Kitchen in the Desert — Restaurant in Twentynine Palms

I've been wanting to go here for a while now. And, I usually don't give bad reviews but it was hard not to and still be honest with you all.

So, the menu was extremely limited but the food was okay; although getting our food took a VERY long time considering everything, and it was overpriced. We made reservations for 645pm, arrived at 630pm, there were many tables open, but we we were seated at our table close to 7pm. Why take reservations if your staff doesn't know what to do with them Kitchen In The Desert? While other tables had plates and silverware neatly set up for other customers our table for 4 had simply silverware wrapped in napkins dropped randomly on the table.

The hostess, seating us outside in the sun (which was okay and expected), offered to put up the umbrella for much-needed shade but then walked away to help other soon-to-be customers. It wasn't until when the party seated about 15 minutes after us at the next table asked for the umbrella did a different employee open the umbrella for us all.

With the room temperature water in a carafe, getting our drinks about 20 minutes after being seated, and watching customers who arrived after us to get their food waaay before us we should have known. Trying to be understanding we ordered desert; a piece of pie and two orders of fried oreos...

Big mistake! The other table got their pie ordered at the same time and we waited almost 30 minutes. Our server acknowledged our wait and gave us a small discount which was kind... but simply did not make up for the length of the wait before or after...

The icing on the cake you ask? Another customer was sat at the table next to us who had a dog (no biggie, I'm a dog LOVER and we have 4 of our own). While this customer waited to be seated that dog showed unwarranted aggression (lunging viciously) toward other customers, however they sat this customer and their dog right next to other people. While my 9 year old son was returning from using the bathroom with my husband that dog lunged snarling at my son. Absolutely unacceptable! Stevie Wonder could see that dog was lunging at a number of people before the customers and their dog were seated. The customers bringing a dog like that to a restaurant AND the hostess sitting that dog around others was irresponsible and put people and that dog in extreme danger. To that dog's owners and the hostess... do better... just do better.

Needless to say, this place lost local money here. I will not return for the overpriced food, sitting under tattered sun shades waiting for the staff to assist with a smidgen of umbrella shade or drinks or food or desert... and I will definitely not return to fend off a rabid pink-puppy-sock...

Partner and I were super excited to visit this place during our visit to JT, but left feeling distinctly underwhelmed.

We were first sat at an incredibly unstable table, which in fairness our server did try to fix, but eventually we asked to move to a different table, which was accommodated for. I noticed they did continue to seat other parties at the broken table after us which suggested an attitude of “pack them in” rather than caring about their guests’ experience.

From initial seating to our drinks arriving took 45 minutes, and while acknowledging we did move tables, still feels ridiculously slow.

On to the menu. Our server informed us it was sharing style so to order around 2 plates each, and that food would come “as its ready”, which with certain cuisines and menus works fine, however this is not one of those menus, and suggested at best chef can’t time their service very well, or at worst, again, KITD isn’t too fussed about its guests’ dining experience.

Everything sounded great on the menu, but given the aforementioned “tapas style” dining, it felt very difficult to create a cohesive meal from the options. There were European, South American, Middle Eastern and Caribbean influenced dishes and a couple of token salads which made the menu feel quite disjointed.

We ordered the sprouts, which were excellent. The focaccia trod a very fine line between “charred” and “burnt” (it was burnt) and the burrata it was stated to be served with was a light smear. The lamb pops were cooked really well, but came as 3 pieces (between 2 of us - so much for “sharing”). Finally, the jerk chicken, which was cooked excellently, falling off the bone. However, it was fundamentally not jerk chicken, lacking all the depth, warmth, flavour and spice of real jerk.

As warned by our server, the food really did come out when it was ready, which surprisingly meant the lamb was served first, with a good 10 minute gap between that any anything else. Essentially this meant my partner and I were sat staring at a rapidly cooling plate of meat while we waited for anything else to accompany it.

Overall this was a true 3/5 experience. The location, setting and ambience is fantastic, and the drinks were good, but took 20 minutes to arrive. Unfortunately the service and execution, for the prices being touted, left a lot...

We spent one night in Twentynine Palms and we're looking for a place to eat around 7pm that had vegetarian options. It was a Monday night and a few restaurants in town were closed. We found Kitchen in the Desert listed with high reviews but weren't expecting too much. We were pleasantly surprised to approach the restaurant and see a glowing outside seating area. Because the place is about a block from the main highway there wasn't traffic noise. We were offered a blanket on our way to be seated in case we got chili in the late October air, and there was also a tall propane heater next to each of the outdoor tables that could be lit if needed. Each table has a small LED lamps with just the right amount of light, and there was a soft warm glow above us from string lights that criss-crossed the seating area. This would be a great place to go on a romantic date as it was quiet with interesting acoustic music playing in the background. I think maybe they weren't expecting so many people on a Monday night because there was only one server that we saw and it took a while for him to come and get our drink order, but we were pleased with the interesting selection of drinks that were available and when they finally arrived it was worth the wait (old fashioned and a whiskey sour). We were thirsty and one of the options was filtered tap water which was served from a wine bottle that they left at the table for refills. Unfortunately they were out of two of the three things we decided to order (the brussel sprout appetizer and the jerk chicken entree). Because one of us is vegetarian and the other only eats birds and fish, that left basically two options for us but we weren't disappointed. I ended up getting the fish plates which came on a bed of nicely seasoned coconut jasmine rice (with only a subtle coconut flavor). It was $43 and definitely worth it! The flavor was phenomenal and everything was perfectly cooked. My husband had the shiitake mushroom toast as a main course and it was a generous portion and also delicious. The chef at this place really knows what they're doing. This would be a great place for any foodie to seek out who wants an exquisite meal and unique, interesting ambience, or just someone who once a nice meal that is worth what...