The Kitchen on Main - Kitchen, Wine Cellar, and Pantry — Restaurant in Ligonier

First time visit today- sort a weird vibe from top to bottom. Went because we had a gift card.

This review is all in the setting of the dinner prices which average ~$18 for an appetizer, $28 for my vegetarian pasta dish, etc. The below criticisms would be more acceptable in a less expensive restaurant. Overall I feel like their menu and overall service/atmosphere/prices do not match.

1. atmosphere: a general “life/laugh/love style vibe on the walls does not match with the (very cool) open kitchen concept and, again, the menu prices.

We arrived at 3:55pm and were given menus for breakfast (done at 3p) and lunch. We asked for the dinner menu and the waitress had to check with the kitchen that they were ready for dinner service… that starts at 4p…

I’m not sure if coffee creamers, ketchup, hot sauce stay on the tables for dinner service all the time, but they were there for ours. Napkins were (heavy duty) paper. Again, none of these are a problem in and of themselves, but for an $18 appetizer I don’t expect to have coffee creamers sitting in a caddy on my table for dinner service. Feels very diner. Appropriate for breakfast service, but I think they should be removed in the evening.

We were also never given a specials menu or had the specials discussed with us, despite seeing the menu on the way out the door and hearing our waitress discuss the specials with another table.

2. Service: our waitress was friendly, but not particularly efficient for having an average of 2 tables at a time during our stay. We asked for waters but were only brought water glasses for the two adults and had to ask for a water glasses for our child. Our child was also never given a set of silverware/napkin and the waitress did not come around in a timely enough manner for us to ask for more so we had to ask the hostess to get some.

3. food: acceptable, but nothing particularly spectacular (again, for the price.) We got the Asiago dip appetizer, which just generally did not have as much flavor as I would have expected, though that may be my personal palate. It comes with delicious crostini, however.

My husband got the burger, which he said was very good and came with delicious battered steak fries.

I got the sundried tomato pasta, which, again $28 for a vegetarian pasta… was underwhelming. It was served with penne, which I felt was an odd choice with spinach and red peppers. I think it would have seemed much more elegant (and yummier) with angel hair. Just felt mid-tier.

Overall, feels like a very mid tier place that is trying (but not succeeding) to higher aspirations.

We may try again for breakfast, but would not...

I usually don't write reviews this quickly, but tonight I feel I must. My wife and I just experienced a very unsatisfying meal here, and at $112 dollars for two entrees, an appetizer, and sparkling water, we won't be coming back for dinner. First of all we had a 6:00 reservation and the restaurant was less than half full. However we were seated directly next to the service area which would make conversation very difficult. I asked that we be reseated and the hostess "had to check on the other reservations...". She came back and offered only the small two tops in the middle of the half full restaurant. I said those were unacceptable so we'd stay put. After about 15 minutes she finally moved us to a corner table which was better, but we still were surprised there was so much resistance in a half full restaurant. Our $19 "eggplant tower" appetizer was very good and we anticipated good entrees. However that was not the case. I had a $36 short rib entree and the reduction was so salty it was inedible. I had to scrape it off whatever I could. The roasted root vegetables were unevenly cooked; the carrots and a few of the parsnips were hard and the others ok. I told the waiter to let the chef know the reduction was inedible due to the salt. He said "ok" but never came back with any apologies or offers to comp part of my entree. Worse yet, the pasta in my wife's wife's $30 lobster ravioli was barely cooked. The edges were inedible because they were so tough. If there had been a bowlful that would have been acceptable, but since there were only 5 (albeit large), $6.00 each for undercooked ravioli was unacceptable. Lastly, my wife ordered sparkling water and we were shocked that a small glass of fountain soda water was $4.00. When the check came there was still no apology offered which would have gone a long way to make our experience better, given the poor...

We went to this restaurant for a celebration lunch for a family member. It was recommended to us by a close friend who works at a business in Ligonier. Our server was functional, but not friendly. She visited our table twice, first to take the order and second to give us our check. We waited close to an hour and a half to get our food (which our server did not deliver, but other workers in the restaurant did). Some of it was not as warm as it should be. During that time, we were frequently blasted with icy cold December air bc we were seated by the front door and there is no foyer for people entering the restaurant space. At the end, our server finally made an appearance and handed us a check with a 20% tip automatically added in. I am not against tipping, but I felt it was rude to do that. The customer should decide what the tip value is, based on the quality of the service and the food. In our case we would not have neglected a tip, but certainly did not feel like the service was worth a 20 percent tip. When I brought that up to the manager, she pointed out that a party of 8 or more (we had 9) has the tip automatically added in. It is in very fine print at the bottom of the menu and was not mentioned verbally to us.at all when we were seated.

Recommendations if management reads this: Do not seat people by the front door in the winter when it is really cold.

I understand the automatic tip policy is there so that large tables will not stiff a server. But the downside of that policy is when there is questionable service, then a large party has no recourse but to pay a tip amount that they feel is underserved. Is that really helping your business? I know that because of that policy, everyone in our party of nine left sad that we had not taken our business elsewhere in Ligonier. Perhaps this policy should be...