Secret Galley Restaurant — Restaurant in Airdrie

This place makes pretty good food but the atmosphere leaves something to be desired.

The food: we had the bbq duck bao as a starter it was good but not quite what I was expecting. It was done in southern style BBQ sauce as opposed to a asian influenced bbq. the duck had been cooked down so much h it was indistinguishable from other types of BBQ pulled meat, a little disappointing but still tasty.

I had the beef dip, I have to try it at every restaurant that has it on the menu. I've got to tell you this is thee best beef dip I have had in a while. The beef was thinly sliced and not dry, it was complimented with what I'm pretty sure was horseradish and the usual beef dip fixings. The roll it was served on was quite crusty outside but soft inside, this along with the quality of the beef was the highlight of the meal. The au jus was on point beefy, salty and not too watery. It's a simple menu item but hard to do well and it was done well here.

My boyfriend had the lasagna which was not as good as the beef dip. He commented on how salty it was and he loves salt so it was odd. Whoever was in the kitchen that night must have oversalted that particular dish, you could see it sprinkled on the plate around the dish. I take minor issue with things like plates that haven't been tied up before they're served in whats suppose to be upscale dining environments.

It looked pretty good when it came to the table but it was for the most part just red sauce, noodles and cheese stuck under the boiler. It was missing a lot of things that give lasagna its oomph and I honestly wouldn't have called it lasagna if they were going to serve it like that.

Atmosphere:

It looked nice inside, but as soon as a few tables were sat it became overly loud and hollow sounding. It was difficult to hear our server and the restaurant was not even at half capacity. This makes me think that they took what probably used to be a banquet hall and turned it into a restaraunt without putting in proper sound dampening.

The table we got was quite small barely enough to have our plates and drinks on. Which might be fine for a Cafe, but not for fine dining. I feel like if they set all the tables and used cloth napkins it would make it look a lot classier inside. Water glasses at the table that the server fills when they come over to introduce themselves or seat would be nice too and add an extra touch of service.

Our server was great, clothing was tidy, hair was pulled back and she was professional. she also made me a killer tequila sunrise. There was one server I noticed with unkempt not tied back hair which is a pet peeve of mine for front of house staff for appearance and obvious food safety reasons.

Overall very minor infractions for our dining experience I would rate it overall as pleasant and we may return to try some of the more expensive menu items. I do love a good Bouillabaisse and I'd like to see if the lamb...

Having heard so much about Secret Galley, we decided to do our Valentine's Day date night here. Have to say we were both disappointed with how our evening went. Firstly were greeted and shown to our table. We had barely had a chance to look at the drink menu before someone had come to take an order for them. we opted for some water to start, and then looked over the drink menu...it was pretty sparse. Nothing there that my wife would have enjoyed. We barely had a chance to look at the Valentines Day menu (no options there, just the Special menu, regular wasn't even offered) when staff dropped off a plate of something. My wife mentioned we hadn't ordered anything yet, and it wasn't ours. Waitress said it was the opener, and it was part of the Special menu. We asked about seeing the regular menu, but we were dissuaded into the Special menu. First time I have ever been somewhere on Valentine's Day (Or any other occasion like that) where it's "This is what you are having" mentality. Both my wife and I opted for the Bruschetta, steak main, and then the 'Velvet' cake for dessert. Bruschetta wasn't what we were expecting, so out off a little by that, and little out off still by the menu situation, so we were both a little disappointed. Steaks arrived, the vegetables,. potatoes, and gravy were very enjoyable, however the steak was dry, while being cooked to my desire, but my wife's appeared undercooked for her personal tastes. Her steak was also dry. After the mains, we had the dessert "For 2". A small piece of what we were told was a Velvet cake. Looked like a piece of oddly dyed carrot cake. We found that the cake was somehow drier than the steaks.

We felt there was no point in voicing our complaints at the time, as there already complaints about undercooked chicken and another couple finding their meals lackluster.

We may or may not come back to try things on a...

We have been and enjoyed our meals at Secret Galley a few times however our most recent visit was disappointing. We booked on Valentine’s Day for the Valentine’s Day meal they had promoted. We booked our reservation one week prior and arrived at our reservation time 7pm. We were sat at our seats and left without menus and drinks for 20 minutes while other tables were helped. We understand Valentine’s Day is a busy day however while we were waiting we could see the hosts standing talking at the back of the room not serving anyone as everyone had been helped apart from us.. Once we were provided menus and asked for our drink order we were left until 7:55 where we let them know we had booked for the valentines menu. We then waited another 15 minutes for the “welcome treat” to be given to us. Another couple was seated about 20 minutes after our arrival and had already finished their appetizer before we even got the welcome treat. When we eventually got our main course we both got the steak and lobster however one steak was ordered rare, the waitress just placed the steaks infront of us and walked away at this point we had to wait another 10 minutes to ask someone for forks before we could eat. We then discovered the food was luke warm at best and we were given the steaks the wrong way around, usually it wouldn’t be a big deal however I purposefully did not order my steak rare as I’m pregnant and eating undercooked meat could cause complications. Sadly due to our recent visit we were left disappointed...