Agricola Eatery — Restaurant in Princeton

UPDATED REVIEW APR. 2023 (5 stars): I downvoted this place a few years ago for a number of reasons: Following an acquisition, its service and menu had changed considerably. I am happy to report that things have stabilized.

Agricola, in my opinion, is back to being the best restaurant in Princeton. Part of the reason for me, is that it is the only upscale restaurant that actively caters to vegan and non-alcoholic customers. The vegan options have become the best outside of a vegan restaurant. The Seedlip cocktails are amazing.

(And yes, the restaurant still doesn't take Apple Pay, but honestly, it's not the fact that they didn't take Apple Pay that was an issue, it was that at the time they blamed me for not knowing!)

UPDATED REVIEW OCT. 2022 (3 stars): OK, it's been a year, Agricola still doesn't have Apple Pay, but at least this is now a well-known oddity.

One of my complaints of last year, is that Harvest Restaurant Group was trying to get the "farm to table" and modern branding, but was not doing any of the pioneering stuff that the original owner used to try out. Well since Summer 2022, I am very happy to report that all HRG restaurants now carry non-alcoholic beverages that use Seedlip spirits. For this reason, Agricola and The Dinky are now back to being regular destinations.

The mocktails are very good! And they change! The Wild Mushroom Paté is still very good...

ORIGINAL REVIEW NOV. 2021 (1 star): First a bit of history: Agricola opened in 2013, by a local entrepreneur, Jim Nawn who owned an organic farm and wanted to create the restaurants that use it. Agricola was his flagship restaurant, and it was a creative, innovative "boutique" restaurant that kept things fresh: For instance, they had vegan dishes very early on, and, in 2018, they introduced the Seedlip, non-alcoholic cocktails. Unfortunately, Nawn lost interest in running his restaurants after a personal tragedy, and sold everything to Harvest Restaurant Group. HRG immediately removed the non-alcoholic cocktails, reduced the vegan offerings, simplified the menu, to appeal to a more generic crowd. HRG seems to only cares about the established "farm to table" branding.

I loved Agricola, and I used to go twice a week for drinks and dinner. I now don't recognize the place. The food is still decent, the waiters are top notch. But the management!!

Last week, we were unable to pay with Apple Pay, so we had to go to the bank to take cash. Despite explaining our intentions, the general manager phoned us frantically — and when I politely asked that they suggest to HRG to get Apple Pay (the detour inconvenienced us and made us look like we were skipping out on our bill), she said: "Well you could also bring money with you." I never thought I'd hear that in the hospitality setting, but certainly not during an active pandemic.

HRG and this rude manager: EVERY restaurant around Agricola has Apple Pay and better service — from place's like Mamoun's, Jule's or Junbi's, to high-level places like Kristine's, to small shops like the Bread Boutique or Witherspoon Bread.

We go to Kristine's now. Better everything!! And they have Apple Pay! And the manager is not rude. My guess is that HRG is a big group that underpays staff and if they didn't they would have a better manager. At any rate, no interest in helping their bottom line!

PS: The Wild Mushroom Pâté was supremely...

This is a farm-to-table restaurant with interior decor almost entirely made from wood. It has a great music selection, which wasn't too loud. It's got a homely, slightly saloon feel in the evening, and the staff were all extremely welcoming when we walked in. I'd recommend booking beforehand, since my friend and I only barely managed to get a table as walk-ins on a weeknight.

My friend and I were led to a very large table, which we always like, and when my friend pointed out that one of the chairs had some crumbs on it, our waiter swiftly switched his chair with an empty one even after cleaning the one with crumbs, which was much appreciated.

For appetizers, I ordered the wild mushroom pate, which I really liked. It came with crackers with sunflower seeds, which were unique. I liked how they were thinner than typical crackers. I did also like how the jam provided with the pate wasn't sweet like most jams. It had a nice tartness to it, which paired nicely with the pate. There was some alcohol at the bottom of the jam jar, which I wasn't quite expecting, and I don't think was mentioned on the menu. While I'm not strictly teetotal, I do strongly prefer not to have alcohol unless it is completely cooked off, and in this case, it wasn't.

My friend's cheese board was also good, although it would have been nice to know the cheeses there, since they weren't written on the menu and the person who brought out our food didn't tell us. Two of them were cheddar and gruyere for sure, but I'm not sure about the third one.

For the mains, I got the pomegranate-glazed prime short ribs, which were soft and tender. They completely fell apart under the fork, and the sauce paired nicely with it, although some extra acidity would have been nice. I should note, though, that the ribs somehow didn't seem to have much flavor on their own, and the sauce was doing all the heavy lifting. I also think some more salt would have been nice.

My friend got a fig flatbread, which he liked well enough. One thing to note is that several of the dishes came with a good bit of arugula, which seems to be the choice of green here. My mushroom pate and the fig flatbread both came with it, and some of the other menu items mentioned it as well.

We had the chocolate brownie and the cinnamon swirl bread for dessert. We found the brownie to be quite heavy, but that was expected given that it's double chocolate, and the cinnamon swirl bread was amazing.

One thing that I think was a bit off-putting was that the mains were brought out when we were still in the middle of eating our appetizers. We were clearly not finished with our plates and still working on the appetizers, but we were given the mains anyway, and we never got an explanation on any of the dishes. Granted, it was quite busy. Still, I'm glad we had a big table to ourselves, or there simply wouldn't have been space for all the plates.

Overall, I think dinner here was okay. I don't mind coming here once, but I don't see myself...

Food - 4.5 Stars Service - 1.5 Stars

Waited for approximately 1 hour after our reservation time to be seated, which wasn’t an issue for us as we enjoyed some drinks at the bar. Little did we know that it meant the rest of our meal would be rushed.

We sat down and ordered some wine for our party. As soon as the wine arrived, we were told it was last call (hadn’t even ordered food yet). We advised we would likely order another bottle and would like some drinks with desert later and were told it wouldn’t be a problem.

Our food, admittedly delicious, arrived one plate after another without a second to digest and the table was cleared while some were still enjoying the plates (very rushed).

Then came dessert. We ordered our desserts and drinks and were told that they had already had last call and that drinks would not be possible. Frustrating but perhaps just mis-communication. (Our attendant apologized having said that she had communicated what we had requested earlier, but was told “too bad”).

Deserts and espressos came, and while delicious, within a few minutes of them coming to the table, the check was on the table, the lights were turned on nice and bright, and a crew of employees sweeping around our table. This was extremely frustrating, but we paid the bill and went back to enjoying our desserts, and had a laugh over the whole experience.

This laughter must not have sat too well with one of the employees (manager perhaps) as this tall well dressed man came over to the table and told us that they were closing and that we had to leave. My wife almost choked on her dessert as he was telling us this.

Not what you would expect when spending a large sum of money on a dining experience. I frequent all of the groups restaurants and have never had an experience like this. Things certainly happen, and it’s understandable if there is miscommunication, but this felt like we were being swept out the door with the rest of garbage.

…Things like this just don’t happen when a restaurant is new and getting off the ground.

If you...