Red Fox Room and Steakhouse — Restaurant in San Diego

The Red Fox Steakhouse and Piano Bar is a quaint restaurant and bar in the University Heights section of San Diego. It is full of charm and atmosphere. According to the restaurant’s web site, the building was originally The Red Fox Room, an inn in Surrey, England during the mid 1500s. The building was brought to the United States in 1926.

We wanted to celebrate our anniversary at a restaurant that was new to us. By chance, we happened upon the Red Fox Steakhouse and Piano Bar (note, you may also see it listed on Google Maps as the Red Fox Steakhouse, or the Red Fox Room). It turned out to be a wonderfully pleasant surprise.

Atalie was our server, and we were so glad that she was. She had an upbeat personality, and a welcoming smile. Her knowledge on wines was commendable. When asked for a wine recommendation, she identified her top choices, and provided a brief explanation of her selection. The restaurant was not full, as it was (to most people) a random Monday night. After our meals, I asked her to remind me of the wine brand (Austin Hope Cabernet Sauvignon) that I had. She did an exceptional job of summarizing the history of the vineyard, and made additional recommendations.

The meal was outstanding. As my wife had specifically been planning to eat steak, we both had filet mignon. Both of us agreed that our respective meats were cooked exactly as we wanted – which is unusual. The cut was tender, with no gristle. It was flavorful, and melted in my mouth.

The bread! Yum! It was heavenly. The bread (what kind, I don’t know) was grilled after being covered with a spread of butter and other things. Whatever the spread, whatever the bread, the flavor was delicious. Usually, my wife might eat a slice of bread before or during meals at restaurants; but this time, she had several – and her eyes sparkled as she savored it.

For dessert, we had the carrot cake. As with the rest of the meal, it was delicious. As with bread, my wife usually will eat a bit or two of desert, when we eat out. I can safely say that this time, she and I split the dessert evenly. Before leaving we bought a second piece, to eat at home the next day.

As the full name of the restaurant implies, it is also a piano bar, in the evenings. It was so romantic having live music playing in the background, as we ate our meal. It helped make this perhaps the best anniversary meal I’ve ever had.

One last comment about Atalie: she had good knowledge concerning the history of the physical structure of the restaurant. How amazing! Few have been the times when our server has taken time to learn about the company, let alone the structure. She is a real gem, and I hope she continues with the company for many years.

I whole-heartedly recommend the Red Fox Steakhouse and Piano Bar. Try it. You will not be...

Updated 1-28-19: Went here for lunch today and brought a friend who had never been here before. I bragged how tender this Filet MIgnon is, and that it was the best in all of San Diego. I ordered mine rare and she ordered hers Medium rare. The steaks are usually so tender the knife glides through like butter and steak juice comes out in the plate....not today the steak seemed tougher than usual and the steak did not yeild any of its delicious juices onto the plate so it was rather dry. Never have I experienced this at the Red Fox Room, their steaks are usually tender and juicy and you only have to glide the knife through it once or twice to sliced a bite off. I have been going there for 27 years and this was the first time I ever experienced a filet like this here,. It was almost as if they were getting thier beef from a different source.

Feb 2018: I would give this 5 stars for the food, and always have in the past......but the piano bar was way too loud, not only did they have a piano, but horns too! I took my brother there Saturday night, when he came to San Diego recently. Due to his work, we hadn't seen each other in about 3 years, so we wanted a nice quiet place to enjoy and have conversation over a delicious filet mignon dinner. This used to be a nice quiet place to eat and have quiet conversation....not anymore. We had to elevate our voices and so did the other diners just to be able to hear each other @ our table sitting right next to each other. A lot of loud people in the bar right behind us, with no barrier in between to lessen the noise. A quiet piano bar would have been nice, but the place is definately too small for horns and the loud level of enertainment and partying, not to interfere with dinner guests. The filet mignon was melt in your mouth as usual the best in San Diego! The sauteed mushrooms I ordered to go with it, were a dissappointment. They used to slice and sautee them in butter, garlic and sherry or wine. These tasted watery, flavorless, and were button mushrooms steemed in water, not fresh, a hint of butter, a hint of garlic, no or sherry/wine like they used to do. I hate canned mushrooms, and these were almost as bad, all they did was heat them up and put a little salt and pepper on them, which I had to add more of! The mushrooms were a total waste of money! I have never had to add anything to sauteed...

I just found this incredible place last night. But I'm very sad to hear that the owners of the Lafayette are kicking the place out. This is part of the history of "the Boulevard" and of San Diego. First I went in the Hotel because I'm planning on moving into a house that is just walking distance from the Lafayette Hotel and I wanted to see how much it would cost for a room for my wife's father and mother. When I went in the hotel I found out that it has a few occupants that have been there for many years that no longer have bodies. So I decided to try to do some exorcism on the place. I discovered by talking to them (I never give 100 percent credit to the disembodied entities' stories, because they often lie or mix them up over the years with other lives) that two of the occupants were husband and wife in a former life and the other occupant was the girl that the husband cheated on at that hotel, which contributed to his untimely death. Apparently the male says he was a touring musician and he performed in the steakhouse bar on the piano (and he doesn't like some of the pianists who are now playing on the piano, which is why he is working with others to get the bar kicked out) and he also performed on the piano in the lobby, and the girl that he says he cheated with was one of the dance girls with the touring group who performed a dance routine in the hotels lobby (foyer near the piano. Apparently the girl was also the girl friends of the Mafioso boss who booked the band and the Mafioso boss found out they were fooling around and had the pianist killed in one of the rooms adjacent to the pool area, which is why his and his wife from that life often haunt those rooms. And the girl that he cheated with got killed by the boss at another show, because of this affair, so now she was visiting the hotel often in spiritual form. So I got her to leave and not come back and if I can come another night, I'm sure I can get the other two to leave and no longer come back, and then maybe the bar won't really get moved across the street. "Who you gonna call: Tim Janakos (don't knock us until...