The Brookdale — Restaurant in Bloomfield

Having checked out the menu for The Brookdale online prior to going I still had no idea exactly what I wanted to try out. It's a nice size menu and everything looks so good! Luckily we got a bit of help from the owners with our selections so we just sat back and enjoyed.

We visited the Brookdale on one of the first nicer days of weather for the year. It was so tempting to sit at one of the nice outdoor tables but the dining room is also a very comfortable setting so we chose to dine indoors for this trip. I would absolutely sit outside next time though.

For appetizer selections we began with the Thick Cut Bacon, Premio Egg Roll, Maryland Crab Dip, and The Big Cheese! The bacon was insane. This meat that is somewhere between the thickness of bacon and of a slab of pork belly, had such interesting flavor. One second it was like chewing bacon and the next it was almost like kielbasa. This is smoked in house and you can tell they give delicate attention to it. The Premio egg rolls use Premio Sweet Italian Sausage and blend in broccoli rabe, long hots, and provolone before being wrapped and fried. These alone were quite good but adding a shot of their red pepper aioli really rounded the whole dish out. It felt like what an Italian Sausage cheesesteak might taste like if that were ever created.

The Maryland Crab Dip also had nice flavor. You could tell they were using real top of the line crab and the creaminess and flavor of the dip was nice on the warm toasted pita. I normally don't really love seafood and cheese together but this was an exception to the rule. The Big Cheese was seriously something else. This was a full one pound mozzarella stick! Normally I'd assume this was a stunt food and just gets by based solely on it's size, but this had a really good flavor as well. Good quality cheese, toasted perfectly, and the breading had a bit of sweetness that was not expected but was nice. The sauce was also a bit sweet but was seasoned well.

For entrees we had the burger (literally just called the burger on the menu) and the steak sammy. The burger was very good, best burger I've had in quite a while. Pressed between this heavily seeded roll was high quality beef, cola braised onions, cheddar cheese, and their house burger sauce. The onions were cooked perfectly and melted as you chewed. The flavor of them blended very well with the cheddar and Brookdale sauce. Nothing Earth shattering here, just a burger done really well. It was also cooked to a perfect medium rare which is an bonus in itself these days.

The Steak Sammy was out of this world. This is not a cheesesteak, and I'm so happy it wasn't. This sandwich boasts filet mignon with a provolone and mozzarella mix, kale, sautéed mushroom and onion, and finished with a house made a1 style sauce. The steak was incredibly tender and the onions and mushrooms just belonged here...there's no other way to say it. I can always take or leave kale but it worked on this application, and that a1 sauce they made really rounded this out.

If you find yourself literally anywhere near Bloomfield at all, firstly make sure you have your wallet (this is high quality food, but the prices reflect that), but then run yourself in and hope to get a table. Run, don't walk. It's worth every penny. The Brookdale in Bloomfield, NJ -...

Hello my foodies. So I usually do not like doing reviews on places where I have a bad experience, but it was my birthday, and it should have been a positive experience. The place isn't really big, and the lighting is really low. We had to use our cell phones for lighting to see the menu. There is parking in the back of the building, so you have to drive to the end of the block and go behind the strip there to park. Free parking, tho. We initially went here because we saw a video of what looked like a hug giant cheese stick, and I love cheese sticks! Which my friends know, so they right away thought I would love this place. We started off ok, and the server seemed friendly at first. They did allow us to bring in a small cake for my birthday celebration. They apparently charge $3.00 per person to use their plates to serve our cake. So we started off normal, but it kinda went downhill from there. Our server seemed nice and got what we asked for, but as the evening progressed it started to get a little frustrating especially for our friend who asked for water 3 times and she smiled saying she was getting it but never brought it to him. However, we noticed that when someone else in the group asked for something, she did bring it in a timely manner, but just not for my one friend. We had to ask the bus boy for more water since she just wouldn't bring him water. My friend wasn't mean or rude to her, so I'm not sure what the issue was. I hate to say things like maybe race had something to do with it because that's everyone's response when they feel like they are receiving poor service, but in this case, I am leaning towards that conclusion. We are an eclectic group of friends representing 4 different nationalities, and most people do look at us funny, wondering how did this group of people even come together. Well, life and work brought us together, and we are perfectly happy in our differences and fit harmoniously together to form this great friendship. So if we feel like one of ours isn't being treated well when we are customers in your establishment, it should be noted. 1st, the prices here hit your pockets pretty hard. 2nd, the cheese stick was not as huge as I had hoped, but enough for all 5 of us to get a slice. It only comes with 1 big cheese stick. We also ordered the thick cut bacon for an appetizer. It came with like 2 strips if I remember correctly. It was pretty pricey, but it was good tasting. Everyone ordered their food, but mine didn't taste good at all. Luckily, my friend spoke up for me, and I was able to exchange it. The second dish was just a burger, and the fries were homemade potato chips. Those chips were good. The burger no. I had a couple of bites but left the rest. My friends did like their choice of meal, but it was mainly the service that changed the mood for us. I wouldn't return here, but like I always say, everyone needs to form their own opinions, and maybe you will have a better time. Pros- they did allow me to replace my first dish, and they didn't end up charging us for the cake we shared. They didn't offer us new utensils for the cake, so we had to track someone down to get some forks. It was a lot of smaller things that they could have done better, but those...

One of the worst dining experiences I've had in a very long time.

Wife, daughter, son, and I arrived at 6:30pm on a Friday evening looking forward to a nice meal to start the weekend. As Bloomfield residents we figured we would try out the new kid on the block.

We were seated promptly and after about 5 minutes, the waitress came to take our drink order. Unfortunately we didn't get a chance to give our appetizer order with the drinks because she abruptly left after the last drink was spoken.

~10 minutes later, the waitress came and asked us if we were ready to order. I had to ask if they had any specials. She said "oh yeah" and flipped back to the front of her notepad to read off the specials. My son ordered a hot dog, daughter had penne with marinara, I had the osso buoco, and wife had the snapper special. We also ordered a calamari appetizer.

After about 15 minutes the calamari came and the waitress also bought our children's meals. We asked the waitress why she would do that as opposed to bringing all of the food out together. She had no explanation. I mentioned that it might be a good idea to ask people their preference.

Fast forward to 50 minutes after we placed our order and our food has still not arrived. The kids are done and we're doing the best we can to keep them occupied. My wife went to talk to the manager and explained the situation. He offered to buy my wife a drink but she declined stating that it wouldn't help the situation. He went and checked on the food and came back a few minutes later.

He explained that the food was almost done and that he's not sure why the kid's food came out so early. He said they couldn't just leave the kid's food to sit while the rest of the food was cooking. I mentioned that it might have been a good idea not to boil a hot dog for 5 minutes at the same time you start a dish of osso buoco. We told him that when our food was done we would like it wrapped to go which he did.

Hey, maybe the food was good though, right? I wish there was a silver lining to this experience but there wasn't.

The risotto that the osso buco was on was very overcooked, dry, and clumped together in hard balls. The osso buco itself, despite looking nice, had almost no flavor except that of salt. It was listed on the menu as braised and then roasted with celery, carrots, and onions. I was actually impressed that so little flavor was able to be extracted out of so many ingredients.

My wife was disappointed in her snapper dish which was placed on a stew. She said the pairing didn't work at all.

When all was said and done, our experience cost $75.97. If you go, I certainly hope your experience is better than ours. We won't...