PORTERHOUSE Steak & Seafood Restaurant — Restaurant in Lakeville

I decided to take my lady here for her birthday dinner. I made reservations on Open Table with ease. I explained to the hostess that we arrived early with the intent to have a drink or two at the bar. The friendly hostess said that she would come see if we were ready if there was an earlier seating available. The bar tender and his bar back were friendly and the drinks were not too strong, but we could tell that they were not skimping on the spirits either.

The hostess came and got us about 10 minutes early. We had just ordered the spinach artichoke dip but since it hadn't been delivered yet, they said that they would just transfer the bar tab to the dinner tab and bring the appetizer to our table.

Appetizer - Spinach artichoke dip with baguettes - The dish presented well and was delicious. The baguettes were crunchy on the outside and soft and warm on the inside. They loaf was sliced almost all the way through so you could see the individual pieces, but they were still connected at the bottom. My girlfriend commented on how she wished they would make the slice just a little deeper because you really have to use both hands to rip the slice from the loaf, which is fine if you are not concerned with your table mates manhandling the loaf. Delicious none the less.

Main Course - My girlfriend ordered the 9oz Filet - well done (I know I know), and I ordered the 24 oz Ribeye Medium. Our waitress explained that the meat at the Porterhouse is wet aged so when they cook the steaks, they usually come out one lever lower than what you ordered. I like medium rare so I ordered medium. My steak was delicious. Marbling was really nice, making the steak juicy and really great tasting. I could tell that they did not season the meat much, letting the natural flavor of the good cut of meat shine though... it did. Oh ya, it was cooked perfectly. The 24 oz was only a few bucks more than the 8 oz so I opted for the larger knowing that it would make a great lunch the next day.

The Filet - My girlfriend cut into her steak and it was more pink than she wanted but after the first taste, she refused to send it back... it was delicious. She cut off a small piece of filet for me. I put the bite in my mouth and the flavor was amazing. The filet was so incredibly tender it basically fell apart in my mouth.

Sides - My GF ordered the mashed potatoes. I should have ordered the mashed potatoes. Potato, sour cream, cheese, butter, rolled into one and anointed with unicorn tears. Order these... nuff said.

I ordered the baked potato. This was a good baked potato with all the fixins. I would have written more about this baked potato but I am currently thinking about the mashed potatoes mentioned above.

We were celebrating my GFs birthday so they offered her a choice of complimentary Creme Brulee or complimentary cake. She chose the Creme Brulee and I ordered the cake. I am a Creme Brulee guy so I never once ever thought I would say this, but the cake was better... in my opinion. I thought the creme brulee was delicious. The brittled top was perfectly crispity crunchity with the yummy creme below. BUT THE CAKE... If I would have done a cake smash, I could have squeezed my fist and liquid would have come out of the cake. It was more moist than any cake I've ever had. After this cake, moist is not an offensive word anymore. The flavor too, was phenomenal. While the brulee was normal size, the cake was giant... enough for 3 or 4 people, and I ate about 1/2. Yes I am a gluttonous tub and I am probably experiencing the onset of diabetes. Also I think I can feel my arteries hardening while I sit here typing. BUT it was worth it.

Service - This probably impressed me the most. The hostess and the bar staff were friendly. Our waitress Jacqueline (pronounced Ja- Quell-in - what she said) was fantastic. She was friendly, had a sense of humor and was super attentive to our needs. Even though she had other tables that she was serving, she was always there before we needed something.

bottom...

This is a solid 4 star review.

My fiance and I spent a date night at Porterhouse on Saturday, February 8th. It just so happens to be my fiance's birthday in a couple of weeks, so our waitress (whose name I can't remember for the life of me - sorry!!!) offered to buy us dessert to celebrate. That's always appreciated!

Overall, this is a really solid/nice restaurant. The ambiance was nice and inviting. Our booth was intimate, and the atmosphere of the restaurant was quiet but not dull. It was a great place to have a really nice conversation.

The quality of the food was really good, but not exceptional. A couple of things brought my review of the food down from 5 stars to "only" 4. First, the salad offered (both my fiance and I ordered a Caesar salad) was mediocre at best. This was easily the least impressive and most forgetful part of the meal. The salad was a small pile of iceberg lettuce tossed in dressing with a pile of croutons and a sliced hard boiled egg (?) on the side. Pretty unimpressive.

The steaks we ordered (I got the black and bleu ribeye, my fiance opted for the original ribeye with a side of mushrooms) were good! The quality of the meat for my steak was, as with the other food items, slightly short of being great. In particular, my meat was a bit fattier than something I'd want to spend $40 on. My fiance noted no problems with her steak. Our chosen sides (asparagus for me, baked potato for her) were both fine - neither outstanding nor worthy of further comment. One bit of feedback for the cooks: I was a bit surprised that my ribeye, ordered medium-rare, came out much closer to rare. I am familiar enough with cuts of steak that I know the dish I was served was much closer to rare. While I personally enjoy steaks prepared this way, someone else might not. It wasn't a problem, but I can see how it might have been.

The desert we picked (which again was comped by our waitress) was a creme brulee. It was pretty good! If I had to nitpick, I would say that the torched sugar on top was perhaps a BIT overdone. But again, that is being nitpicky. And it certainly is a huge plus that our waitress offered to comp the desert for us!

Also: we split an order of crab cakes for an appetizer. These were also good! The dipping sauce (which I believe was a spicy mayo or something similar) was tasty. My fiance ordered a few different martinis, both of which seemed quite good. She was in a good mood when we left the restaurant at any rate!

In closing, this is a really good option for a decently priced steakhouse without the fuss of going into Minneapolis. It's a great option for people who live in the area to get a good approximation of a downtown steak dinner without actually going downtown. I'm not saying that to be insulting - Porterhouse is a really good option which provides a hefty amount of "bang for the buck" so to speak.

That said, there are some minor nitpicks that motivated my 4 star review. The food quality, as mentioned, was not at the superb level I was hoping for. The salad in particular was mediocre. I would also much prefer if the restaurant offered an option to have sides come with the entree, or perhaps an a la carte option for potatoes or vegetables. I would have loved to have both with my meal, but settled on just...

Anniversary date, so we were really looking forward to having an amazing meal but we left extremely disappointed. We have lived mostly on the east coast & probably have higher expectations of certain types of dishes because the recipes originated from that area. The lack of seasoning or over usage of it just makes me think that this restaurant doesn't have a qualified culinary chef BUT your definitely going to pay like one prepared your food. We ordered a crab cake app, a cup of clam chowder each, barbecue bacon wrapped shrimp & an 18 oz ribeye with melted blue cheese (according to the menu description) & we both got the garlic mashed potatoes as our side. The positives 1st; ambiance, service, wine, bread & our soups were served hot. Negatives; crab cakes although they were made with lump crab it was finely shredded & seasoned with chopped red pepper & green onion, which totally took away from the crab flavor. I used alot of the remoulade sauce to mask the flavors just to enjoy the crab cake. Typically I use very little of this sauce when I eat crab cakes at other MN resturants because it adds a slight flavor & I'm not trying to mask an unpleasant & unnecessary added ingredient. The soup barely tasted like a traditional clam chowder due to the heavy use of sage; I got through it by dipping my bread which made it much more enjoyable. My bacon wrapped shrimp were not seasoned, except with the mediocre BBQ sauce on the undercooked bacon. I only ate 2 of the shrimp & the garlic mashed potatoes again lacked flavor & were luke warm. My husband got the steak which was cooked correctly but it lacked flavor. He asked for the melted blue cheese topping & I kid you not it looked like they literally poured a cup of blue cheese salad dressing on top of his steak. It looked disgusting because the blood from the steak was mixing with the runny blue cheese dressing & he had to keep pushing it off to one side of his plate because it kept pooling around his steak, it was a mess. I have never seen anything like it. Needless to say we skipped dessert & will never return. Normally we don't mind spending $200 on dinner at what would be deemed an upscale resturant & in appearance it is very nice but the food is definitely not worth the price by any means. I'm not upset about the money but more by that we left unfulfilled & let down in the quality & flavor of the food. I do not recommend this restaurant at all & we really wanted to love it. Spend your money elsewhere like Suzette's in Jordan or Wildfire in Eden Prarie where we have had some of our best meals...