Freeland’s Restaurant — Restaurant in Carmel

I had the pleasure of dining at this new-ish (walking distance) Carmel hot spot. We waited a considerable amount of time to try it out, with the hopes they'd work out the kinks/growing pains a new restaurant inevitably goes through. Expectations were high for our 4-top due to the price point, and for the most part, the experience delivered. However, a couple of hiccups kept the evening from reaching it's potential.

The ambiance & service was impeccable—our server (Alex) was attentive without being intrusive, offering insightful recommendations and ensuring our glasses were never empty. Candidly, the pacing was slightly off (dinner arrived minutes after apps), but better than passable to be sure.

Culinary Highlight: The Heirloom tomatoes were a standout: bursting with freshness, elevated by wonderful blue cheese and fried pickles (soooo good!).

The entrees, for the most part, lived up to the hype. My dining partner’s Pork Belly, cooked to a wonderful tender texture, earned high praise. However, my $52 halibut dish was a slight letdown. While the fish was fresh and wonderfully seared, the halibut itself was WAY overcooked, lacking the flaky, moist texture I’d expected for such a steep price (and the fact that it's a relatively easy fish to cook).

The only other disruption to an otherwise stellar evening was a crying baby at a nearby table (the place is small, so every table is pretty nearby). While I empathize with parents dining out, the persistent wails made it challenging to fully relax into the upscale ambiance. CLEARLY no fault of Freeland's, but in a setting where the bill easily exceeds $100 per person, a quieter environment feels like a reasonable expectation.

Freeland's is undeniably a "hidden" gem, offering a dining experience that’s wonderful and a bar that is just AWESOME. The service, ambiance, and most of the cuisine were exceptional, making the high cost feel largely justified. If not for the overcooked halibut and the distraction of a crying baby, this would have been a...

I was classically trained as a Chef in Colorado. An intensive 3-year program where your culinary skills come from over 6000+ hours in actual restaurant kitchens, some of which are considered the best in the area. I only mention this for reference. I'm not the best garde manger, saute, or grill cook, but I know what high-end restaurant food is.

The restaurant itself is absolutely beautiful. I was confident the experience would match because, well, how couldn't it? What separates average restaurants from fine-dining "destination" ones are the small things, the details. Unfortunately, that's what was lacking.

The food. It was okay, I guess, or as my 12-year old son would say, meh. But I wasn't expecting meh. I expected it to match the appearance of the restaurant itself and the prices that came with it.

Burrata - outstanding, but the bread was sliced entirely too thick and made it hard to eat. Escargot - good, but the puff pastry was dry & hard. Mushroom Tartine - under-seasoned & mostly just grilled corn on bread, which was also hard to eat. Shrimp & Grits - good, but the tasso ham was dry and a large chunk of ham fat found it's way on to my plate. The fat had good flavor though. Halibut - the most disappointing part of the night - over-cooked, and not just slightly, but to the point it became chewy. And zero flavor. None. No salt. No acid. Nothing. It didn't even taste like fish - quite odd, actually. Apparently this is purposeful because I overheard a server tell her table it was bland. She couldn't have been more right. No dessert. The sorbet I wanted was 86'd because someone left the freezer open...

The service? Meh. Our entrees came out on top of our appetizers. We had to move plates around just to fit them on the table. My wife never got her 2nd glass of wine and no coffee service was offered after dinner.

Maybe they just had a bad night. I want to give this place another try, maybe, but...the small things - details. It has so...

I can’t say enough great things about this restaurant, I would dare to say it’s the best restaurant experience I’ve ever had - very memorable and excellent. We started with two appetizers, the carrots and tuna tataki. Both were incredible - the fact you can make me say “mmm” after every bite of carrot for a girl that typically doesn’t like cooked carrots is impressive. The tuna tataki dish was unique, flavorful and incredibly fresh. Then we moved onto our entrees, my husband had the halibut which was phenomenal and I got the sirloin special that was UNREAL! It was served on top of hummus with shaved edamame and kimchi and a beautiful glaze… it was creative and the flavors all worked together perfectly… the kicker was the shaved black truffle on top. The chef came out and did this himself - and after talking with Grace she showed us a video on her phone of the dog in Italy who hunted this truffle and dug it up.. and was delivered to them that day from Italy. We LOVED seeing this… such cool attention and care to detail. Then we finished with two desserts, the yuzu bar was delicious and my husband got the pot de crème with roasted marshmallow. My gosh it was delicious I had to sneak a bite even though I stay away from dairy. It came with this ash on the plate that was roasted down from vegetables that oddly brought the whole dish together and instantly gave you that campfire nostalgic feeling.

We LOVED the experience and the food. Grace was excellent and really made sure everything was top notch and we loved all the knowledge she gave us about what we were eating and the history of the chef and their restaurants, etc. The amount of care and detail that’s apparent from everyone was unbelievable. Obviously we are big fans, and we can’t...