PotPie — Restaurant in Kansas City

Date: 8/24/22 Dinner

Headline: A bit over rated but not terrible

My wife and I visited this little restaurant in the Westport area of Kansas City, MO for a date night. She had been there before and wanted to make a good memory with me. Unfortunately it was not to be as wonderful as she had imagined.

We made reservations as it appeared this place was quite popular. Their website was quite…simplistic. Which made it both easy to find the menu and make reservations, but difficult to know much about the place before arrival.

An important note about parking - THERE IS NO PARKING! The location is at the corner of a very busy intersection, in an area of the city where parking is very limited and restricted. There is space for maybe 5 mid-sized vehicles behind the restaurant. One can pull into the space, but must back out onto a street to get out.

When we arrived it was apparent that they were not needed, at least on a Wednesday evening. There were, perhaps, 6-7 other couples there when we arrived. There were 8 other people that arrived while we were there.

We were seated promptly at a small table for two with very uncomfortable hard wood chairs, sized for butts much smaller than that of the average American. This usually means the place wants to turn tables quickly and seemed quite unusual for a venue which appeared to require a lengthy dining time.

The décor and feel of the restaurant gave me feelings mixed between dive bar and cute European café. Dark & dingy but well-lit and cozy.

In any case, we ordered cocktails from their drinks menu. The server brought them in a reasonable time. We were not overwhelmed by them. They were made mostly as described on the menu, but just lacked…something.

For our food, we ordered the Butcher's Board to begin the meal. For our entrees, I ordered the Beef & Mushroom potpie - but was told that it would not be available for another hour as their previous batch had something wrong with it. So, I changed to the Chicken & Vegetable potpie. My wife ordered the Sauteed Salmon.

The Butcher's Board arrived and it was quite good. While the web menu listed this as $17, their menu in store lists it as $21 - so take note of that. Was it worth the money? Meh…my wife liked it a lot, so probably.

It took quite a bit more time for the entrees to arrive - maybe 20-25 minutes. Gave us plenty of time to enjoy the appetizer and have some great conversations.

My wife reported that the Sauteed Salmon was very good. She appreciated the good sear and the flakey texture.

The Chicken Potpie was hyped by the server and its appearance was very nice. The pastry top was a rough-puff seasoned with a sprinkling of salt & pepper on top. There was no other pastry, though. The "potpie" filling was just in the ceramic dish with the pastry top laid over as a cover. The pastry by itself was good and had good layering. It was a bit lacking in flavor, though. The filling was ok, but had a consistency closer to wallpaper paste than soup. There appeared to be an "ok" amount of veggies & dark chicken meat. It didn't have a lot of flavor on its own. However, if each bite of filling included the pastry top, then the extra butter, salt, & pepper did add to the overall flavor profile.

The service was adequate for the venue and we likely would not have complained about any wait time, except that the chairs were so uncomfortable that we were getting sore half-way through the entrees. By the time the server returned, we really just wanted to get the check and leave.

Overall, I have to say that this was an underwhelming experience. The prices are not reflective of the actual delivered quality of food. Including the two entrees, an appetizer, and 3 cocktails (my wife had two), our bill came to just over $100. For that, I have a bit higher expectation of quality than that which was presented.

My wife decided that we shall not return. So, I can't recommend...

First the good and to be clear, it’s very good. The pan seared chicken is the best chicken I’ve ever had the pleasure to eat and it’s not even close. How do they get the outside so crispy and keep the inside so moist and tender? Don’t sleep on the pan sauce either. The entire dish was flawless. We also ordered the boneless short rib and it was also amazing but short rib usually is. My only slight criticism with the boneless short rib was that the polenta was significantly underseasoned for my liking but that is a personal preference of mine and opinions may vary. Additionally, we had the butternut squash soup and the butchers board. Both were delicious and worth ordering again. Now for the not as good, the service. The wait staff was inconsiderate, bordering on rude, less than helpful and not at all welcoming. In their defense however, it was a busy Saturday night, but I go out to eat a lot and most places I go are busy because they’re good and very rarely am I treated in this manner. Another issue is that they don’t keep the website menu updated so if you are like me and like to look ahead at where you’re going and sort of plan out your meal you will have to start from scratch once you get to pot pie because many of the items they list on their online menu, they no longer carry and apparently have not carried for sometime and the prices are not accurate . The last negative was that it took 40 minutes to prepare our food which seems a little excessive but all in all I must say it was worth it, and I will be returning and I recommend you give them a shot...

I went to the Pot Pie thinking I would order a pot pie, but when I arrived there I saw scallops on the menu. I was seated right away and the waitress came back quickly with water and some really fantastic bread. The menu is just posted on a chalkboard on the back wall. I thought I had ordered seared scallops, risotto and a pecan salad. I asked a few times about what kind of dressing would be on the salad but no one seemed to know. They said probably a lemon vinaigrette. Anyway, unfortunately when my food arrived, I saw a very bright purple risotto, three scallops and the salad. There were small pieces of orange or tangerine on the salad but I didn’t see any pecans. I asked the waitress about the risotto, and she said it was beet risotto as stated on the menu. Well, I looked at the menu again and still didn’t see it, but my eyesight apparently isn’t that good because sure enough it did say beet risotto. I don’t like beets AT ALL. She did offer to bring potatoes instead, either mashed or roasted. I opted for mashed potatoes, another mistake on my part. The scallops were fantastic, perfectly cooked. She brought pecans for the salad, which was fine, but all in all, I paid $50 for 3 scallops, a few bites of not very good mashed potatoes, an ok salad and some fantastic bread. I really should have ordered the pot pie, considering that is what they are known for. I do intend to do that after I save up to go out again. For over $18 I hope the pot pie will...