Uli's Restaurant — Restaurant in White Rock

I need to start off by saying I absolutely LOVED this restaurant. Loved it. The first time I went, it was the best burger I have ever had in my life. The server we had the first time was an older lady with short hair and literally the best service I have ever had. Last night however…wow. Just horrible service (not the same server, last night we have a young lady with a curly blonde bob). First I was told the latest reso I could make was 5pm…because they had a buyout at 6:30pm. Fair enough! Only to get there to find out the buy out is at 7:30pm, and we could have had the reso we wanted at 6pm. Okay, strike 1. But whatever, love this place so who cares right? We were seated in a hallway table hightop next to the window. First I thought it was a cute location, until I realized staff would be running back and forth by us and talking about setting up their buy out. Completely ruined the mood of date night. We couldn’t keep a conversation because staff were constantly beside us talking and ruining our intimate experience. Strike 2. Our server was nice, but horrible at her job. She took our drink and appy order and then disappeared for about 25 minutes to talk to her bigger table just outside the window where we were sitting. She didn’t deliver our appies or drinks and then didn’t take our food order. The manager took our food order because she was “distracted” he said. We could literally see her outside talking to the same table I mentioned earlier. The hostess ended up delivering our food to the table. We didn’t see our server until we needed to box up our food and she wanted to save her tip. I ALMOST asked for the manager again, because that was the worst service I have ever had for the amount we spent. We were never even asked if we wanted second drinks. I didn’t care to order dessert after all that. Strike 3 was the food. Zero flavour. Do they know what salt is? Jeesh. Bland. Bland. Bland. We both had schnitzel. His hollandaise sauce was more like hollandaise GOOP, way too thick. My mushroom cream sauce was the opposite…way too thin. The schnitzel to side ratio was way off. Too much schnitzel, not enough mash or cabbage. Mashers were okay, cabbage tasted like just steamed red cabbage. No cloves, no cinnamon, no salt. NO FLAVOUR. The drinks though? Absolutely fantastic. Our appy was baked brie, and would have been better if it wasn’t wrapped in phyllo. I really loved this place, but last night was horrible. I don’t think I will ever be...

So I finally made it out to Uli’s, and made resos on a Wednesday afternoon for 6.

Service was super friendly from start to finish! They gave us the option of inside or outside and we chose inside as it was empty except for 1 other party across the other end of the restaurant. The interior is bright and we sat by the window, with no obstructed view of the water.

Their beer and wine selection is plentiful. We chose to with the German Erdinger Weissbier, a nice refreshing wheat beer that was so tasty I didn’t want to share and ordered my own 😁. Our server poured it out for us in a tall glass perfectly.

My kids got the kids menu burgers and frites but one with the house salad with Caesar dressing. They loved it! I tried the salad and the dressing was delicious!

My hubby and I shared the beef dip with frites and a 2.0 burger with the seafood chowder . The beef dip was pretty good, but I only got rare hints of blue cheese with the half that I ate. The jus was really good! The chowder was very generously loaded with seafood and not too heavy. Frites were very crispy and they were generous with the amount!

Now I was beyond excited for the burger because it had been recommended by so many and I was really pleasantly surprised that no one had mentioned to me that they didn’t cook them well done! I love medium cooked burgers and all of ours were cooked to perfection. It was definitely a messy, sauce dripping down your elbows burger! They did miss added bacon on my MIL’s 9.0 burger but rectified it very quickly. She got half frites, half Caesar and the Caesar was a full leafed Romaine with delicious looking large capers (she doesn’t like capers though) and generously topped with parm. She is a tough critic with burgers but thoroughly enjoyed hers!

It was on the pricey side, but I love that they are a restaurant that prides themselves on farm-to-table, sourcing local beef and ingredients which doesn’t go unnoticed in the quality of the dishes! Our server was very passionate about how they cook their burgers and it was evident that he enjoyed working there.

I’ll be back to try out another burger that I won’t be sharing next time, their brunch menu looked amazing, that beautiful view is hard to resist and their service...

Stumbled upon this restaurant yesterday, and it was a very pleasant meal. The place has everything sourced locally, so I expected some prices.

I ordered two glasses of white, a chowder, and their catch of the day. I come from Toronto, so fresh seafood is what I wanted for my trip here.

I was able to get a patio seat. Haley was my server, and she was very friendly. She also does know her menu when I asked around various specific questions. One can tell if someone is reading off stuff on top of their head or if they really understand the material.

I can't remember exactly which white I ordered, but they were chill and crisp, exactly how I'd like to go with the creamy food I've ordered.

The chowder was a big surprise to me. Many places have chowder just filled with the soup, some clams, making sure it's creamy so it's filling. This place though, it was filled with clams, tiny shrimps, fish (really didn't see that coming, although it's on the menu), and potato. It was really filling, and I thought the price was justified. The focaccia was also fresh, goes really well with the chowder.

Catch of the day probably is on the pricier range, but the market price changes. It was uni, or sea urchin, with prawns, fish (can't remember the exact one), fiddlehead, served in linguini. It was creamy, with fat coming out of the seafood, the greens and the wine to balance the texture.

Perhaps the weather was just perfect for it, and Happy Hour set in, so that's when I ordered the second white. It was also there I met a group of friendly strangers, Jasmine, Julian, and Shona (I'd take this off if you request to not be name dropped). Pleasant food and weather brings people together, and may you three be well.

At the end, Haley did provide some interesting spots around White Rock to check out. Food experience is more than just food themselves, so I gave five stars. Hope this...