Mad & Vin — Restaurant in Solvang

First off, Warn, Jacob, and Tyler at the bar are amazing and made our experience one of the most fun and memorable ever. Warn looks like he’s straight out of an episode of the Bachelorette and the only thing missing was a rose in his teeth and a white horse, his hands looked so soft that mere glass was impervious to his gentle grip while gravity took charge only to remind him of the power of E=MC2 several times throughout the evening. Jacob was a magician with the drinks and would make Tom Cruise look like an amateur in the 80’s movie Cocktail. While Warn would test the glasses to see if they’d bounce off the floor, Jacob was just short of balancing a martini glass on his nose while pouring a self made concoction that tasted like it was something Santa himself used to make his sleigh fly. Then there was Tyler, the son we only wish we could’ve had, smart as hell, funny, personable, and professional, and as soon as he makes his first million, we’re going to arrange his marriage to our daughter. Tyler polished the glasses while handsome Warn tossed them on the floor still learning of the power of gravity while Tyler shook his head respectfully saying “see, looks aren’t everything”, while Jacob mixed the nectar of the gods with literal unicorn dust emitting from his hands. The only thing missing from the bar for these guys was a trapeze that would drop from the ceiling where Jacob and Warn could gently toss Tyler back and forth through the air while brilliantly recommending amazing dishes like the Poke, Calamari, Charcuterie, or cheese curd plates and reciting the theory of relativity to Warn as perfectly polished glassware flew across the bar. At one moment my wife said to me “this is better than Thunder from down under” at which point I realized that the gold speedo I brought would not go to waste later that evening after drinking a gallon of premium liquor each. We had such a great time at the bar and enjoyed the food so much that we returned a second night with plans to have one drink and go back to our room at the Landsby, but before we knew it, we’d been there for 3 hours and had an equally as amazing evening as we did the night before. And then, sadly, and I mean seriously sadly, we had to say goodbye to our new friends Warn, Jacob, and our future son in law, Tyler. And we cannot wait to return in a few months to see if they got the trapeze...

We are from the Los Angeles area. It was our 22nd wedding anniversary and we decided to go wine tasting in Los Olivos and spend a couple of days there. We heard good things about Mad Vin and read the reviews. The atmosphere was really nice, not too crowded for a holiday weekend. We dined there with our best friends on Sunday, the 25th. We had a reservation for 6:45 PM. Our table was great, the food was really good. The service was terrible. Our waitress was extremely inattentive, didn’t know too many of the alcohols on the menu, and left our table for long periods of time. She disappeared after we had asked for refills, when ready to order our main entrees and dessert. My friend asked her several times for sweetener for her coffee, never came back with it. Everyone we asked for something, she was gone for 10-15 minutes. It was so strange. We couldn’t believe how bad the service was.

We were told by our sever that the dessert would be on the house due to our anniversary, come to find out we were charged for it. When we asked our waitress about the charge, she said, “Oh yeah, I should have checked to make sure you weren’t charged.” We didn’t finish our email/desert until 9:30 PM. We are fairly quick eaters, too.

After our meal, I went up to the hostess desk to speak to a manager. She spoke with me for a few minutes and I explained our experience. She apologized over and over and said that this should not have happened and that she would speak to the waitress later on after her shift. She said, it’s very busy tonight (which it wasn’t) and she has a lot of tables. The manger gave me her card and said if you come back, we will make sure this doesn’t happen again. That was all! Are you kidding?

We couldn’t believe that nothing else was done. The next day we went wine tasting at a few places and come to find out, each place said to us, “this place has terrible service, but does have good food. Not worth going there.”

Wish we knew. It was not a pleasant experience for an...

A pretty good experience at Mad&Vin. Even though we had appointment at 5pm, but it took 10-15 mins for the hostess to actually greeted us, it was ok, since it was warm inside and we're on vacation anyway. The servers and waitress are friendly and knowledgeable about the dinner menu highlights, lovely energy. I ordered the Cabernet that was suggested by Kathy, and It was delightful. The Skal cocktail and Gold rush were also delicious. I wish I could say the same about the food. The starters were great, brussel sprouts and calamari were made just right, flavorful and tender, crispy. They hit all the right notes. The entrees were a bit anticlimactic. The tomahawk pork was a bit on a dry side for me, but flavors were there. The flat iron steak even thou they stated prime on menu, it tasted like choice to me. Confit chicken was a bit boring, I was expecting more of it, clunky seasonings, as we found chunks of salt clumped together on different spots inside the cast iron pan they served in. Caesar salad was a nice surprise, delicious with some shrimps and very nice dressing, perfectly seasoned. The servers and waitresses and waiters were attentive, so 10 points for them. I would come back to give them another chance, since the restaurant is beautiful inside the Landsby hotel,and the...