I went to Red Haven with a friend, wanting to try something new. It had been recommended to me as a "Main Street Ann Arbor" quality restaurant. I hate to hurt the pride of fellow East Lansing-ers but that is simply not true.
Firstly and most importantly, the food literally left me with a bad taste in my mouth that could only be cleansed with a generous helping of frozen yogurt afterward. Not all of it was bad, but what was bad was really bad and expensive, which makes inexcusable.
I got the chicken and potatoes, the ravioli, and the chips to share. The chips were expensive for what they were, but non offensive, mixing salty and sweet. The ravioli was creative with a mix of apples vinaigrette and ravioli. However, one of mine was under-cooked and a little crunchy. It was far too small for the price as well.
The chicken and potatoes, [fry] was the horrible dish I wish I could un-eat. It was overly salted and overly spiced. The dark meat chicken (something the menu didn't seem important enough to mention) was salted, the gravy poured on top was salted, and the fries were salted. I got a piece of muscle or gristle that I had to spit out. It cost me eight dollars, but I could not stand to finish the salty soggy mess it turned into five minutes after being served.
I ordered the chicken and potatoes admittedly with little understanding of what it actually was. That is because the menu is pretentious and resembles a page from a food livejournal trying way too hard. It seems inexpensive until you realize that they expect you to order multiple overpriced small dishes and make you pay for bread. As reflected above, it is hard to tell what you're actually ordering from the menu. I didn't realize how truly terrible my order was for my body (fries were billed as potatoes, the chicken was fried dark meat) until it arrived drenched in gravy.
The service was okay, but I couldn't really hear much of what our waiter was saying because of all the noise in this cramped dining room space. The hostess was rather abrupt, but they were busy. I found the decorations were nice.
Still, what irked me the most was the price. Comparatively priced restaurants will include free bread or a salad, and wait for it . . . good food with decent portions. I could spend the same amount in Ann Arbor and get an actually delicious meal with an appetizer at almost any restaurant on Main Street. And that's part of the issue. Restaurants in Ann Arbor are forced to provide value for their prices, but Red Haven, because it has been billed as the one "gourmet" restaurant in East Lansing, seems to be getting away with being pretentious without substance due to the perceived "lack" of competition.
And the funniest thing is that there are better, cheaper, restaurants five minutes away. Go to Sansu. Get a Bento-Box with free salad and miso soup for half the price. Go to Sultan's. They do not charge you five dollars for their warm delicious endless bread. Whatever you do, save your money and don't go to Red Haven. read more