Bin 189 — Restaurant in California

I made a dinner reservation to celebrate my friend’s birthday. I requested table 5 in the corner by the window. She put us down for 5:15. I asked if they still did anything special, such as bringing a slice of cake with a candle to for the birthday guest. The hostess assured me that they do and she set up the arrangement with the reservation. My friend was looking forward to dining at Bin 189 since she had never been there before. After a fun day of shopping, I showed my friend around the resort suggesting we come back for spa treatments. We arrived slightly early at 5pm and the restaurant was fairly empty except for a few customers seated at a couple tables. I approached Demming at the hostess station and mentioned we were a tad early for our reservation, it was my friend’s birthday and was hoping we could be seated sooner. I could clearly see that table 5 was available in addition to most tables. Demming rudely said no, we must only be seated at our reservation time, 5:15. I then said that we’d wait at the bar and asked if he could let us know when our table was ready. He barked, “I can’t. I’m old and won’t remember. You’ll have to come get me.” Frustrated by his odd and rude behavior we sat at the bar. At 5:08, Demming approached us stating our table is ready and he could seat us now. We hadn’t gotten our drinks yet so we’ll wait. As the bartender proceeded to mix our drinks, Demming hovered closely behind our seats impatiently pacing back and forth. His strange behavior made us uncomfortable. At 5:15 we grabbed our drinks as Demming escorted us to our table. We were relieved when Laura introduced herself as our server and I informed her we were celebrating my friend’s birthday. Her service was mediocre and she never brought the cake to our table after we finished dinner. She just slapped down the check and disappeared. I approached the hostess and discussed that we weren’t happy with our dining experience. I was hoping to still surprise my friend with a slice of birthday cake, even if they had to charge us for it. It wasn’t about us trying to get a free slice of cake, it was about celebrating. And we wanted to order coffee too. The hostess sent Demming to our table. He stood before me uncomfortably close, poorly dressed with a giant stain on his shirt as his beer gut was inches from my face as I sat at the table. His customer service was awful, he’s creepy and extremely rude. He said, “If you wanted cake you should’ve requested it when you made the reservation.” I did! I told him I was going to write a review and Demming said, “Go ahead. I don’t care. It’s a free country.” My friend and I left the restaurant upset and disappointed. We will not be returning to Bin 189 or the resort for spa treatment or anything else. We will spend our money where we’re treated...

I’m super excited to write this review because of the relatively poor standing on Google. We can all agree that the hospitality industry has taken a major hit since the Plandemic, with many not wanting to work in general. This leads to poor reviews. The service my husband and I had at here at Bin 189 was fabulous and five star worthy.

It began with being greeted by the darling freckle faced, Ava, the kind hostess. We arrived at 4:30 pm and dinner was not available but the beautiful bar was. You’ll see from my photos it’s tastefully decorated with a stacked bar filled with a wide variety of spirits. Angelina, the Dave Mathew’s loving bar tender recommended the vanilla old fashioned for my husband. I ordered a Tito’s lemon drop while we chatted about her devotion to Dave Mathews Band and her recent concert experiences seeing him play at the Irvine Amphitheater and Yamava. As we chatted and shared concert experiences, I drank my icy, sugar rimmed lemon drop. Angelina, noticing my martini had dropped halfway, filled my glass with what remained in the shaker. This was much appreciated since the cocktail was $19.00 I believe: $15.00 for Tito’s + $5.00 for the lemon drop. Worth it!

After 5 pm we moved outside, sitting in a beautiful corner table shaded by a large blue umbrella. David, our waiter, introduced himself and we ordered an appetizer and salad. The guacamole with chips was alright. I regularly added salt and pepper to each bite. The burrata salad with seasoned artichokes and arugula was divine. If you order this, save some of the warm table rolls to make a little sandwich. Delicious!

We ordered the cheeseburgers with bacon jam and fries. The burgers were meaty, and quite large. We should have shared! However, none of the leftover went to waste because here we are day two at the resort and have both enjoyed a half cheeseburger each for lunch.

Deming, the restaurant’s manager also came to our table to greet us. We exchanged pleasantries and had a lovely conversation.

I hope this restaurant will continue to offer the wonderful hospitality my husband and I were offered so that their review reflects our experience overall as an average.

Thank you to Ava, Angelina,...

Bin 189 is the restaurant at the Lake Arrowhead Resort and Spa Hotel located on the 2nd floor. The ambiance and decor of this restaurant is amazing. It has a complete bar and they serve breakfast, lunch and dinner.

I was fortunate to actually meet the chef, Heath Miller, and he is very creative and always trying to make new and exciting dishes, especially dinners. We ate dinner there on Nov 8th and although the menu is a bit pricey, the food is wonderful and the experience is great. The Chef is really cool, and I got to know him a bit, and he is always looking to making new creations. They had the diver scallops as their go-to item that night, but we chose a couple of different menu items.

I had the chicken saltimbocca with a Cesar salad and a shrimp cocktail for the appetizer. They were great. I didn't realize the salad came with anchovies, but i was able to remove them. lol. The whole thing was great. The chicken was perfectly marinated with prosciutto and it came with risotto.

My girlfriend has the french onion soup and she said it was the best she ever had. We split some chips and salsa and they were better than most Mexican restaurants we go to, then she ended up having the 20 oz. French Bone-in Rib-eye with roasted potatoes. She also said this was the best steak ever!

For desert we got the tiramisu and that was super rich and awesome. The chef brought us a special off-item menu item cheesecake which had 24 carat gold icing and a strawberry as well. It was out of this world!

Our waiter was Lindsay and he was superb. We also met the manager Lisa Marie and she talked to us for a little while about the restaurant and Lake Arrowhead. It was a wonderful experience. I recommend this and give this 5 stars all the...