I consider myself an amateur foodie. I love to eat at great restaurants. I am talking about the quality of Michael Mina, Charlie Palmer, Hubert Keller, Gordon Ramsey, and Wolfgang Puck to name a few. Several friends have suggested Hawk’s in Granite Bay to me, so for our anniversary dinner naturally we decided to try it; after all it had gotten great reviews. Whoa… we did not just dislike it… we hated every minute and my hubby is still feeling a bit sick. Here is how it went. We had no reservation, but we told no problem when we arrived, we were then seated in the oddest location I have ever sat in at any restaurant. They have this ½ round room where all the seating faced into the center of the restaurant; we were at a table right in the middle of that area. Like in a fish bowl! And… I do not think that this table belonged here because there was no light on the table, there was one little candle and we literally had to steal a candle from another table in order to read the menu. Oh wait we don’t quite have a menu yet. We waited and waited and then finally the server arrived and asked us if we had a wine in mind. Yep, before he even said hello or gave us a wine menu. So we asked for one and he left it with us. Then we wait and wait and wait and finally we got a dinner menu with the special Prix Fixe menu. We ordered that. So here comes the food. Trying to keep up with the real chefs they offered us an amuse bouche that was tomato gazpacho that was under seasoned and had a very acidic aftertaste. First course is a Puree of Mushroom Soup with Truffle Emulsion and Crispy Shallots. Well…. It was truffle cream and soggy shallots that accompanied the soup which was good, but the soggy shallots killed it! Then there was this Hawk Burger with Braised Short Rib and Fries. After serving us our red wine in a white wine glass dinner came…. Overcooked!!! (We ordered medium and got well done) and under seasoned with… soggy fries. Neither one of us finished our burger and no one came around to ask us how it was. Not even when they took our ½ eaten plate! WHAT!!!!! Someone came to scrape up our crumbs and finally after plates are cleared asked “how was your evening” we replied “ok” he left!!! Also, I forgot to say while sitting in this fishbowl table, there was a suited, buffed, bald guy hovering around, but NEVER even looked at our center of the universe table. He totally made both Darrell and I a bit uncomfortable. I can understand me, but if Darrell feels it, I promise it’s for real! He talked to everyone but us! So odd! Our server was cold the buff guy ignored us, the bus boy took care of clearing and bringing food, but was not particularly friendly. Overall a cold feeling from all. Ok now comes dessert. A chocolate mousse and vanilla bean crème brulee’ Well, I can not say this was bad. It did taste good, but one or the other would have worked out the chocolate and vanilla were in the same cup and when I got to the bottom of the cup… Uncooked crème brulee, oh so sad! I did make it to the bottom, but seriously why not a good surprise at the bottom. So, we waited again and after finally being able to get someone’s attention from our fishbowl location, we asked for our check. They brought us a little silver tray with coconut macaroons and palmiers on it. The macaroons were the best thing I ate all night. Then they could not swipe my credit card, but there system could not take a manual entry. OMgoodness!! I kinda wanted to use THAT card but was forced to use another. What if I did not have one, would I still be washing dishes. Stupid!!! I know that is not a nice word, but I failed to mention the tab was $100.00 after all that!!! It was really only worth about $25.00 and the cold service accompanied by lousy food made it a memorable experience, just not in a good way!!!!
Cons: see the lengthy review
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