Public House Temecula — Restaurant in Temecula

Update 11.29.25-

Came back to PH. What a great night. Day after Thanksgiving and the vibe was great. Excellent cover band tonight. As luck would have it, "fun sized Josh" ended up serving me again. Five stars to him for the second time as well as five stars to another great evening, courtesy of Public House.

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I do not get up to Temecula often, but I decided, "Why not go explore the Old Town area" since I had an impromptu day off.

I lazily stumbled into a few other places, and to be honest, I was not that impressed with the selections. I saw this cute little house restaurant and heard live music, so I wanted to check it out. I entered Public House Temecula and could not have been more happy that this was where I was ending my mini trip.

I entered and felt right away that the energy, ambiance, buzz, and smells, that this was the vibe I needed.

I was greeted instantly by my server, Josh. He was very friendly, excellent at making recommendations, and had an adorable smile for days. I am typically a beer guy, but he recommended a Vodka based cocktail, I believe was called "Queen Berries." It was really good. Great recommendation for a "one off" cocktail for me. After that drink, I went back to my usual Mexican lager.

He recommended Brussel's Sprouts for a starter.

Point to note is that the acidity alongside the earthiness of the Bleu Cheese summoned me to go back for more with each crispy bite. Afterwards, I had a couple of tacos. The Quesabirria was the best, IMO.

To the entertainment, I wish I had remembered the ladies name who was performing. She did a bunch of great covers with a keyboard alongside a backing track. The vibe was on point that she even extended her set for a few more songs to keep the crowd engaged.

For dessert, I enjoyed another beer.

I wish I had tried the Short Rib Entree that Josh recommended. I just had already overindulged enough that day. I guess in summary, I will have to make another trip up to try it. I also hope to catch another great acoustic set and hopefully have another great...

We decided to Public House on Mother's Day since they were advertising a "Mother's Day Brunch Experience" that sounded like it would be nice. Unfortunately, it was a terrible experience.

The assortment of food choices on the buffet was limited at best. I made a special trip to visit the restaurant 2 days before our reservation to get details about this "Mother's Day Experience". I was told that the brunch buffet would include a "huge assortment" of breakfast and lunch items. Nothing on the buffet was labeled, so you had to lift every lid and hope you could identify what was in the pan. The bacon was greasy and limp (not even close to crisp), the diced potatoes were dry, the fruit was not fresh, and the only non-breakfast items we found were refried beans(?), cupcakes, and something that resembled taquitos with green sauce. Everything that was supposed to be hot, was cold and vice versa.

The guy running the "omelet station" didn't speak English, so telling him how you'd like your omelet prepared was challenging. He was also manning a carving station, when asked what the meat was, he wasn't sure. We weren't willing to try it because it was not under a heat lamp, and we didn't know if it was safe to eat.

Bottomless mimosas are a full glass of champagne per person and 1 glass of orange juice for the entire table to share. How does this work? 3 of us had mimosas that we had to 1) figure out how to mix ourselves and 2) pray that a server would make it somewhat worthwhile by giving us refills.

Here's the kicker! When asked about what charges were, because the cost of the buffet and bottomless mimosas were not posted anywhere to be found, we were informed that the buffet was $60 and mimosas were $25 PER PERSON. I asked the server if he was joking, and he immediately offered us a $10 discount, but agreed that it was not worth the money. It felt very "thrown together at the last minute" and incredibly...

We stopped in for the first time on a Saturday night in Jan. 2020 around 7PM for dinner, and got seated at a high top right near the stage. The hostess was super nice and when our server finally came over, he actually had notes with our names and that it was our first time there.

The drink menu is amazing – we had the buttery brown old fashioned and a pear tree, both of which were outstanding. For our meal, we ordered the Cory Lime Chicken and the Short Ribs. The chicken was just ok, nice presentation but very small portion for the money. The ribs were better. Service was super slow and our waiter was sullen and humorless. Try as we might, we weren’t able to coax even a tiny smile or draw any personality out of him! Our high top was overlooking the bar area where the bartenders looked like they were having a great time, smiling and interacting with the people sitting there…we were wishing we were over there!

The place started to get really crowded as the band started their set at 9. Music was good, although we were so close to the stage that it was way too loud for us to stay beyond 2 songs! We were surprised to see a bottle of Pappy Van Winkle over at the bar and as we were paying the check, we asked our server to inquire on year/pricing. Alas, as he had already closed us out, he never returned with that info! He might have made a nice sale there...

I had high hopes for this place based on reviews and initial impressions of the great ambiance. Strong positives–super drinks, great vibe and ambiance, decent albeit pricy food. If we had had a better experience server-wise, this might have been a 5-star! I know the server’s name but don’t want to call him out, as I’m hoping he was just having a bad day.

We’ll certainly be back to try their brunch, happy hour and dinner again. I’m also anxious to try out their location...