Julius' Castle in North Beach, SF
Continuing with the dine-about-town dinners, MH and I took out two good friends tonight to Julius' Castle. Julius' Castle is located in the North Beach area of SF, which means that parking is next to impossible. Actually, the restaurant itself is quite difficult to find; it is located on a dead-end street off of another dead-end street at the top of a hill. Thanks to MH's excellent navigational skills, we not only arrived early, but had time to find street parking instead of valet parking it for $10 (plus tax & tip)! Score!
Our friends were not as fortunate; they got stuck in traffic and were nearly an hour late for dinner. To the restaurant's credit, they not only honored our reservation, but gave us an excellent table in the corner of the larger of the two upstairs rooms, next to a window overlooking the Bay Bridge, which was lit up gorgeously. This was especially kind since while we were waiting for our friends, several other similarly-sized groups came in without reservations, and the restaurant turned them away.
Julius' Castle was a Zagat noteable restaurant of 2003, when the SF Zagat was still working out some kinks, and I can see why this accolate was not repeated. Kitsch factor was high (a full-sized statue of a knight at the entryway; the restaurant is in the shape of a castle; etc.). The food was fine, but not noteable. And there were certainly too many badly-dressed tourists milling around.
One aspect of the service was offensive: the waiter came to our table with the regular menus, the wine menu, and the dine-about-town menus. He handed out the regular menus and the wine menu, but withheld the dine-about-town menus. We had to call him back to get them. Tourists may have been fooled, but not us!
We all got the dine-about-town dinners. The appetizer was an insubstantial, but well-composed Caesar salad (the house special salad). Entree was either a filet mignon served with whipped potatoes or a salmon patty served with whipped root vegetables. And dessert was a black walnut bread pudding with vanilla gelato. Three of us got the filet mignon, and one got the salmon. The filet was cooked to my liking (medium rare), but MH wondered if the portions were smaller than portions from the regular menu. The bread, served at the outset of the dinner, was quite good, with the rustic sourdough leading the pack.
Julius' Castle
6.5/10
Our friends were not as fortunate; they got stuck in traffic and were nearly an hour late for dinner. To the restaurant's credit, they not only honored our reservation, but gave us an excellent table in the corner of the larger of the two upstairs rooms, next to a window overlooking the Bay Bridge, which was lit up gorgeously. This was especially kind since while we were waiting for our friends, several other similarly-sized groups came in without reservations, and the restaurant turned them away.
Julius' Castle was a Zagat noteable restaurant of 2003, when the SF Zagat was still working out some kinks, and I can see why this accolate was not repeated. Kitsch factor was high (a full-sized statue of a knight at the entryway; the restaurant is in the shape of a castle; etc.). The food was fine, but not noteable. And there were certainly too many badly-dressed tourists milling around.
One aspect of the service was offensive: the waiter came to our table with the regular menus, the wine menu, and the dine-about-town menus. He handed out the regular menus and the wine menu, but withheld the dine-about-town menus. We had to call him back to get them. Tourists may have been fooled, but not us!
We all got the dine-about-town dinners. The appetizer was an insubstantial, but well-composed Caesar salad (the house special salad). Entree was either a filet mignon served with whipped potatoes or a salmon patty served with whipped root vegetables. And dessert was a black walnut bread pudding with vanilla gelato. Three of us got the filet mignon, and one got the salmon. The filet was cooked to my liking (medium rare), but MH wondered if the portions were smaller than portions from the regular menu. The bread, served at the outset of the dinner, was quite good, with the rustic sourdough leading the pack.
Julius' Castle
6.5/10
posted by epicure | 11:00 PM
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