Red Lantern Steak & Spirits — Restaurant in Fairbanks

Great service and very pleasant and efficient wait staff (however, when we had eye contact, the bartender did look a bit hostile but no matter, we were not seated at the bar).

Now, on to the FOOD….

We ordered the fish and chips, which came in the classic deep golden hue. The batter fried coating on the fish was cooked to perfection. However, the fish inside was not as cooked as I would like and leaned toward a medium versus my preferred well done. The fish was not the pure white flaky I so love.

The fries were golden and delicious. They came in their own cute fry basket that actually looked like a miniature metal deep fry basket.

Malt vinegar and ketchup were our side orders— nothing else was needed.

On the whole the meal did not disappoint and I like that you can choose between two pieces of fish and three. We ordered three and split the meal and that was perfect!

The atmosphere was fun and electric. It was nicely crowded and vibrant with travelers sharing stories of their adventures. It was fun to dine with people at the end of their trips and those at the beginning—-everyone seemed to be traveling with Holland America. I did not meet any local diners.

One weird thing was that the water tasted strongly of chlorine or done other chemical additive—it was tap water so it may just be the way the water tastes in Fairbanks— up to that point, I’d been drinking bottled water. We ordered another...

This was a little further to walk to from my room at the Springhill in the current weather, but well worth it! I did expect fancier food, but I also expected "fancier prices" being that it's inside a hotel. What I found was a welcoming bar, with an easy to talk to host, good food and reasonable prices. The beer selection is a little low right now because of COVID, but they have Alaskan brews in bottles. For dinner I opted for the Alaskan Halibut, followed by some butternut squash soup that was perfect for the -20° temps I walked through to get here. The food was really good! The bartender knows this area really well too, and he was able to give me some recommendations of places to check out while I'm here. All in all a good night out. Definitely a place I would recommend going to! Only downside I have to mention is that I was originally given a dirty glass to our my beer into. It looked like it had sat from not being used, not that I was given a previously used and unclean glass. But I still decided to drink straight from the bottle while I was here and had...

The service wasn't just bad, it was non-existant. The restaurant didn't have enough people working. It was our waiter's first day; he should have been in training but instead the restaurant threw him into the deep end. We waited at least 30 minutes before anyone even came to our table. We had to go get him twice just to order. It took us 3.5 hours to order, eat, and pay for our check.

The waiter didn't include one steak meal on the order for the table; it arrived after everyone else had finished. Drinks were forgotten, too. The food was mediocre at best. The tomato soup was like a marinara sauce consistency without much taste. One person got fish and chips. The batter didn't have much taste and the fish was over-cooked. One person had seafood fettuccine. It was missing scallops and the pasta and had no flavor because the sauce has basically no seasoning.

We talked with the supervisor and she just gave excuses but no apology for the terrible service or questions about why food was basically left untouched...