Dirty Dan Harris Steakhouse — Restaurant in Bellingham

Let me start by saying that I frequent restaurants for dinner (3-4 times per week on average) and I have NEVER sent a plate back to the kitchen at any restaurant. That all changed during our "date night" at Dirty Dan's.

It was our date night and we decided that we would go to Dirty Dan's as it is somewhat known as a Bellingham staple and neither of us have been. We arrived with no reservation and were seated within 5 minutes, which was nice. We ordered the garlic bread that was topped with a gorgonzola cheese gravy. It arrived within 10 minutes and it was delicious. After another 10 minutes we were able to place our order for dinner. I ordered "Dirty Dan's Best Damn Meatloaf" with garlic mashed potatoes as my starch. My girlfriend ordered the Ribeye steak, medium rare. Our waitress warned us that the meatloaf takes approx 25 minutes and asked if we would like anything while we waited. One of the specials of the evening was clam chowder, so we ordered a couple bowls of that and requested the complimentary bread be brought out with the soup. The soup was promptly brought to our table (3-5 minutes later) and the flavor was ok, however, we both determined it to be far too thick in consistency. We both ate about half and decided we were done with that, but ready and anxious for our entrees.

We waited another 15 minutes or so and our entrees were finally placed in front of us. My meatloaf looked and smelled good, the potatoes and side vegetables left a lot to be desired, but I figured that the taste would make up for that. In short, the taste did not make up for it. The meatloaf was fine, but it was very salty and lacked texture. The potatoes and side veggies were dry and overly salted and the "garlic mashed potatoes" had little to no garlic in them.

Now, onto my girlfriends steak. Upon being placed in front of her, it looked fine, other than the same potatoes and vegetables that were on my plate as well. She cut into it and it was obviously not cooked to "medium-rare" as requested. It most likely sat under a head lamp for some time or was microwaved. She took her first bite, I asked how it was, she replied with "the look". We all know that look. I asked if I could try a bite, she cut me a piece and handed me her fork with the steak on the end. I took the bite and chewed and then chewed some more. The steak was not seasoned AT ALL prior to or during cooking, that was obvious. There was no flavor, the steak was stringy and tough and dry. When you spend $40-$50 on a steak you expect a tender and delicious cut of meat. Unfortunately, that experience was nowhere to be found here.

We pushed our plates to the end of the table to ensure the wait staff would come to the table. Our waitress came over the next time she passed by and asked how things were going. I informed her of our opinions on the meals, she was very good about asking what specifically we didn't like about our meals. We informed her and she took the plates back to the kitchen. She returned with the bill. As she dropped off the bill, the manager walked by and smugly said "I removed the steak from your bill but we all tried it in the kitchen and it tasted fine to us". I replied to that saying that it was a "horrendous tasting steak" and encouraged him to try it again from a customers point of view.

I filled out the receipt and gave a good tip and commented on the receipt that our waitress was great (which is why I tipped), but the food was not good. It's not the waitresses fault that the food was bad and I did not want to punish her by not tipping because our experience with the food left much to be desired.

To sum things up, if you are looking for a good date night spot, avoid Dirty Dan's. I will not be returning. If you are wanting a nice steak, I would recommend The Steak House at Silver Reef or my new favorite date night spot, Leader Block in Ferndale. The Ribeye that I had at Leader Block was phenomenal. Great flavor, tender, and a steal of a deal at $40. I would highly recommend checking out Leader Block if you...

The absolute worst experience. Ever. First off, we have young kids, so this makes it hard to get these date nights out. But, we figured it’s our anniversary so we made it happen and we were pretty excited for a kid free delicious meal. We were debating on going to our favorite restaurant up the street, but we thought we would do something “different”. We chose WRONG. I have no idea how Dirty Dan’s gets it’s positive reviews? So, for our anniversary we call ahead early that day and make reservations. We get to the restaurant and wait a couple minutes to be greeted (I get it, hostesses get busy) but then when we said we were here and had reservations, she went to seat us at our table and someone was sitting there... so she asked if the bar was alright. My husband and I looked at each other —a bar isn’t exactly the romantic-ish evening we had planned for. But she reassured her we would be just as taken care of there as we would in the rest of the restaurant and that it had a great view overlooking the restaurant, so we agreed. We sat there for a good 20 minutes before having our drink orders taken. By this time, the restaurant is clearing out. Only a handful of tables left. We weren’t asked if we wanted to move, but then again, we didn’t ask either. They were out of prime rib. We weren’t given any specials like the people below us got (remember we have a view of the whole restaurant now since we are sitting in the bar). We were told that they would bring out fresh bread four separate times— never got fresh bread. My husband sat with an empty beer for over 20-25 minutes. The bartender seemed to be annoyed that we were sitting in the bar and had about a million other more “important” things to do. Waited WELL OVER AN HOUR for our steaks. The nice hostess that sat us was doing a walk through and could tell we were annoyed and asked if we were waiting a while. YEP! So she went to check on the food, then followed by our “server”. Comes back with our steaks which you can obviously tell they have been sitting there for a while! The butter they top it with when they bring to us, couldn’t even melt. My fillet mignon was TERRIBLE. I could tell it had been sitting somewhere for quite sometime, no flavor. Chewy. Disgusting. The mashed potatoes were so dense and stuck to the roof of your mouth. The best part of the meal was the 3 pieces of broccoli and 1 piece of cauliflower. Oh, and that fresh bread? Still never got it. All this time, We had the table below us having all this exact same experience. They had to send back their steaks because they were way overdone. We were disgusted by this place. The food, terrible and way overpriced. The service, even more terrible! And they even knew ahead of time that this was our anniversary dinner. Do yourself a favor and NEVER, EVER eat at this establishment. When we were leaving we were trying to find a manager but everyone was having a Conversation regarding the table below us and we had already spent way too much wasted time in this joint. So, we called and left a message hoping we would hear back from a manager with some kind of explanation why this place sucks so much and we still haven’t heard anything from them... 7 days later.... so please, please, please pass on this restaurant. Do yourself a favor and go somewhere else. Or heck, make your own steak. I don’t even make myself steaks much, but I guarantee I can make them better...

Chose to eat here because of the positive reviews and wanted to try someplace new in Bellingham. I have 2 words for this place. Overpriced AND overrated! I have a hard time believing all of the positive reviews posted. First of all, when you pay the kind of prices they charge here, you don't expect mediocre food, you expect food that you thoroughly enjoy and even think about into the next day! And you should also have the right to expect excellence in the food when that is how they promote their food on their menu. That was not the case with anything we ordered here! We started with an appetizer, the steak tips. It was so bad, we couldn't even eat it. The meat was tough and chewy. The sauce was way too oniony. I guess that was a way to disguise the poor quality of the meat. When the server came by and saw it had been put to the side, she asked if it was okay. We told her it wasn't what we expected and would prefer just to wait for our entrée. Instead, she had the chef make the exact same thing again and brought it out to us. It was the same poor quality, same sauce, and have no idea why she chose to do that. We did not ask for another appetizer, nor did we really even complain about it, we just said we didn't care for it. She did then tell us that the steak tips was actually a combination of three different cuts of meat. That was a surprise, since that is not the way it was described in the menu! It was supposed to be filet. Not, one bite of filet and the rest inferior beef!

Next came the entrée. One of us ordered the "fresh" salmon and the other ordered"prime rib." We've ordered salmon at Anthony's Home Port many, many times. It's always been exceptional! This salmon was horribly fishy smelling and, after a few bites, had to just set it aside. I had the prime rib. Again, I don't understand the positive reviews. It had a decent flavor, but was tough, chewy and grizzly. The au jus tasted like flavored water, and the horse radish tasted like light mayo. Terrible. Obviously, an inferior cut of meat. I've had better prime rib purchased at Fred Meyer. The garlic mashed tasted like they'd sat our for hours. They were so thick, I could only eat a few bites.

For the prices charged, I expect to get the kind of food quality that I've had at similarly priced restaurants. Unfortunately, that's not the case. It guess it wasn't surprising that the place was fairly empty on a Saturday night. That should have been our first clue. I would never go back here. Even the...