I was waffling between three and four stars but I think I have to go three because four conveys a…read morebetter experience than I think you'd get here. Nothing is overtly wrong, and it is better than say an Applebee's, but there were some pitfalls.
The service is a high point. Very friendly and fast, the whole order was correct. The ambiance is of a lodge restaurant, reminiscent of restaurants I've been to in national parks.
We ordered a tot poutine, chicken fingers, steak tips, and autumn turkey wrap, finished off with a pumpkin swirl cheesecake. The tot poutine was pretty small to share, but it might be right sized for one person. The flavor was pretty good, but it struck as trying to be fancy with poutine unnecessarily. The scallions are a good addition, however, as they cut through everything with a bite of fresh.
The chicken fingers were chicken fingers, juicy and coated well, not fancy and not needing to be.
The steak tips were juicy, and most of them were medium rare. Even the ones that were over still were not dried out, so you can't complain much there. The mashed potatoes were okay, nothing special if you were eating them alone, but dragged through steak drippings they were better. The green beans with squash was an odd pairing, both with each other and the rest of the plate, but also not a detractor.
The autumn turkey wrap was unbalanced, tough to get a cohesive bite. Not that you'd usually complain about an overfilled wrap, but if you're going to make it where you can either choose a bite of turkey or a bite of everything else, it takes away from the experience of your dish you've prepared. At this point in the meal, I was prepared to give four stars, but it fell down after.
The pumpkin swirl cheesecake indeed had a pumpkin swirl, but then was doused in a topping. A whip? Not a cream or sauce. In any case, it was gingerbread flavored. Plus a ginger snap cookie. Then drizzled with maple syrup. So what you got was more like a gingerbread cheesecake rather than pumpkin swirl, and I wouldn't have ordered that. Who does that?
On my way out I went to use the restroom. As I was finishing, an employee came out of the stall behind me. As I turned to go wash my hands, said employee was leaving the bathroom. This was probably ten seconds. Where was the hand washing? I don't know. What I do know is I left the bathroom and saw that same employee, now with gloves on, making pizza. Yes there were gloves, but how clean were the hands that put them on? When I looked I didn't see a blatant employees must wash hands sign on the mirror, but it's not a good look for employees who are going to handle food to have a thorough hand wash after using the bathroom.
If you're at the zoo, you could do worse than eating here, especially as there didn't seem to be anything else with a 10 mile radius, but that should be no excuse for the restaurant to serve food you'd be happy to get either.