The Wine Bar — Restaurant in Oakville

I came on here to write a review after the experience my husband and I had this evening. We almost never leave reviews unless we feel very strongly about our experience and now that I’ve read some of the other reviews on here I’m not surprised about our experience. This place looked really lovely initially, there is a great patio and nice selection of wine and cheese plates. I have a feeling we must have tried this place on the worst possible day because we are not easily upset and almost never complain. When we first walked up to the wine bar, the patio was packed with far more people than there should be according to covid restrictions. The tables are jammed close together with 8+ people dining at some tables (current restrictions set 4 as the limit). We quickly brushed this off because we've both been fully vaccinated and we were excited to be out of the house. As the reservation continued, we noticed that a majority of the people on the patio appeared to know one another. Though a bit odd, we thought it must have been some guests planning a large outing together. As we overheard our waiter speaking to other guests, we found out it was her boyfriends birthday party that all staff were participating in. Though we felt this was still a bit odd, we continued on. She quickly brought us our bottle of wine and poured us both a glass. We also ordered a cheese plate. After this initial interaction we didn't see her for well over an hour. During this time, the birthday party guests were frequently travelling in and out of the wine bar bringing their dirty plates (trying to help staff we gather), but were 100% unmasked while doing so. One of the guests appeared very intoxicated and was kicking the front door to get someone to open it and then nearly dropped all of the plates she was carrying. We had almost finished our entire bottle of wine by the time we caught our servers attention again to remind her that we never got our cheese plate. She apologized and another 20 minutes later we got our cheese plate, but it was still missing crostini/ anything to put the cheese on. We had to wait another 20 minutes to catch her attention again and she apologized again and went to get us crostini. In between all of this, it was quite obvious that all of the staff were carrying drinks in and out of the wine bar to enjoy with the rest of the birthday party and would often stay and hangout with their friends and family to chat while the three other tables were waiting long periods of time for their food/drinks. It was really just all around a very disappointing, frustrating, and unprofessional experience. I sincerely hope in the future they consider closing the doors when hosting events that staff are directly involved in. It was obvious that staff were intoxicated/ consuming alcohol and too preoccupied with the party to focus on...

Arrived very excited to try this wine bar in Bronte with a friend. Ordered a “flight” of wine, as well as a charcuterie board.

Charcuterie board was Ok. Gotta say I expect fantastic when I’m paying $60 for crackers and cheese.

Now for the review.

The flight of wine came to the table with two of the three glasses filled with 15+ dead fruit flies between them. When I mentioned this to my server, there was hardly any reaction, and no effort to refund monetarily or rectify the situation. Just “would you like another glass of wine?”. Obviously. The next glass had more flies. Server then blamed the issue on “this time of year”. Beyond the flies, I’m not sure as to the intricacies of wine tasting bars, but I imagine that if there’s this many flies in the wine, then I am drinking less than fresh bottles.

Also, someone who I believe to be the owner was sitting in the middle of the restaurant on their computer, playing videos out loud. Completely destroyed the ambiance that I expected when coming to a “fancy” (and relatively overpriced) wine bar.

Absolutely do not recommend unless you enjoy eating bugs and spending too much money on sub-par service. Cheers.

Edit: I see the owner responded to this post. Please note that every word I said above regarding my experience was 100% true. The reason I noticed the fruit flies in the first place was because I swallowed a few with my first sip whilst doing ‘cheers’ with my friend only then to notice that there were enough dead fruit flies to cover most of the surface of the glass. To blame it on “2 fruit flies around my table” would be untruthful. I want to emphasize that I am in full support of small businesses; however, the issue here is the overall lack of accountability and the fact that no action was taken to rectify...

Listen folks. If you are looking to be treated as a number go to another restaurant where you will be herded in, served quick, same old menu and leaving in an hour and feeling like you didn’t catch your breath. But if you are looking for an ever changing menu, based on the season (as they shop local) and it has a farm to table feel and you are treated like family, where it’s an experience and great vibes, then come here!! I have been here too many times to count. And I think it’s sad that they get 1* ratings from people that came in wanting to be treated like a “number” and not understanding how different The Wine Bar is and what makes them so special. Is it slower, yes. Is the menu different every season, yes. But it feels like I am dining at my family’s house. It feels warm, inviting and the vibe of the restaurant whether inside or out always feels like a connected community. I love that it is small and quaint. I love that you don’t feel rushed. I love that you don’t feel like you just finished your plate and the bill is there hinting for you to leave. I couldn’t recommend this place enough. I drive 30 min to just get here, always have my friends, family and meetings here, and couldn’t recommend it enough! Thank you Devon and The Wine Bar family for all you do to always make me and my guests feel so welcomed and always walking out with an...