Woodfire Kitchen — Restaurant in Maryland

My husband and I had arranged to meet a pizza-loving friend, who’d been curious to taste the wood fired offerings. It was a temperate early summer day, but although there were plenty of picnic tables, there was not very much shade available from the umbrellas —plus we’d have to contend with traffic noise from York Road -- so we opted to eat in the small dark dining room.

Our server was friendly and prompt. The covers on the menu binders have cheerful hand-drawn inserts by local children, which adds a nice homey touch-- but in our post-Covid age I’ll be happy once QR menus have replaced the sticky plastic ones that make me feel the need to pull out the hand sanitizer.

The 3 of us ordered small salads, and the home-made Caesar dressing was outstanding. Actually, that dressing was the star of the meal.

Our friend ordered the Margherita Pizza and was far from impressed. He said the dough needed salt, there was too much cheese and was done after consuming a single slice of his pie. I tried a slice from his pie, and found it curiously flavorless. My husband was disappointed also in the taste of his Brie, sausage and fig pizza, plus he did not care for the floppy crust. He took home the leftovers and found the dough to be better on the 2nd day, reheated in our convection oven.

I’m not a pizza lover, so I checked out the Angus Burgers from Roseda, a local farm. Nothing appealed to me from the 4 signature "Griller" creations: the Woodfire has BBQ sauce; the Chesapeake is topped with crab dip; the Spicy had peppers and Jalapeno Jack cheese; and the GOAT had goat cheese with bacon and fig jam. Grillers were supposed to be served with french fries. My preference is a blue cheese burger, so I chose the “build my own” option. My customized burger was disappointing at best. I was presented a naked plate with just the burger. To clarify, it wasn’t served with french fries, yet was the same price as the 4 signature burgers. Fine, I can overlook the missing fries, who needs the extra carbs… But the glaring omission was the absence of pickles. I mentioned the missing pickles to our waitress and she said their burgers come with lettuce and tomato. That’s it. A slice of red onion would also be nice, but I didn't mention that. After I voiced my disappointment on the absent garnish she brought over a saucer with some bread and butter pickles.

Can I have found the only restaurant in the country that serves burgers without pickles? Pickles are automatically added to burgers, and dill spears accompany sandwiches. I know this because my husband despises pickles and I’m always happy to receive his on my plate. Anyway, the curious lack of garnishes on my burger detracted from my own experience. 3 diners left...

Very good food. Very friendly staff. Excellent pizza. The BYOB is kind of a fun concept.

We went here last night for a birthday. It's one of our favorite restaurants in the area. We noticed the menu has changed slightly. Two of our favorites (bean burger and crab cake sandwich) are gone, but the addition of an Impossible burger was a nice surprise. My wife had that and said it was great.

I had the salmon in cream sauce. Compliments to the chef who cooked it to perfection. The fish was crispy all the way around with the interior still moist and flaky--not over or under cooked one second. The spinach was nicely wilted but still with a texture to it, and the sauce was amazing. They nailed this dish even during an evening rush when the kitchen was slammed with several big parties. HOWEVER...

I do have one bone to pick with management/ownership. The menu labeled this salmon as "Wild caught Atlantic salmon"--but I'm 99.9% certain that's not exactly right. I knew that but ordered anyway. Atlantic salmon are largely a protected species in the wild and I'm unaware of any commercial fishery of them. Most farmed salmon are Atlantic salmon, and all though some companies label theirs as "wild harvested," "ocean reared," "open sea," or other marketing verbage, they're typically fish raised in ocean pens, but they're not wild. Their flesh tends to be a lighter orange color than their wild king or sockeye counterparts from the Pacific--as was mine last night. Farmed fish also tend to lack the succulent fatty/irony (as I can best describe it) flavor that wild fish offer.

Had the chef had wild Pacific salmon in his cooler last night, this might have been the best salmon dish I have ever eaten. Seriously.

I would ask the management/ownership to check their labeling of this fish as Atlantic wild caught. If it was sold to you as such (and that wouldn't surprise me), grill your supplier on it and do your own research if necessary. This is a glaring mislabeling of fish to anyone even modestly aware of fish sources. And with the National Aquarium promoting the Seafood Watch app to every guest, it's quite likely your menu will strike many other area patrons the same way it struck me--but they may not give you the benefit of the...

Tucked away location. so much so that 2 different GPS gave me crazy location spots(one wanted me to park on 83).

Clean rustic/barnish feel, with plenty of outside eating if you choose to eat outside.

Service was very quick and plenty of refills were offered throughout the service. Pleasant attitude and could see the staff coordinated to ensure coverage. Cleared table as you free'd up dishes to remove clutter. The only downfall was this being my families first time we didn't understand why it felt like the appetizers took a long time(Explained in the next section).

Food appeared 100% fresh/in house made/made to order. This explained the extra time on appetizer of waffle fries and pretzel/cheese. You can tell these items were created in house and the taste reflected this(in a good way). The portion sizes were good for a meal without feeling overfull from stuffing yourself or having to have the necessity of a to go box. The only negative food wise for me would have been the desserts, which were okay, but not up to items I have had elsewhere(Live in amish area, so may be unfair competition).

Last bit is pricing, in which i am conflicted. Everything appeared house made/made to order and was rather delicious. But was slightly more expensive then i would like to spend on a normal basis. Some items are more reasonable like burgers.

Despite the pricing, I will definitely return again. But maybe not as much as i would if the prices were slightly...