everyone has a bad day from time to time. In their defense our table was a larger party of a somewhat boisterous nature. Still I can't excuse the pretentious attitude.
I'd probably come back for the food but will keep a low profile with a smaller group.