Whitebark Restaurant & Lounge In The Westin Hotel — Restaurant in Mammoth Lakes

Do yourself a favor and do not waste your time or money going here if you have kids. They might as well add a sign “no children allowed” unless they are grown. We had the worst experiance ever dinong here last night 1/15/2024 at 7:50 PM.. Main reason was due to the Assistant General Manager “Mannada Eanes”. As she calls her self whom should not even hold any position that is customer service related or people related. She is beyond rude, disrespectful, uneducated and has no people skills. Her discrimination agains kids is beyond words and comprehension. Its a shame that this Westin resort is even affiliated with this establisment inside their hotel. My whole group is speachless as to what they witnessed last night. We checked into this beautiful property and went down to grab a quick bite with our friends and a 2.5 year old. At the door Mannada or (name she have us AGM) immediately told us that we have to sit in the lounge because there we did not have reservstions. Mind you the place was completely empty but fine no problem we wanted a quick bite anyway. Did not offer a high chair for the toddler but did bring coloring menu without color pencils. When we asked for the color pencils they brough used unsharpened colored pencils that were previously used by other kids (so much for cleanliness and safety). Simple order of fries took over 30 mins to get for my toddler.. By this time he is hungry and bored. Without a high chair he wants to go explor and walk around he made 2 circels around the table and was just looking around. Mind you NO ONE WAS IN THE LOUNGE SIDE.. COMPLETELY EMPTY except our group. Mannada or what she calles her self came to my husbad with smerk on her face with attitude to tell him that MY 2.5 year old is a “THREAT AND DANGER” to her staff?? First we tought she was joking with us. Like are you serious place is empty and even if it wasnt there is a more nicer and polite way to say this to a parent. My husband looked at her and said what is he doing thats dangeroua he is just walking around the table.. She proceeded to say we need to keep him at out table or she can pack our food to go? Excuse me how about you calmly come over and say what is the problem without making a scene. Isnt your job to make sure customers are happy and to tone down any situation without escalating it further?? You are disrespecting my child, our friends and my family. My child is very well behaved he is not distuptive, he does not scream nor yell. He has traveled the world with us and skiied at some of the worlds most prestigious resorts and we NEVER EVER HAD AN ISSUE WITH HIM AS A BABY OR TODDLERS. This is when I asked her for the first and last name from the waitress who was more than appolgetic and kind. So called “Mannada”comes over with a pieace of paper from the thermal register tape with a name and “title” and start to argue with me again. When I asked her for her business card she said she is new and didnt have one.. At this time she proceddes to ask us to leave the establishment or she was going to call the police??? Call the police for what for 2 year old getting out of their seat and you coming over to argue with a customer..Our waitress came over and just kept appologizing to us and asking if she could do anything.. Bless her heart!!! At this time someone else came over trying to calm us down not sure whom she was assuming the manager.. So Mannada wants us to leave yet she is sitting and arguing insted of bringing us our bill so we can leave. I guess its more important to cause a sceen than get us the check but again maybe im crazy for even paying the bill.. Or was she maybe hopping for us to get physical i dont know.. This woman who claims to be an AGM should not hold any customer service jobs positions. She needs some serious training on etiquette, and basic people skills.. There will be consequences for this. You dont kick me and my child out like some criminals while we are staying in the resort.. Everything is on cameras you can see it all and we have 3 witnesses who heard the...

Let me start this off by saying, HORRIBLE experience. Our service throughout the rest of our experience eating at the Whitebark has gone downhill. Nearly every time we stay at the Westin in Mammoth, there is something new wrong with the Whitebark. They seem to never hire the right managers. Jennifer, who was the manager before, did an okay job. A bit rude it seemed but okay service. The new manager amanda, that works at the whitebark, is beyond rude. She ignored us at our table after asking for her, and before that, told us we needed a reservation to even sit down. Mind you, the entire restaurant was empty! We ended up getting seated and finally ordered our food. We had to wait at the front for about 7 minutes before she even noticed us standing there. Does this restaurant not hire hosts? Do they not ever stand at the host stand? It took almost 45 minutes just for two thrown together burgers. This place claims it is fine dining, yet they only serve diner food for the most part. Also, the prices for the Whitebark have gone UP when the service has gone DOWN! Rapidly!!! Those two burgers my wife and I got, which were 40 dollars combined, were burnt when asked for medium rare. There were tomatoes on my wife's burger when she asked for none. The next day, we both tried the chicken schnitzel. It was so rock-hard. I thought I chipped my tooth at first! I am not sure who, in their right mind, approved the raising of whitebark menu items. Whoever did should be fired, and the whole restaurant needs quite a few lessons on service. The prices DO NOT match the quality of food or service. I remember when there was a sushi bar, and the staff cared about their customers. It seems better business practices are not practiced at this establishment.

To anyone thinking they would have a good night eating here, do not even fool yourself. This establishment must be bulldozed and rebuilt again, with a new front of...

The restaurant itself is inside the Westin Hotel, is in good shape and is advertised as a fine dinning restaurant but I would say it’s just a family dining restaurant in a nice setting. It has a high end feel about it but to be honest they will let all hotel guests in, whether they wear flip flops or high heels, and I don’t see them turning anyone away. And that’s fine with me because my messy baby would definitely not meet the fine dining restaurant criteria 😂

Staff was helpful and very friendly- the front of house lady was amazing at entertaining my 10mo baby (they keep playing peekaboo).

Drinks menu is average and they were able to do a decent margarita (our stick yard for any food and drink establishment).

Food was good although unnecessarily complicated. We ordered the halloumi as a starter and I’ve never seen halloumi served this way: smothered in about 10 other ingredients - from asparagus to pico de gallo and some cold grilled tomatoes - and served on an indescribable purée (pea or avocado or something else green). Just let the cheese shine for goodness sake, that was the only good thing in that plate and the only thing we wanted!

Same happened with the salmon. All the ingredients were good but unnecessary: it came on a carrot puree and was topped with pearl onions, peas, pickled daikon, purple potatoes, and frisée lettuce. Too much!

All in all was a good dinner but not fine dining in my opinion which was not a...