Bear Branch Tavern — Restaurant in Vienna

I have wanted to visit Bear Branch Tavern for years. I bike a fair amount and on long weekend rides, I've always looked longingly at all the happy, well-dressed, partially-drunk patrons sipping their ice cold drinks and generally enjoying their lives on the patio that overlooks the W&OD trail.

Desperately wanting to be one of those happy people, my wife and I decided to take our family here on a weeknight to see what all the fuss was about. Honestly, we're really not too sure.

We came at about 6pm which, admittedly, is the dinner hour so we expected things to be a little busier than usual...but it was also a Thursday night and who goes out to dinner on a Thursday night? Apparently a lot of people because when we rolled into the parking lot, it was basically the plot of Mad Max playing out in real life and we barely snagged a spot.

Once we walked inside we were greeted with noise that felt like we had walked into the actual Super Bowl, except instead of a field and players it was just a bunch of TV screens and a very full bar area; which I suppose could be considered a field with players, if you catch my drift haha.

Anyway, it was loud and a little overwhelming, but the restaurant is attached to some kind of office building so I assume most of those folks were there for a happy hour kind of thing, which made sense. We met with the hostess, shouted our party number to her and were seated basically immediately.

Our waiter showed up a few minutes later and dropped off some water. Little did we know that would be the last bit of liquid that we would receive for the rest of our time at the restaurant. If I had known, I wouldn't have been so flippant about sipping on it when we sat down.

About 10 minutes later, our waiter came back and took our appetizer order. We opted for the fried wings because you get to pick two sauces to go on your 8 wings and that sounded cool. We tried the DC Mambo and the mango habanero. The waiter basically told us that we shouldn't do the habanero because it was super hot but we went for it anyway.

Turns out, we would never find out if the mango habanero was hot because when the food-delivery man brought out our wings, they were covered in buffalo sauce. We would have sent them back, but we literally didn't see our waiter again for another 15 minutes and by that point our girls were getting hungry and fussy; so we had to make a call.

Finally, our waiter came back and took our food orders. I ordered their chili burger thing and my wife ordered the fish tacos. Then the wait for our food commenced, honestly about 45 minutes after we had sat down.

20 minutes later our food came out. The portions were plentiful and both dishes had TONS of fries, which was pretty great. The food itself was okay...the burger was nothing to write home about and the chili salsa stuff on it really just tasted more like onion and looked like this green spray that was put on the buns. I didn't look too closely at it. The fish tacos didn't get my wife sick, so that was a plus, and she ate all of them.

At this point, our waiter finally came back and, I'm not joking asked us about 4 times, "how is everything so far?" I wish she had asked, "how about a little more water?" but that never happened, unfortunately.

We finished our meals and sat for a little bit, expecting the waiter to come with our check. About 10 or 15 minutes passed and our girls were finally out of runway. They were getting squirmy and it was time for us to go home. Our waiter stopped by and asked how everything was going so far and we said we were ready for the check. Our two meals and appetizer set us back over $50, which was a lot for a mediocre meal and experience. We might come back and try the patio at some point too see if that's a different experience, but I guess a few drinks really do cover a...

I visited on a Friday afternoon for a lunch business meeting with a longtime professional service provider. The unique layout of this place directs you to the back of the building for the entrance where some open air seating exists away from the road. I found the call ahead seating process quite easy and worth the call 30 minutes in advance of my requested time for indoors. The hostess graciously greeted me a couple of minutes after I entered and offered seating either in the front or back since I wanted some privacy for my discussion. I found a perfect table at the back (section nearest the road) and was greeted by my server about a minute after I sat. The interior looks clean and well maintained, including a bathroom I saw before leaving. Service throughout my meal was both attentive and cheerful, and pacing of food coming from the kitchen came at appropriate times.

I opted for what I believed to be a relatively straightforward order of a roasted pork sandwich sans mayo, fries, and a house salad. The nicely flavored pork filling sits in a wonderfully crusty baguette and offers a nice balance of spice from some chilies, sharpness from the cheese, and earthiness from the well-cooked broccolini. For the price I would like a little more filling even if the overall portion was quite satisfying. The fries while tasty felt just a both south of warm and seemed to be clumped together in spots rather than being distinctly crispy individually. The fresh tasting side salad happened to be one of the better versions I have eaten in the past several months. The vinaigrette dressing was portion perfectly and thus dressed the fresh field greens and cherry tomatoes flawlessly. Fresh ground pepper shakers instead of pre-ground shakers at the table would punch the flavor up a tad for my taste. I finished by indulging my curiosity of the ricotta flan and largely left satisfied. This generously-portioned variation of the classic dessert has a welcome and restrained sweetness in the flan and house-made caramel both. I wonder if some kind of lemony accent with zest or juice could cut through the subtle richness of this dish. The amount of caramel could be too much for some given the portion size, but overall I could certainly and unhesitatingly order this item as well as the savory dishes again.

The total cost without tax and tip amounted to just over $30 which seems to be a good value for eating in Vienna. My overall experience being this positive should lead me to visit again and try some of the vegetable and not-so/vegetable appetizers along with a couple of other sandwiches and tacos. Their sister locations (different names) in Arlington and Dogwood Tavern in Falls Church I imagine provide similar experiences and likely are worth visiting as well based on my impressions of...

I hope the owners of Bear Branch read this and conduct the necessary training for their team. My husband and I have supported Bear Branch since it's opening, but today, have had the most unprofessional customer experience of any restaurant in the Northern VA, DC area. We've taken many friends, as we thought their drinks and truffle fries were the best in town. Today, however, we discovered many large egg shells throughout our fries. Mistakes happen and this could have been a salvageable situation had there been any communication or even common decency. They took the plate away without an apology or discussion, circled around it not far enough away from us to hear them all gasp "how does that even happen". They brought out another plate, no discussion, avoided us the entire time we were there, sitting and waiting for a conversation. The manager at one point came over and said (without ever stating his name) he was sorry and he would "figure it out", and said "the chef also cooks brunch". We were offered no solution and shown no care for the fact they had just served customers food on a dirty brunch plate, which had ended almost two hours before we were ever there. This immediately gave us pause as to the sanitation and hygiene of the kitchen and the rest of the meal. When we asked our waiter, Jack, what was happening and if we could please speak to the manager, he refused to let us speak to him. He then raised his voice at us and said he (himself) was very busy and "just needed to do his job"; completely disregarding us and refusing to converse in any approachable manner. He ended up getting frustrated, causing other customers to stop eating and focus their attention on our table, and stormed off, without any discussion. The manager finally came over expecting us to pay for the meal in exchange for a $20 gift certificate. We politely declined the gift certificate and he did comp the meal. We gave the gift card to the table next to us and will never be back. Things happen, people aren't perfect, but this is the most disappointing and disgusting experience we...