Rare Restaurant — Restaurant in Peterborough

We were really excited to try this place. The room looked cozy and romantic. We ordered our drinks and told the specials.

We ordered the bone marrow ( delicious) and the escargot (also very good) BUT the waitress never came and checked in on us. She did approach at one point, and picked up my prosecco and said " are you done with this?". I still had 1/4 of the glass left - MUCH more than a sip- and she picked it up without waiting first for my response. I shrugged and let her take it. She made me feel cheap for thinking " no, actually, I am NOT done".

The wine we ordered was great, but again, she didn't give us the opportunity to taste it first and then decide, as is common practice.

Things got worse.

When we ordered our 12oz ribeye, we told her we would like to share it and she offered me a choice of side. Garlic mashed potatoes. Then she turned to my partner and asked him what side he wanted. We clarified we wanted to split the dish but she replied " when people split the dish, we usually add a side" so he ordered the stuffed potato.

The steak came and it was overcooked and covered in a sauce that was not jus - it was more like BISTO! / fake gravy. It was thin and medium-well. It had been cut in half so whoever cut it certainly saw it was well overcooked but I gues they didn't care. It was maybe just under an inch thick and much smaller than 6oz each. I worked as a butcher. I know what 6oz of meat looks like and we were ripped off. The bearnaise was much too thick (again, Hobarts is WAY better)

Again, she didn't come and check on us nor did she pour our wine for us. When she came to collect the dishes she ignored the fact that we hadn't finished our sides and didn't ask how it was.

She asked if we wanted dessert menues and we said no. She brought us the bill. We hadnt asked for it, and we were still enjoying our wine.

Oh and get this: she CHARGED us for extra vegetables and an extra side! She had made it seem like it was included and hadn't mentioned that by "splitting" our $45 ribeye, we were going to be charge an extra $9. Outragrous and unacceptable.

All in all, it was incredibly disapointing.

I woke up in the middle of the night naseous and threw up. No joke. I sat in bed, unable to sleep and felt MAJOR restaurant remorse. .....

and then I realized: there weren't even grill marks on our steak!!

SO this place is called Rare Grill...but our rare steak was medium and not even grilled.

What a load of crock.

NEVER going back....

I’ve heard amazing things about this restaurant and after a while I decided to pay them a visit. One of the things that struck me was the location of the building, sadly it’s placed in a not so great area of Peterborough and it’s crowded with drug addicts around the parking lot.

Once in the restaurant, the ambience was great, dim lights, relaxing music and a great smell! Upon entry we were greeted and seated in our table, shortly after we ordered our drinks which were quick and tasty. After some time researching the menu we ended up choosing the calamari as an entree, a rib eye steak and a NY striploin.

Shortly after some warm bread and butter came to our table and after 15 minutes or so our calamari arrived, the presentation was spot on but as much as I loved the presentation the flavour wasn’t there. The calamari was lacking seasoning, just a pinch of salt and a squeeze of lemon will have turned the plate around! The calamari was sitted in a purée that tasted good but kinda sweet and garnished with some apple. I love the idea but personally I think there were too many sweet flavours in one dish and made it seem like a dessert.

Once our entree was finished we waited for our steaks and to be honest it was quite the wait, I did not mind waiting since the ambience was pleasant and the waiters were checking on us from time to time. After 30 minutes or so our steaks arrived, once again presentation was amazing, both of the steaks were cooked exactly how we ordered them and my side of bone marrow tasted amazingly. Once I got to the steak I noticed a gravy looking sauce of top of the steak, even though it tasted good it was covering the taste of the rib eye. In my opinion a cut of meat like that should be served without any sauce in order to enjoy the full flavour. The steak was tasty and juicy but as I’ve read in other reviews it was indeed lacking some seasoning. Our steaks came with a side of vegetables but upon trying them they seemed more as decorations rather than part of the dish as they were not throughly cooked and tasted bland.

After all it was a pleasant experience, our bill came to a rough 130$ and even tho the presentation and the service were on point, the expected flavour from a dish in those prices...

We decided to try Rare for our anniversary. I called to make reservations over a week in advance. I told them that I looked at their menu and was pleasantly surprised. I asked them if they ever had bone-in rib steak or Alaskan king crab legs. She told me that they don't usually have those items. I mentioned to her that I had been calling around to some other restaurants in the area and was always told the same thing and that I really wanted to have those items for my anniversary dinner. She asked me if she could call me back. When she called me back about 10 mins later she said that they would definitely have those items for me when we came in for our reservation. At that time I also mentioned that my wife really wanted sautéed shrimp but she would like 13/15 size. She told me that they don't usually carry that size but would definitely have those as well. I thanked her and ended the call. When I called to confirm our reservation I gave her the wrong day. She seemed confused because she couldn't find our reservation for Saturday. When I mentioned to her that I requested rib steak, crab legs and shrimp she immediately without hesitation said ohhhh you reserved for Monday and immediately knew who I was, and confirmed that they had all the items I requested. I told her that my schedule at work had changed and that we couldn't make it on Monday and asked if we could come on Saturday. She immediately said of course you can and managed to give us the same time. Upon our arrival she asked if we had a reservation, I said yes, told her my name and she directed us to our table, asked how much crab legs, and shrimp we would like, and asked us how we wanted our steaks cooked knowing already that we had requested certain items. We had a great time andeverything was cooked perfectly regardless that we asked for items that aren't usually on their menu. WE WILL DEFINITELY BE BACK!!! THE SERVICE WAS EXCEPTIONAL AND THE FOOD WAS BEYOND WHAT WE EXPECTED!!!!...