Kitchen Table Cafe- Evergreen Place — Restaurant in Vancouver

Before writing my review, I want to preface that I have worked in the restaurant business for over a decade and my father was a restaurant manager for 30 years and some. My hope is not too disparage a local business, but to shed light on the reality of what they have to offer here. Or lack thereof in terms of service and food quality.

My husband picked this place because the ratings were 4.7 stars… I am really entirely unsure as of why now.

We were in town to spend the last day with my father-in-law when we came in. Upon entering, the lady that greeted us barely spoke a word of English when my husband tried to ask a question about whether or not they had just the creamer packets or actual cream. (Obviously places like this don’t provide actual cream just FYI). Mind you, he had tried to call several times before we came to ask and find out. But we were running low on time and decided to just pop in.

When we were seated, the owner‘s daughter was our waitress. my father-in-law ordered the corned beef hash. I ordered two eggs your way, and my husband ordered the French toast and our four-year-old daughter ordered the pancake kids meal.

When the corn beef hash came out, it looked absolutely disgusting, the hashbrowns were barely cooked. I had prefaced during the ordering to have my hashbrowns extra extra crispy. My hashbrowns came out, looking very undercooked. The turkey bacon looked under-cooked.

My tummy started to grumble and I didn’t even finish my entire meal. My father-in-law‘s bacon looked like it had been microwaved and tasted very tough. In the middle of our meal, he said he couldn’t even finish his meal and wanted to order something else so he did which took the entire time. By the time he got his hashbrowns back initially and then ordered something else. We were all done with our meals.

The majority of the time was spent looking for our waitress, trying to figure out where our food was, and what was taking so long. When I asked the waitress to speak with a manager, she said that there was none on staff that day, when I asked to speak with the person in charge or the PIC, she said that they didn’t feel good and they were home. So essentially no one was running the show, which all makes sense now. When my father in law called the waitress over to re-order, the waitress literally walked away in the middle of my father in law talking to her. Short staffed or not- that’s inexcusable.

I told her what would make us happiest to have our entire meal comped because the experience was so poor and the food was disgusting that it ruined our whole morning pretty much and our last meal with our father-in-law before we had to go back home and drive 6+ hours. To which she refused to comp the meal. Her excuse was that they were short staffed and was also parroted by another waitress standing at the front counter. Again being the owner‘s daughter, I’m surprised at how she could make that executive decision. I told her we would be leaving a poor review and that this is not the way to run a successful business. Don’t get greedy because you have 4.7 stars on Google. It will go down if you continue to operate business as you did today. In light of all of this, we still ended up having to pay $45, she did comp my father-in-law‘s two meals that he ordered and a coffee and an orange juice. He didn’t even finish his second meal that he ordered because it was so disgusting. I’m shocked that they are charging just as much as Cecilia‘s or La Provence right down the street for the lowest of the low quality of food. My eggs also had green stuff on it. And I’m disgusted that we even had to feed our daughter this kind of food. After all was said and done she tried to make light talk talk about our...

I finally tried this place because of the good reviews. First, let me address two things that I think contribute to the high ratings: 1) blatant bribery via free menu items and $ off for social media posts (see photo) and, 2) the average culinary taste of the typical customer that frequents this place and Vancouver restaurants in general. -In short, the stunning reviews seem inaccurately optimistic. For an average American chain restaurant, the food is ok, the portions are large, and the prices are reasonable. I'd say taste and quality are near the black bear diner category, and somewhere a bit higher than IHOP. If you're looking for pine state biscuits or screen door-esque quality and taste, this is not your place. Service is fast and friendly, and the menu selection is pretty large. The regular coffee was decent, but I found the huge bowl of flavored creamer packets on the table to be a portent of things to come. I had the country-fried steak, which turned out to be the typical frozen-type you hope isn't arriving on your plate (if you've EVER had made-to-order). The hash browns were average, but the server graciously had the cook put extra gravy over them simply because I mentioned gravy complements my browns. The country-style sausage gravy? -hmmm ...Usually, gravy is either average, uniquely-seasoned, bad, decent, salty, etc., but this gravy was just "there" -Not terrible or bad, it just doesn't leave any impression. The over-medium eggs were as expected. My side of two pancakes was pretty good. Atmosphere was decent for this type of establishment. Sanitation/cleanliness seemed high. I'd recommend only if your taste has lead you to believe places like shari's and elmer's actually serve...

We don't go out as often as we used to. Drive-thrus are convenient but not necessarily cheaper. We went through the drive-thru of a popular burger restaurant and it was very expensive. For the same price, including a generous tip, we ate at the Kitchen Table Cafe. The difference was that the service was excellent and personal, whereas the drive-thru was generic and not a pleasant experience. It wasn't necessarily unpleasant. It just wasn't personal and enjoyable. The atmosphere at the Kitchen Table Cafe was very pleasant. There was plenty of room in the seating areas, so you don't feel crammed in while eating your meal. The staff are extremely polite and helpful. We didn't have to wait a long time to order, and we got our coffee right away while waiting to order our breakfast. It was nice to have a choice to order breakfast or lunch. We didn't have to wait very long at all for our breakfast to arrive. We never ran out of coffee while we waited, or while we were still eating. It was so nice to go in and sit down and just enjoy our meal within a pleasant atmosphere, and the entire experience was calm and friendly. We highly recommend the Kitchen Table Cafe for those who wish to get the most for the money. I'm sure you'll enjoy the food and...