3731-A India St
San Diego, CA 92103
(619) 295-3939
www.winevaultbistro.com
A highly recommended place to try for Restaurant Week!
I love Restaurant Week, I really do. It gives me an opportunity to try restaurants I otherwise, due to the constraints in my budget, would not be willing to try. But $20 for a pre-fixe meal is quite reasonable, considering the amount restaurants charge nowadays for a single entree.
With that said, the boyfriend and I chose the best bang for our buck when seeking restaurants that fit the $20/meal criteria: steakhouses. And among one of these results was Wine Vault and Bistro. After some intensive research (read: Yelping and comparing the other choices), we settled for Wine Valut because of its high reviews and the fact that we knew it would not be a restaurant we would regularly eat at, due to its small portions (we are big eaters).
I made the reservation for 7:15 pm several days in advance, and on the day of, I even received a courtesy call reminding me of my reservation! I haven't been to a lot of fancy restaurants, per se, but even when I ate at Donovan's/Ruth Chris, they never called to remind me.
Dinner night: we parked and walked to our destination. The restaurant can be easy to miss if you're driving past at night, since there is no lit up sign and it is tucked away behind some walls (it appears to be one of those adorable restaurants where it was made from a house). Luckily, we found it and made it in time for our reservation.
We were seated promptly by the firepit -- they had no other tables left when I called to make the reservation, and I actually had no idea what the firepit was so I agreed. It was simply a smaller, lower table, where my boyfriend and I leaned over to eat. It wasn't a problem for me, but others may have found the position a little disconcerning.
Our server introduced himself as Alex (I believe), and was extremely informative about the menu, gratuity, etc. As it was Restaurant Week, an automatic 20% gratuity was added to our bill. I normally detest this policy because many, MANY, restaurants find it as an excuse to give despicable service since they knew their tip was already in the bag. I was happy to know that this was not the case. All our servers were extremely attentive -- our water cups never ran empty, our bread basket was constantly refilled, and for every course, someone would come out and inquire how we liked it. I especially like how they explained what was exactly in each dish. Among the best service I have ever received in a restaurant.
As for the food - impeccable. As previous reviews have noted, the servings are not large as it is one of those "fancy pants" small serving type places. Not a problem for us, though, as we gorged ourselves through three baskets of bread -- what can I say, we love our carbs!
Appetizer: crispy duck confit and the ravioli. I've never had duck confit, but it was absolutely delicious. Ravioli -- easily the best ravioli I ever had, since for once it didn't taste like it was out of the frozen section at Costco.
Entree: my boyfriend and I both got the prime hanger steak (3 oz). And let me say - WOW! The steak was so tender, so flavorful...one of the best steaks I've ever had. I only wish there was more of it. It was accompanied by a potato ... thing (my apologies for my lack of culinary expertise and laziness to look up the menu), avocado mousse (??), and a ...vegetable. Anyway, moving on!
Dessert: my favorite meal of the day! I had the 3-apple-smith, and it was crisp and refreshing. Definitely felt my palatte cleansed! My boyfriend had the dessert which included the butterscotch pudding - I highly recommend this! In fact, I wanted his dessert instead of mine. I was extremely tempted to ask the waiter if he could smuggle us another one under his shirt.
Wine pairings are available for $15, but we opted out of this option.
Our bill came to roughly $51 including tax and gratuity, extremely reasonable for the food and fast, friendly service we received. I highly recommend this place!
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