REVIEW: The Table

Wednesday, November 9, 2011

THE TABLE RESTAURANT
1230 Wellington Street West 

Ottawa, Ontario Canada
Phone: +1 (613) 729-5973
Menu (changed regularly)



Type of Restaurant: Vegetarian + 
Attire: Casual
Prices: BUFFET STYLE. Priced according to weight of your plate.
Payment Options:
Visa, Mastercard, American Express, Debit/Eftpos
Hours: Monday-Friday 11am-9pm
              Saturday & Sunday 11:30am-9pm
Reservations? None
Handicap Accessible? Yes 
Vegetarian Friendly? YES!
Vegan Friendly? YES!
Gluten-Free? YES!

RATING:

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Quality of Food: 4/5
Service: 2/5
Originality: 4/5
Atmosphere: 3/5



I had just arrived in Ottawa and my friends Russ and Sara were already eager to bring me out to eat. First stop-- The Table. 

The Table is a very cool restaurant concept that I haven’t seen before. The restaurant offers a wide assortment of fresh, organic food served buffet style, and you pay according to how much you take (based on the weight of the plate). One catch though, EVERYTHING at this place is for the health conscious—MEAT-FREE.

Buffet Style Food & Service
The assortment of food was amazing.  The buffet offers a wide selection of entrees including aromatic vegetable casseroles, lasagna, and silver beet rolls; Indian-inspired lentils, chutneys, and grilled corn fritters. Nothing here is fried. As you can imagine their salads were impressive too. Italian potato salad, cous cous, raw greens, and all sorts of toppings for you to make that salad your own including organic seeds and nuts. Selection gets revamped on a regular basis due to seasonal produce availability.

The thing that impressed me most about the food was their dessert selection. One would think that a healthy restaurant would skip dessert all together... not this place. They have everything from fruit cobbler, puddings, pies, cakes, and delicious cheesecakes-- get this-- all gluten-free, sweetened with organic molasses, maple syrup, and agave nectar. Don't let any of this scare you off though-- I LOVE my desserts and this place definitely hit the spot with the pumpkin swirl cheesecake, and double chocolate cookies. 

Asides from the food, however, this place was a little bit of a let down. Perhaps, I am just not used to this style of restaurant but the service was one thing that threw me off. This place lacks the interaction I usually find so important with restaurants. The only person who I interacted with was the cashier at the end of the buffet line. Made me feel like I was back in the high school cafeteria, only the food was kicked up several notches. I was fortunate enough to have two people who had been here before, but to just walk into a place with no servers, and little signage of how this place works would probably throw the ordinary visitor for a loop.

Don't get me wrong. I liked this place: food was great, concept was cool, but interaction was missing for me. If you are planning a visit DEFINITELY bring good friends, they might be the only people you get the chance to speak with.


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