Washington Square Bar & Grill, White Bear Lake

With my foot being broken for the last few weeks, we haven't been going out much, but that means that William's been cooking a lot, so we decided (on our way home from him picking me up from work) that we would go out. Using his iPhone apps, we found a place to try in White Bear Lake (15 miles from our location at the time).

Grade: C

We were told at the host stand that it would be a 10-15 minute wait. Their dining room only has about 12 tables and, apparently, they only had one server staffed, so they were controlling the flow by making us wait in the bar. We were able to find a table (for me to sit down) in the bar and waited at least 5-7 minutes before anyone came over. She asked us if we were waiting for a table, but looked confused. I guess sometimes they seat tables in the bar, so she wasn't sure if we were staying there or going to move. I ordered a martini and shortly after it arrived, our pager went off saying our table was ready.

We walked into the dining room where the host gave us a choice of table by the window or by the fireplace. I tend to get chilly by the window, so we chose the other table. However, it had not yet been wiped off. We had to stand there waiting until the host got a towel and wiped it down. (The seats never got wiped down. I had to brush crumbs from my chair.)

Greet time was a little longer than most people like, but he seemed friendly and gave us time to look over the menus after getting William's drink order (I still had my martini.) We waved him over when we were ready and he wrote everything down.

Starter was potato boats which were cold on the bottom and in the middle, burnt on top and had some bad spots. I wasn't going to finish the last one, but the server came over to inform us that the computer system had rebooted for no reason and he couldn't send our entree order to the kitchen, so it would be another 15-20 minutes. I asked if he could give them a paper ticket and he said the kitchen would not accept that since the system would be back up in 5 minutes or so. He did send the manager over, who apologized for the delay and took our starter off the bill.

Editorial: Every restaurant owner/manager should know that technology fails sometimes and they have to be able to run without it. Five minutes is a long time to a guest who is waiting for their food.

When our food finally came, my steak was undercooked and my broccoli was cold. When the server checked back, I asked him to heat up the broccoli. Without saying a word, he left to grab a small plate and held it next to my plate so I could scrape the broccoli from one plate to another. The only thing that was right was my baked potato. The "steak sauce" that was served with my meal tasted like Hormel chili that wasn't even heated up. William had ordered the chicken caesar wrap, which had luke warm chicken (apparently, it was supposed to be hot).

I did order another martini - these were signature drinks and neither one of them was very tasty. The mix of flavors just wasn't balanced.

I ended up taking most of my steak in a box, along with my broccoli and asked the server if there was a dessert menu. There isn't, and he rattled off the dessert choices, then added that the apple crisp takes about 15 minutes to make. If I had known that, I might have asked him to order that before I was done with my entree.

Anyway, we wanted to get home at that point, so we declined dessert and asked for our check.

Would we go back? Maybe. It might be a while, though, and it might be only for drinks and appetizers if we happen to be in the area.