Evan's American Gourmet Café — Restaurant in South Lake Tahoe

This place is over priced and under delivers. Seems to be run by a husband and wife team that are more interested in hosting their friends than crafting a gourmet dining experience. Feels like an awkward extended family gathering in this small space rather than a gourmet dining experience.

After arriving at the reservation time my party was required to wait around another 15 minutes for our table.. not a huge deal but it was strange considering there were many vacant and ready tables available... but they did not know us and they wanted to seat us at a currently occupied table that we ended up SHARING with another party... This isn't advertised as the grab and go dining up on Heavenly so why would you have parties sharing tables with a small 1 chair gap in between? Did we forget that Covid is still impacting us? We were so hungry we chose to overlook all of this and then were immediately disappointed in our meals... they weren't inedible but certainly lacked the flavor and composition of the kind of restaurant they represented themselves to be. If you are thinking of coming here do yourself a favor and go to Riva Grill on the lake or heck even Base Camp Pizza by the gondola for more flavor... Will not be back but they will not care as long as they have a few friends who they can make to feel important when...

The first thing the host said at the door was an accusatory, "we've tried to phone you twice today", however skiing in heavy snow in an area of poor reception does not make answering the phone easy. Service did not really improve from there, we were seated and then left until another table came in 10 minutes later so that the server could go through the specials with both tables at once, the other tables order was then taken before ours despite us having been in the restaurant for significantly longer. The food was alright but nothing special and the bread tasted like it was bought at a supermarket. Desert was disappointing considering the website waxes lyrical about their pastry chef, I think the closest item on the menu to pastry was a croissant bread pudding. The cheesecake tasted like standard store fare. The whole experience lacked the sophistication I would expect at this price point.

Starter of roasted quail was the highlight and was actually very good, main course was bland with nothing to elevate it beyond average and desert was an uninspiring waste...

Main reasons for going here were due to it being open and the high ratings online. Appetizer was decent but the entrees had way too much salt and were just trying too hard. My filet mignon ($42) was swimming in salty sauce and I ate about 2 bites and came with overcooked brussel sprouts which were covered in butter and bacon - again way too salty. The plate was a mess of ingredients, which might be ok if you're coming off the mountain and starving but this is not how fine dining works.

Dessert was awful, Oreo seems to be prevalent in pretty much every option and the cheap canned cream they use is a kick in the arse considering how expensive this place is. We dropped almost $300 for two people and honestly it was not money well spent. My reason for not complaining or sending anything back is because of how tough things are for the hospitality industry right now so the main conclusion is that this place is way overpriced and is a million miles away from being considered fine dining. I would never...