Balkan House Restaurant — Restaurant in Burnaby

I used to love going to their buffet but they no longer have that.

So I went in for a sunday late lunch instead.

It was my first time revisiting since COVID-19 started around almost 2 years ago.

The place smells and feels even more musky and moldy now than when compared to before (And it was a sunny day). Before, you had a more refreshing leathery smell along with the smell of wood since this place has dark interiors of leather and wood.

Table cloths and utensils are poorly laid out.

Service is on the slower side, even though it was already close to 2 PM and the restaurant was around 25% capacity. They had to have their chefs bring out dishes at times.

I have to be honest, the food isn't reflective of the prices that they are charging, especially their entree plates.

I ordered the pork loins with rice and greek salad. It also comes with home made bread.

I also ordered a plate of their cevapi @ 10 pcs.

The pork loins are done quite well but the brown sauce is choke full of starch to thicken it up and it just throws everything off. The reason I know it is full of starch is when the sauce begins to cool down, it just coagulates into a tapioca-like consistency with bits of chunkiness here and there. The rice is the cheapest kind and old and isn't even fully cooked but quite grainy and has a certain box carton smell - think airplane rice. Salad was fresh and good.

The cevapi was a day old - not fresh and or juicy but dry and tasteless.

The only thing that really stood out was their piping hot, fresh home made bread (I assume home made), which is something the restaurant needs to start worrying about if customers are mentioning their bread was the best thing.

@ $23 for the pork loin entree and $16 for the cevapi, I expected more.

I probably won't be coming back any time soon as I think management needs to...

The restaurant is tucked away in a strip mall area. Hard to spot if you weren't looking for it. The mashed/baked potatoes were nicely done. Grilled veggie is nicely done. The cauliflower and broccoli is a bit plain, but you can taste the sweetness from the vegetable. Baked chicken thigh is nicely done, a little on the dry side. Pork tenderloin with mushroom sauce is flavorful. The roast is probably the best dish that day. It was nicely done, melts in your mouth. Pork schnitzel was nice, a little on the dry side. The pork sausage was nice. The salad and cabbage were good. Liked the cabbage better as it complements the meat items. The little cornbread was really nice, had to stop myself from getting too many of those.

There were lady fingers, blueberry cake and chocolate cake, haven't tried them yet. (Update) the lady finger like dessert is soaked with light syrup, and has coconuts bits in it. Very nicely done. The blueberry cake has cake and custard layers with blueberry sauce on top. The chocolate cake like dessert has some fruits in it, couldn't figure out what it is, but it has cinnamon in it.

The service was welcoming and the ambient was nice.

Think some of the reviews I saw was saying the dishes should be made this way and that way. Bottom line is, if you want Greek salad with tons of feta, go to a Greek restaurant. Coming to a buffet demanding a salad should be made into a Greek salad is actually quite rude. You will get a say if you open your own...

The dark atmosphere doesn't look "Eurobalkan;" it just looks depressing and not cared for. The customer service is stunningly POOR. We have waited for 10 minutes to get someone's attention in our booth. In the end, we got up and went to the bar for help. There were two waiters and they were sulking all the time. They were very good at sulking. We asked what was inside of one item, if there's any meat inside, we kept getting the answer "just cheese." It was also pork. Okay, no big deal. When we asked for extra bread, the waiter went to the other side and started playing on his phone - never to be returned. When the waitress spilled some salad water to the other table, the customer warned her, and she lightly brushed the table with her finger. Her carefree attitude warmed my heart. Overall, the service was bad.

What we ate was okay at best. All food items smelled the same grease, even the ones that shouldn't. If you terribly miss the food at home and long for a community, maybe I can understand why people...