Harrimans Grill — Restaurant in Middleburg

Spent more than $500 at Harriman’s on Thanksgiving. This was our third or fourth Thanksgiving at the restaurant and it will be our last.

First, I was led to believe that they were completely booked (6-7 weeks out) except for a 5 p.m. reservation. I happily took it. We were there for 2.5 hours (way too long, which is another problem) and the entire time half the restaurant was empty. When I tried changing our reservation from two to three people two or three weeks before the dinner, that change took them DAYS to figure out and confirm. Why? Either they have service/hiring issues and/or priority was given to a large private event that was happening at the same time.

The service was terrible for the second year in a row. Our waitress was nice enough and she tried everything she could to make amends for it taking 20 minutes to get bread, 30 minutes between a couple of the courses, the kitchen staff completely forgetting food that should have been on our plates, pouring/mixing tap water into our glasses though we were paying for bottled water, etc., but it took three tries to get her to understand the cocktail I wanted. I kept saying, “look at the brunch menu, it’s served here all the time,” but it still took three tries for it to click. The “manager” who eventually brought our bread stopped by and I asked him about the cocktail. His response was “I don’t know. I’m only the night manager.” No problem solving (like asking the bartender or looking at the brunch menu) between them.

We paid $175 per person for a four-course meal (not including alcohol). That’s nearly $44 per dish. My husband said the four oysters were wonderful, but that’s $11 per (maybe) mid-size oyster. I still can’t believe I paid $44 for ¾ cup of lukewarm soup that I could have made at home. The octopus was good but heavily salted. The risotto was lackluster, meant more it seemed to be a filler than a culinary delight. One of the main courses – a traditional turkey plate – was spectacular. The beef was a joke. The $44 plate was more than half empty (literally) with (maybe) 4 oz of beef and a few large mushrooms on the side. It was such a disappointment that we even asked the server if something was missing. To be fair, the beef was well cooked and delicious, but we ended up stopping at IHOP on the way home because my husband was still hungry after four medium oysters, one octopus tentacle, 4 oz of beef, and ½ cup or so of bread pudding. All the desserts, it should be noted, were wonderful.

We missed the family style service, which is what it was the last few times we attended for Thanksgiving. My husband and guest both noted that the change took away something from the overall warmth/tradition of the meal. The overall experience was a disappointment, especially since this was meant to be the redeeming try from our last Thanksgiving at Harriman’s. This was a holiday – the big show. Food and service, especially for those prices, should be remarkable. Six years ago was our first Thanksgiving with Harriman’s and it was phenomenal. We were responsible for several couples/families giving it a try the next year. But it’s been downhill since.

For those of you still reading, I definitely still recommend the Harriman’s brunch on Sundays. It remains the best in a two to three hour radius (and we’ve tried most!). The Christmas buffet spread was also...

Although this post is about the restaurant, I wanted to share that our experience staying at the Salamander Resort was spectacular. This was our final experience before leaving the resort after staying for a few nights.

It was a bit unusual when we reserved a table for Sunday Brunch as the doors opened at 10:30am and we were given an 11:00am even though we requested an earlier time which they said was not available. We got to the restaurant 15 minutes early just to see if they could accommodate us, which they did. Entering the restaurant, we noticed that more than 60% of the restaurant was empty. Not sure why we weren’t able to get the earlier time.

On to the food, we started off with an Amuse pallet cleanser. First course was a nice pear salad, mini avocado toast, fruit salad, fresh bread, and Nutella bread. The salad and fresh bread was delicious. Nutella bread was dry and didn’t taste very good.

For the second course, we had scrambled eggs, a meat platter (bacon, prime rib, chicken sausage), potatoes, pancakes and french toast. Everything was good besides the sausage, french toast, and pancakes. The sausage was dry and lacked flavor. The french toast was dry and lacked flavor. No amount of syrup could help it.

We decided to box the desserts since we were full. We also needed to box some of the second course as it was too much food for us to finish in one sitting. The servers asked if we wanted to box the food and we took them on their offer. Come to find out, they just dropped some boxes by our table. This was a bit disappointing considering the level of service we had received at the resort the previous days. We boxed it all ourselves.

Finally I don’t particular like to complain in my reviews but one thing to note here. If you have plans or things to do be mindful to bake in a buffer. The pace of this meal was much slower than normal. It took a long time between each course and the servers rarely came to check in on us.

I wouldn’t recommend this place for Sunday Brunch. Try another place if...

We celebrated our wedding anniversary at the Harriman’s today. It started out nicely with a glass of nice wine and some bread and house made butter which was nice. We ordered buttered pasta for our daughter and I asked if they could do spaghetti to which I was assured that they absolutely could do it.

Our appetizers came next. Octopus was fine but parsnip soup too salty to eat. Pasta came at the same time. It had marinara sauce and small wavy fusilli looking pasta. I told them I did not order marinara. No apologies. About 15 minutes later they brought again the same pasta, overcooked and falling apart. Half of the bowl was filled with water. It resembled a pasta soup. The waitress came over, again without apologizing and asked if everything was to our liking. I asked her why they did not make spaghetti like she said they could do, to which she said that this was the pasta they served (no apology again). Then I told her that the pasta was falling apart and overcooked and that half of the bowl was full of water. She looked at it and said that it was melted butter. Pasta was barely warm and any butter would have solidified by now. It literally looked like they rinsed marinara sauce off the noodles and just tossed them back in the plate. At that point my toddler just ate bread and butter.

Entrees came later. Cod was dry and sauce it came with was very salty. Wagyu steak was ok, a bit chewy.

For dessert we got their pannacotta which was the best dish out of our meal. When the waitress came over to check up on us and asked how we were liking it, I told her that their dessert was the best dish out of the whole dinner. She said that she was very happy we enjoyed our meal. Clearly there was something lost in the translation.

All in all, a rather disappointing experience, especially for a wedding anniversary...