By Dessa Bayrock (The Cascade) – Email
Print Edition: March 13, 2013
45300 Luckakuck Way, Chilliwack
Prices: $12 to $28
Hours: Mon 4-10 p.m., Tues-Sat 11 a.m. – 10 p.m., Sun 11 a.m. – 9 p.m.
The spot where Bavarian Haus is located hasn’t been lucky for restaurants in the past – two others have occupied the same territory and given up a year or two into the endeavor. The location is on a fairly high-traffic road, and the restaurants nearby seem to do alright, so I’m more inclined to blame the restaurants than the location itself. Unfortunately, I have a sneaking suspicion that Bavarian Haus will soon be joining its fallen restaurant comrades. In a word: lacklustre.
We were greeted at the door by a waitress dressed like a Bavarian milkmaid, which was an odd if logical experience. As she led us to our table, we all realized that the music we’d be listening to all night was campy and accordion-filled. And then we realized that our menus were attached to weird wooden handles.
It’s not that I dislike having an “experience” with my dinner. The weirdness of the situation was the juxtaposition of these borderline-cheesy elements in such an elegantly-set restaurant: high-backed chairs, glossy wooden tables, soft lighting, a tastefully dark colour scheme and chandeliers edging on artwork. I would hazard a guess that chairs, tables and paint job were left over from the previous restaurant. The result was a classy restaurant atmosphere caught in the midst of a last-second theme party – odd, to say the least.
The menus themselves continued the lacklustre themes, with plain printed pages encased in page protectors that I swear came out of my middle-school binder – and maybe it’s just me, but I have a hard time thinking I should pay upwards of $20 for a plate of food when the menu looks like the one I threw together for my lemonade stand at age 12.
Prices aside, the selection was lacking; keeping with a “Bavarian” theme doesn’t mean your menu has to be 75 per cent bratwurst and schnitzel. Interestingly enough, the liquor menu was far more extensive than the food menu, and offered an inspired selection of wine, dark and imported beer, and mixed drinks. However, upon further inspection and the help of a smart phone, we soon realized that the mark-up was astronomical. A bottle of imported Argentinian wine ticketed at $32 was on sale for $14 at the liquor store down the road, and another priced at $60 could be found less than five minutes away at $18.
With such limited food choice, most of our table opted for schnitzel. I ordered “gipsy style,” which promised a bell pepper sauce, and others went for schnitzel with mushroom gravy.
First of all, our food was haphazard leaving the kitchen; with a party of six, I can understand plates taking two or three trips to deliver, but the first plate came seven or eight minutes before the next one. We all sat awkwardly as our food arrived piece by piece, torn between waiting politely and eating while our meals were still warm.
One of the few good features of the meal was the amount of food; plates were heartily set with generous portions. On the other hand, this also worked against the restaurant’s favour. The red cabbage leaked into the fries, the red pepper sauce (instead a largely acidic tomato-y concoction) polluted the vegetables and made the shnitzel soggy, and by the time I worked through the schnitzel the fries underneath were cold.
We ordered bourbon-infused ice cream for dessert, which tasted exactly like plain old vanilla and came at a price tag of $6 for two half-hearted scoops.
Overall, the food was hearty and filling. It was home-cooking, just like the menu promised. But paired with higher-than-average prices and the fact that you can find better schnitzel for half the price elsewhere in town, I’m sorry to call this particular eatery a bust.
Just like the restaurants that came before it, I don’t think Bavarian Haus is going to last long. It’s not the location that will sink it, but the lack of selection and grievous over-pricing.
In short: the accordion music refused to quit, but maybe Bavarian Haus should.
