Olive & Vine — Restaurant in Truro

Finally! Truro has a proper nice restaurant that isn’t “small town nice” like Frank & Gino’s 😂.

My wife and I were very excited to have her birthday dinner at this new restaurant. I made reservations with a little note advising that it was my wife’s birthday. Any quality restaurant we’ve ever been to will try to make the dinner a little extra special with a piece of cake, glass of champagne, a visit from the owner/manager, etc.. I was curious and low-key excited to see what this spot had in store to honour their guests who are celebrating an occasion.

Upon arrival, I see there is an area to hang coats beside the door. I love the option of hanging my coat, but I would never leave my coat in an area that is right beside the entrance and doesn’t have constant supervision. It might sound cynical, but I just don’t trust people.

The hostess greeted us and brought us to our table. It was nice to see the new decor (compared to the previous café). It was very dark and cozy. Each table had a little lamp that is activated when the table is in use and turned off when the table is empty. Very nice touch!

The server was very friendly and was quick to offer her suggestion on drinks. I opted for the ‘blue moon’ beer and my wife decided to check out the ‘main squeeze’ cocktail. My wife really enjoyed her drink. I found it was refreshing, but not overly sweet like many cocktails are. Thankfully, my blue moon had an orange slice garnish. It just pairs so well and elevates the flavour.

The complimentary bread was delicious; however, I had to remind our server that we were still waiting and it came out about 5 minutes before our entree. Not the end of the world and hiccups are expected with a new business. Hopefully this isn’t the standard.

The entrees, overall, were great. I’ll start with the seafood chowder. Wow. I’ve been searching, for years, for a proper seafood chowder that accurately represents the Maritimes. It’s often watery and barely has any… seafood. This hit all the boxes. Creamy, hearty portions of seafood, flavour, presentation. My only “complaint” is when I eat chowder, I like to salt and pepper as I go. The tables were not supplied with either and I don’t think the server was prepared to come over every minute to top me up! Yes, I could have asked her to leave the S&P, but I didn’t want to be “that guy”. Moving on; the arancini was great. The balls had a nice crisp and the texture of the rice wasn’t too gooey. On to the sliders. This is where I’m kind of torn. They were good, but not great. The 3 flavours were chicken, pulled pork and beef. I feel like these have potential to be killer, but all 3 were lacking flavour and moisture. Every bite had to be followed by a drink. Upon inspection of each slider, there was a hint of sauce on each one. Naturally, you don’t want them dripping… but enough to keep you from reaching for your drink after every bite and enough to elevate the flavour. As for the actual flavours, the only word that comes to mind is “basic”. I definitely won’t write these off yet because they were still ‘good’ and the restaurant is brand new. Lots of time to learn, grow, and nail down their flavours.

Sadly, we were not presented with anything “special” for my wife’s birthday. Of course, this is something that many restaurants don’t do and I definitely don’t expect it. All I can say is when restaurants go above and beyond, in cases like this, it gets people talking because who doesn’t want to be treated like a VIP on their special day? Even without a complimentary treat, you can still be “wowed” by the hosts and servers and treated like a VIP. This wasn’t the vibe here. That said, we felt welcomed and service was acceptable.

To wrap things up, I can say that there is 100% chance we will return and 100% chance that we will recommend this place to anyone. I can’t wait to return and work my way through the menu over time.

Honourable mentions: prices were fair, the drink menu had great selections, and the menu wasn’t too big (indicating a better chance for fresh...

Food: The cocktail was good. Ordered the flatbread as an appetizer, along with our mains at the same time. (Seafood linguine and chicken burger) Our appetizer alone took an hour and twenty minutes to arrive to the table. Flatbread was mediocre at best, but at that point we were so hungry it didn’t matter and we ate the dish. Our mains took another 20 minutes to arrive; (usually thats fine but with an hour wait- it felt like forever.) and immediately there were more issues. There was no shrimp in the linguine dish, the “lemon dill” cream sauce was a dry onion sauce and when asked about the lack of seafood, it was advised that the seafood portions are “pre-portioned” so guessing frozen. Basically a pasta and haddock dish with far too many scallions. The burger was 5/10, good “enough”, but was not hot, very greasy and again, not as described in the menu(no parm on the burger).

Service: Our service started out great and upbeat, but unfortunately changed as the experience went on. Our server was very kind, and notably busy at some points of the night. Having been in the industry- I understand that stuff happens and it’s not always fair to assume what is happening in the kitchen and I tried to ignore it and enjoy the night out with my husband. She apologized for the long wait after about 30 minutes, and said “I’ll take a percent off your bill, it’s been a really long time.” To which I thanked her and advised her I knew it wasn’t her fault. When we received our mains, she had asked how things were and I immediately brought up the issues with the linguini dish. She had said she would speak to the kitchen and never returned with an explanation or response- but had been to the table beside us multiple times since without looking over at us. After eating about half our meals I asked for the bill and she had promptly brought the machine, asked if we wanted takeout containers, input the total and walked away to go back to the bar area. (With of course no percentage taken off the bill as stated there would be…)

Atmosphere: Good atmosphere, beautiful decor and fitting music playing all evening.

Overall, this was one of the most disappointing dining experiences I have had in a long time. I think there is potential- however it was definitely not worth the $75.00 I wasted on incorrect,...

Had dinner with a friend there on Saturday. Third visit. The atmosphere is flawless. It’s a beautiful space. But they need to hire management and staff with proper restaurant experience.

First of all, after several minutes of waiting for someone to stop to take a drink order, I had to wave down a server to get a drink while waiting for my friend. Our server was extremely friendly. He just hasn’t been properly trained.

The glasses containing our cocktails were not very clean. Lots of grease and smudges.

I ordered the beet salad and chuck burger. The beet salad was much better than last time in that the beets were cooked. Last time they were intentionally raw and hard as a rock to eat. These ones were roasted. But it wasn’t really a beet salad. It was a bowl full of roasted beets. It was good at first but got a bit boring after 7 or 8 bites. Was good but way too much and could have been way more interesting from a seasoning and presentation perspective.

I was pleasantly surprised when the server agreed to cook my burger to medium as I prefer it. Most restaurants flatly refuse and overcook their burgers. The chuck burger was good.

The portions were large and our dishes went back half eaten. But interestingly, the server never asked if we had enjoyed our meal. All good servers ask how you enjoyed your meal, especially if you are sending back plates with food.

Olive & Vine is a good restaurant, with the potential to be great with more experienced management, kitchen and front of house staff. Ownership shouldn’t worry so much about how the servers look and focus more on...