Black Walnut

First of all, I am so happy I got to try this place. My friend took me here for a birthday meal last night. It was fantastic! The service, the ambiance, and the food were amazing!

We started with the margaritas, which were nice and refreshing. We had the dungeness crab arancini and foie Gras & duck liver pate for starters. Next, we paired a red with our Applewood smoked beef tenderloin and mushroom lasagna. Everything was great! We finished everything because it was amazing!

In the end, we were too stuffed for dessert. However, in the end, we got a couple of truffles. I would say that this is a great place for fine dining. I highly recommend this place.

Service started out great. The hostess wished me a happy birthday and brought us to the bar to order drinks until our table was ready. Our server was friendly and attentive when we first sat down, but as the night progressed it was difficult to flag her down. The biggest annoyance of the evening was it took 45 minutes from the time we finished our appetizer to receive our entrees. This caused us to order more cocktails on an empty stomach.

Cocktails:
dress to empress: I recommend if you want a pretty drink with a floral aftertaste.

lets get the show on the road: this vodka-based cocktail sounds fruity but it was disgusting...like drinking straight vodka with a splash of raspberry juice.

florida stole my parents: this rum-based cocktail was refreshing

They ran out of the sablefish and the server advised they could make me a grilled salmon if I really wanted fish. I shared the salmon and applewood smoked beef tenderloin with my friend and we were still hungry so we ordered the black walnut burger. Because we waited so long for our food I didn't bother ordering a birthday dessert. Overall the food was pretty good, but this isn't a great place to celebrate a special occasion due to their small portions and the ridiculous wait time for your food.

There are very few steakhouses outside of downtown Vancouver but Black Walnut is, and is very good! Soft opening was about a week ago and they are still ironing out the kinks but everything was awesome tonight.

We had two appies and the tomahawk steak. To start we had fried octopus and hamachi. We had great service and the food was delicious. We will be back!

I have been to Black Walnut twice. Then there was a 3rd thing...

Visit 1: The first time we received the wrong food - not what we ordered. There were apologies and we were told we would get our meal quickly. They then picked up the meal that had been left at our table cooling for 5 minutes and gave it to an adjacent table. The wrong meal arrived the second time; my friend received her pasta but I got steak instead of fish for the second time. They asked me if I would keep the steak - no! - then left my friend's pasta at the table to cool while we both waited for my fish. Once it arrived the food was fine though her meal was completely cold. We were offered a free dessert - which we did not want. I took the steak home for my husband. No other accommodation was made.

Visit 2: The restaurant was busy. Everyone was trying but service was very slow. We were not offered any drinks after our first - had to chase down the waiter. My paste with sage and pumpkin was bland and uninteresting - there was no sage in the sauce, just a single sage leaf for garnish. Our friend's meals were fine. But the prices are high so 'fine' is not really sufficient.

Visit 3: We booked brunch for a birthday after a friend recommended it several times. My husband, who had booked weeks in advance, received a call less than 24 hours before our brunch and was told they were no longer serving brunch. He scrambled and was able to find another location. Did they decide that morning? Our reservation was in the system - surely they could have called earlier? No accommodation was offered.

Summary: Boring food for very high prices, poor service, and who does that? Avoid Black Walnut at all costs.

This is an upscale restaurant with excellent food and service. The fish special was a great combination of flavors and the service was excellent.