This was my first visit to any First Watch. When we first arrived, we were greeted in a warm manner and brought to a table where we were given menus. The atmosphere is bright, open and has a lovely patio outside to dine at. We chose to eat inside. Our waiter came over promptly and asked us if we wanted something to drink, so we ordered coffee. The coffee was good... But nothing spectacular although they did provide a variety of flavored creams on the table .
We did notice other little things... Like they left a carafe for coffee, they allowed you to grind your own salt and pepper with very nice looking mills, when they served water... They served it with a carafe so you could easily refill - small little things... But definitely enhanced the ambience of the restaurant.
We shared our server this was our first visit to the restaurant and that we needed a minute to look at the menu. As a server, I would've taken the opportunity to tell us about the menu what they offer, what their specialties are, and to try to upsell us on some of the specialty drinks, we noticed others had... But we didn't get anything about that. We had no idea until we were halfway into our breakfast that everyone was ordering what looks like very interesting drinks that we might've been interested in getting. What we also noticed halfway into our meal was that everybody else had received, a blue menu in addition to the regular menu. Never got that menu... I'm thinking maybe it had drinks on it... But we'll never know.
The menu we did receive though however, had some very interesting and unique dishes. For those who care... They advertise they serve cage, free eggs. We ordered the trifecta and other works omelette. The trifecta came with eggs of your choice, Belgian waffle or pancakes, and a side of meat. I chose the Belgian waffle, which was undercooked in the middle but I chose not to send it back. The bacon was two strips cooked to my liking... Just undercooked, not crisp. The sunny side up eggs were cooked to perfection. The person I was with had ordered the Works omelette which was filled with the variety of meats and two kinds of cheese, as side of potatoes, and sourdough toast. The toast was cold when it arrived... Which you promptly noticed because they had buttered it and the butter had not melted into the bread... It was just sitting on the top. The omelette itself was tasty and the potatoes did have some flavorful seasoning but again we're cool in temperature, not hot.
We also noticed that other people had water, we had never been offered water so we had to ask for it halfway through our meal. After getting our water, our server never came back to check on us during the course of the meal and until it was drop off our check. We felt rushed and kind of like eat and get out, I'm trying to flip the table.
When we asked him for a refill on our carafe of coffee, he brought it... But didn't refill our empty cups before he left.
As far as servers go, there are those you tip 15%, those you tip 20%, those you tip 25%, and those who are exceptional and get tipped more. For lack of a better , this was definitely a 15% server - took our order, got us oral, and refilled our coffee pot and gave us water only upon our request.
As far as cleanliness goes a few things that we noticed during our visit. When we arrived, there were two empty cups for coffee, waiting on each table... Both of our cups on the table were dirty... One had a sticky handle and the other had dirt in it. As far as bathroom maintenance, since this restaurant just opened I expected it to be in decent condition. The bathrooms are shared gender ... and I'm guessing because of excessive use... The seat is half falling off of the one in the bathroom I went to and the soap dispenser on the top is already showing signs of rust. I also noticed when I came out of the bathroom that there were some lovely hanging knickknack shelves... That had no knickknacks in them... Kind of looked half put together or somebody stole the knickknacks.
I would say this restaurant is OK... I would give it another shot because I do believe service makes up 40 to 50% of the experience you have ... ours was lacking which impacts my feelings towards the place. When we exited, we noticed our server standing by the cash register... He obviously had some knowledge because he helped the cashier figure out how to do our bill... And then we saw him serving outside on the patio. Perhaps he was just a little busy to handle as many tables as he was given????
All-in-all a solid 3-star. read more