Spring Mill Cafe — Restaurant in Whitemarsh Township

Please read all the way through. Original post was 3 stars and have since changed it.

Let me preface this review by saying, I have been coming here for years and I have always had a nice experience. That now out of the way, we had a 180 degree experience last week. There were 4 of us, there restaurant was not full or busy and it was a Sunday for dinner. Started off with the woman seating is. She was nice but way too scattered. When we asked a couple of questions we got the same answer that had nothing to do with what we asked. It was more of a standard response that you would give when actually not listening. We then placed our orders. All 4 of us ordered apps and main course and then dessert. There appetizers came out extremely fast. A pate sampler, 2 octopus and an escargot. Pate sampler (3 kinds), two of which were good but the third, the duck rillettes was awful. First it was very cold, above freezer but below normal fridge temps. Second is was so greasy it was inedible. I know what rillettes is and eat it frequently.. I've had it here many times in the past and was not disappointed. This was like eating pure coagulated grease. Second was the escargot. This is a cooked dish obviously. It came out just above room temp. This was sent back and a new one came out. This was only a bit warmer than the first. Third was the octopus. Both came out just above room temp. It was a grilled octopus dish. We didn't bother to send them back but should have. That's on us. There octopus was also off on texture ( during around for a bit)Between that and the temp you could conclude that these were not freshly grilled/cooked. They were definitely somewhat reheated. Now the main courses. Filet mignon; A Moroccan ground chicken dish; and 2 salmon. The filet was too be cooked med rare, it came out rare but my son ate it anyway. The chicken dish had a nice flavor but was dry. To the extent that you couldn't eat too much without talking a drink of water. 1 salmon came out perfectly cooked but was only a little more than warm. The second salmon was way over cooked and was sent back for a replacement. That came out good. During dinner the same woman who seated is also too the orders and did some of the serving (this is not a complaint), she put our wine in ice buckets and set them out of the way. She said she will be around regularly to refill our glasses. Never happened. We filled out own, each time having to get up out of a seat to get the wine. After all this we were offered a free dessert. I can understand an occasional issue, stuff happens. But some was just poorly made and others were not freshly cooked/made. That is a problem. I would love to say this was a one off thing (staffing issue what have you), but for the price you have to question if you want to take the chance to come back.

It's not what it used to be.

Update 1/15/20.... We went back to give it a another go after talking to the owner. He was apologetic and very sincere in his taking seriously the situation. I am happy to say that the food was fantastic, the service was beyond excellent and the staff friendly. We will be coming back. I recommend this restaurant if you want something cozy, romantic and different. ...

Unfortunately less than two weeks away from the date and time of my reservation they called me to cancel, the reason they gave me was that they had allowed a party to book the entire venue and they were calling everyone to cancel their reservations. I won't be able to reschedule in any reasonable amount of time because of my schedule so I'm afraid I won't be able to try any of the delicious looking food featured in their menu.

Edit1:

I received a phone call from the establishment after making this review. The person who called me said that the person who called originally didn't explain the situation properly. They went on to explain how the party has been scheduled for at least a year and they just decided to expand it last minute. They decided they felt the need to explain down to me that 'Sometimes in business you have to make hard choices'. They asked me if there was anything he could do for me which was nice, to which I politely said "No, I don't think you can" because as I've stated with my schedule it's very difficult for me to make time to go and do things like this. The response to this was something along the lines of "When a restaurant reaches out to someone who gave them a bad review, most people are gracious enough to" and I stopped listening at this point because I didn't appreciate the rude and presumptuous tone I felt this person was taking with me.

I understand that businesses have to make hard choices, I've run enough of them. It just so happens that this time the hard choice you made ended up getting you one or more one star reviews. I had previously considered visiting in the future at some point if I was able and potentially changing my review but now I'm not sure that I will. Calling to see if there was any way it could be made up to me would have been fine, however, I'm not generally one to frequent establishments that have their employees call to insult their potential customers which is exactly what you did when you lectured me on the hard decisions businesses need to make without knowing my background. Your shortcomings should not be made the problems of your patrons.

Also, when you implied that I'm not gracious because you were kind enough to 'reach out' and you asked if there was anything you could do and I said I didn't think there was? How is one supposed to know what you're even able to do? Perhaps YOU as a business should have at least one thing that you can offer to make up for cancelations instead of putting the pressure on your customers to know what they can or should ask for?

Seems like a really nice place, overall I did not have a pleasant experience trying to eat here...

SO DIsappointing!!! Went to lunch at the Spring Mill Cafe to celebrate 14th of July (Bastille day) and will not return. Always lived this place and even had our entire family here several years ago for dinner for my Mom's birthday. She was 97 and I am glad she will never know how sad this place is now. To start with - 4 measly escargot are $13!!! And they are not even in the shells! Dinner price for escargot is $16 and you only get a few more. Who offers less than 6 escargot per order, even at lunch?!?!? Next - the chicken liver pate was grainy and had zero seasoning /flavor! Serving it with 10 skinny slices of bread did not help at all - please serve it with a half a baguette and let me tear the bread if the pate is that poor! And I don't need 2 heaping tablespoons of dijon mustard. The gravlox were blah and serve with spinach leaves (not needed) - could have used some lemon..... Now, on to the entrees.....who serves rack of lmb with only couscous?!?!??? We do not like couscous and requested "anything but couscous " ...we got some roasted potatoes (which they do serve with their omelets anyway. ..), but they charged us $3 for those potatoes when the bill came and had not told us prior to charging!!!! I can buy a whole bag of potatoes for less than $3 and these were not even worth paying for. We ate only 1-2 pieces of those potatoes, since my rabbit also came with potatoes. If I had known they were charging us extra I would have taken the potatoes home to heat someday for breakfast ! The service was excellent, but the food and menu were a TOTAL letdown, bummer, pathetic experience. We did not even look at dessert and just wanted to leave. The lamb was $25 for six rib chops and NOTHING else (since the potatoes were extra)!!! The rabbit was ok, but did not need the potatoes (more potatoes) swimming in the sauce....

If we had known they charge extra for potatoes with the lamb, we would have just accepted the hat ed couscous and not eaten it....which is what ended up happening anyway since we did not eat the potatoes. AND there was no rosemary on the potatoes or the lamb......just some parsley sprinkled. ....what a waste of good lamb! Note to restaurants - if you are going to charge extra to change your ego - centric vegetable choice at customer request, you should warn them..... Will not return to the Spring Mill Cafe. Just keep feeding those construction...