Lantern House Kitchen & Bar — Restaurant in Reston

tl;dr - originally rated 5/5 overall with subtype of 3 on service category due to perceived lack of attentiveness by staff. Staff grilled me on my rating of their service after my party paid before we left.

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What a bummer. I really wanted to like this place. Good food, good atmosphere, etc. etc., you've seen this time and time again in Eve's glowing reviews... I can agree to the good food and outstanding atmosphere.

Here's where my experience went from good to bad: They offer 10% off to write a review on Yelp and Google. Everyone in your party IS REQUIRED to leave a review to get the discount BEFORE you pay. The staff will check your phone before giving you the discount, let alone running your card.

Originally, in the moment, I reviewed 5 stars overall: (in categories) 5 in food and ambience, and 3 in service. My reasoning for 3 in service was due to slow speed of service. This was because there were multiple times were my party felt the need to flag down the staff to either order more drinks or food. Service was not painfully slow overall (the staff wasn't hiding from us), but slow service is a symptom of a larger problem, either a staffing issue from a management perspective (there were only two FOH staff, which was fine that evening. We were one of the only parties there when we first walked in, which looking back should have been a red flag given how many 5 star reviews they have and their average overall rating), or an attention/skill issue on the staff side. Regardless of the slow experience, the food was good enough that it had me dreaming of many returns to try new dishes and drinks, feeling lucky to have such a lovely place close to my house. When we went to pay, the staff member looked at our phones to see that we all submitted our reviews and went to run the payment card.

When the staff member returned with the card, they looked me dead in the eyes and said something along the lines: "Did my other server or I do something wrong or offend you somehow? You rated the service a 3!" I can't even imagine being on a date with someone and being in that situation. I told the staff member that "it was fine" - to which the staff member reciprocated by repeating the question again, and I repeated my response. This left a terrible taste in my mouth on the way out, dampening all previous positive perceptions I had of the place.

Paying/Incentivizing reviews and confronting those that do not leave glowing reviews is not illegal because we live in a country that is built on the freedom of speech. However, I don't support this business practice. Reviews are subjective, and as you can see, many other people have had outstanding experiences. But the fact someone else reviewed a similar experience, has me believing many are not truly expressing their experience at Eve's.

I regret my experience at Eve's. I wanted to like it, but they definitely executed a speed run on tanking a 5 star experience.

-- Tip to those visiting: don't agree to their 10% off review incentive. It's a grey zone for Google and Yelp reviews policy, and you'll get grilled if you want to leave anything...

I dined at eves garden this evening, it was a Monday night so the volume was a lot less. The atmosphere was very clean and aesthetically pleasing, and it smelled like five spice simple syrup when I walked in. The garlic noodles were definitely my favorite entrée that I had there.

That being said, my issue is not with the food or the atmosphere, but rather the service. We were greeted with an attentive bartender at first. However, throughout the evening, we had to constantly flag down the bartender to ask for another round of drinks. Her and another bartender, possibly a trainee, were seen eating and on her phone at the bar constantly making me feel a little awkward, asking for service because they were eating their dinner. We went during their happy hour, which is an amazing happy hour, 40% off all their wine by the glass, beer, and all their appetizers. The bartender said that we would be able to get an additional 10% off our check if we were to write a review on Google and then possibly copy and paste the same review to yelp. I happily obliged and began to write the reviews, but then the bartender said that she needs to see Google and yelp reviews from my entire party before she could cash us out. We then proceeded to ask her to cash out, while my companion was just finishing writing his last review, and the bartender was very pushy and said that she needed to see confirmation of all of the reviews that we wrote in order to get the remaining 10% off. The reason why I was attracted to this restaurant was because of the glowing and consistent reviews about the food. The food was amazing, however the service was very tacky and pushy towards the end of our experience. I felt like I was lying on my review, because the bartender wanted to see the review and verify how many stars I gave. My companion gave them a five star review overall and a three star review on the service, and she immediately came up, and proceeded to harass my companion with questions about what they did wrong in a condescending and passive aggressive tone.

It’s so unfortunate that this place with great food and great ambience has such a tacky and fake way of gaining five star reviews because while they have a 4.9 star review, it is not be a true reflection on the service, because the bartenders are extorting peoples reviews for a discount on their total check. I truly was intending on coming back, but the entire review writing experience has now left a sour taste in my mouth. That being said, I believe that there is a better way to go about asking people to write reviews for your restaurant, perhaps, if the female bartender was not so pushy and adamant about seeing the reviews that we made, and confirming that we did, in fact, write them for both platforms, Google and yelp, and making so transactional and impersonal, then perhaps I wouldn’t...

Update: Thank you for the response from the owner. But 10% doesn't replace what we spent for the terrible entree we had. Maybe in time we will try it again, but with the food being so greasy, and not fresh, it's not high on our list anytime soon.

We visited Lantern House Kitchen and Bar last night, hoping for a nice meal close to home. We were in the mood for good Vietnamese food and a drink, but when I sat down at the bar, the waitress mentioned they weren’t serving alcohol because of a delay with their liquor license. I know the restaurant changed ownership or management months ago, so I was surprised that this still hadn’t been resolved. This wasn’t posted anywhere online or at the restaurant, which was a bit frustrating—we might have chosen differently had we known.

Despite that, we decided to stay and give it a shot. The waitress was polite but clearly busy managing a large party and a couple of other tables. Service was okay, but it felt a bit rushed, and water refills didn’t happen.

We ordered pho, crispy noodles, spring rolls, and pineapple fried rice. The pho and noodles were good to average, the spring rolls - rather greasy but decent flavor - BUT the fried rice missed the mark completely. The beef was dry, and the overall flavor wasn’t fresh—it tasted like it had been sitting for a while. At $21, it was disappointing and not something we could enjoy. When we brought it up, the waitress acknowledged it but didn’t offer a replacement or anything to make up for it. We were surprised it still appeared on the bill without further discussion. So basically we left an entire order of the pineapple fried rice mostly untouched. It was clear it wasn’t good. We would have taken it home with us had it been edible.

The restaurant itself is cozy and has potential, but for the price point, we expected more attention to food quality and service. Most of the good reviews were from the previous management/ownership. I didn't read them before we went - and regardless I like to decide for myself and always give local restaurants a chance. I’m not sure we’d return for dinner unless they make some improvements. Drinks, when available, might be a better...