West Chase Grille

We had such high hopes for the West Chase Grille, maybe to high. Consequently our disappointment was probably slightly more devastating than normal. Located in the space occupied by the much missed 40 Sardines, with chefs pushing a lot of street cred, and a menu that is truly drool inducing, what could possibly go wrong? It wasn't the location or decor, service was gracious and on point, but the food... the food was lacking.

Susan and I had gone for lunch since I was disturbingly excited about the Kobe beef burgers (which I know is not actual Kobe, it's Wagyu beef raised here in the States... to their credit, West Chase has amended their menu to show American Kobe but that's still cheating in my book). Our server was lovely and attentive and we soon ordered Classic French Onion soup and a house salad to start. The soup was fantastic, a perfect example of what this soup represents. The house salad was lovely with lots of goat cheese, walnuts, greens and sweet red onion. Honestly, splitting these starters could have easily afforded a couple a nice lunch, but I'm a greedy, gluttonous SOB and I was going to get a burger. And here is where it went downhill. Susan ordered the Truffled Crimini Burger and I needed the Balsamic Glazed Vidalia Onion Burger, we both ordered medium doneness accompanied by truffled french fries. When we received our beautiful burgers mine was a little over done (which is somewhat forgivable), but Susan's was borderline raw?!? Needless to say we sent hers back to the kitchen and snacked on my fries until the order came back. The fries (truffled?) were not particularly good, obviously a pre-cut frozen product, not necessarily fried to order. When Susan's burger came back it was very over done. Truly, absolutely disappointing. We made our concerns known to our server who apologized but was unable to get a manager as there apparently wasn't one there. We paid our bill and left.

When we got home I fired off an angry email to the owners. To our surprise, the reply was almost immediate. They apologized profusely, comped our entire meal and requested that if we ever came back, to please let them know so they could introduce themselves and apologize in person. We haven't been back... but man, that menu is tempting.