Bodega Rose — Restaurant in Waterloo

Interesting new restaurant with high quality food, excellent service and one or two rough edges. The order started with warm freshly made bread with a garlic butter. It was divine and I gladly ignored my doctors orders to lower my carb intake to eat it all.

I ordered the bone in rib-eye steak and the meat was so tender and perfectly charred. On the down side it was a bit aggressively seasoned and I really don't understand serving it bone it but then pre cutting the steak into strips and the microgreens on top were completely unnecessary. That said I devoured it all quite happily.

Interestingly, the sides here are all separate from the mains which would be great if I was here sharing with others and we could all try each others' orders but alas I was eating alone as usual. I ordered the cauliflower and brussel sprouts with citrus vinaigrette which were the highlight for me. The veggies were cooked perfectly and the citrus brought wonderful brightness.

The big miss for me was the chocolate banana parfait. It came topped with a whole handful of banana chips that totally overwhelmed the rest of the dish to me. A few of them smashed up would have been perfect texture, but so many meant i couldn't taste much of anything else. I also found the cookie base to lend a sandy grit to the dish that made was is usually a wonderfully soft dessert unpleasant to eat. I ended up not finishing it. I am told it is one of their most popular dishes and the one diners rave about but i was just not for me.

What I appreciate was that when the wait staff realized I wasn't loving it they immediately asked if they could get me something different, and when I didn't have time to stay for another try they instead comped it. I would never ask for this, but appreciate it when it is offered.

I rarely comment on decor as I will (and have) gladly eat in a shack if the food is good...but the design choices at Bodega Rose had me scratching my head. There was a lot of play on dusty rose and hunter green that had me flashing back to the 90's and not in a good way. It didn't effect my food ranking but I was certainly chuckling while waiting for my food. That said no one ever accused me of having cutting edge design tastes!

All in all Bodega Rose doesn't make my top rank of restaurants in Waterloo, but it is somewhere I am willing to let develop and try again...preferably with a group of friends so I can best take advantage...

Checked out Bodega Rose in Waterloo yesterday for a birthday dinner. WOW. We tried many apps, including the bacon wrapped scallops, bang shrimp, Korean BBQ chicken, tuna tartar, rosemary veggies, peperonata, and truffle fries. Let me tell you, each and every one of them were delicious. The attention to detail in terms of combination of ingredients, plating, and balance were incredible. I didn't get pics of everything, but you can also see the serving sizes are generous and easy to share with multiple people.

Onto the mains - our group of 4 shared the aforementioned apps, so for mains, my husband got the steak (done blue to perfection, including a 20 minute rest) and another friend got the mushroom gnocchi with braised ribs, which he said was "to die for". I ordered the crab mac and cheese side and our 4th ordered the caesar salad. Mac and cheese had generous portions of crab and the caesar salad came topped with fresh parm.

Dessert - do yourself a favour and try their banana dessert. Can't remember what it's called but it was layers of cookie, chocolate and banana puddings, and dried bananas. We are making plans to go back just to have this dessert again. Additional the churros and phyllo wrapped cheesecake were tight AF.

Atmosphere - this is a fabulous place to celebrate an important event. The decor is gorgeous, and even the smallest details have been thought about, such as their logo stamped on their napkins and the beautiful rose displays on the walls and ceilings. The seats are incredibly comfortable, lighting is great, airflow is great, it's super clean (including the gorgeous renovated bathrooms) and even though it was really busy while we were there, you have enough space to not hear other diners. Finally, the service was top-notch. We could see the bartender from our spot mixing complex drinks all night and our server was so diligent and friendly. The chef came to our table to discuss some of the dishes with us as well.

Long story short, do yourself a favour, and go to...

I really, really wanted to like this place when I went for brunch. The menu looks great, the atmosphere was nice, but in the end I left disappointed.

The food was pretty good (with an exception noted below), but the service was very slow. It was almost two hours from being seated before we left. A table near us ordered after us but got their food quite a bit before we did. No one checked on us after our food was delivered. We had to flag someone down to ask for butter because the Banana Bread French toast was a little dry and the side of sourdough toast was not buttered at all (nor was there any jam). However, the butter never arrived.

When we were finally able to catch someone’s attention again, we just asked for the bill and some take-out containers for the leftovers. It took some time for the bill to arrive, but I had to ask for the containers a second time (and when they were delivered, they were so small that the food had to be cut up to fit!)

The side of toast was thankfully removed from the bill at our request, because no one ate the cold, dry toast. But it still made for a disappointing experience, as the sourdough toast was a draw to the restaurant in the first place. The rest of the food seemed well liked by everyone. The lattes, bacon, and crispy potatoes were particularly good.

The restaurant was a little busy by the time we left, but we may have been only the third table when we arrived. If they turned over the tables a little faster, maybe they would not have had so many simultaneous tables by the end.

I hope the management hires more staff and puts some effort into training, as this could be a good restaurant. But currently, I would only recommend going if you have a lot of extra time and don’t mind repeatedly asking...