Golden Restaurant Guide

The Cedar House is touted to be THE BEST restaurant in all of Golden but we had a horrible experience when we dined there in Feb 2009. I called to reserve a table for our party of 9 and spoke to the owner who asked that we move our reservation back 15 minutes so there would be 45 minutes between seating us and his other party of 9. I gladly complied. It didn't help. The services was positively abysmal. We ordered appetizers immediately, which was a good move on our part, otherwise we might have started to gnaw on the furniture. Note the restaurant was not full - there were several empty tables. It was 30 minutes before our dinner order was taken, another 30 before our salads were served and much longer than that between our salads and entrees. I complained to the waiter who retorted as he picked up our salad plates, "well, your food is being plated now if it makes you feel better" a comment that was false as well as snide. I also spoke directly to the owner and although I was firm, I was polite. Instead of apologizing and offering a conciliatory gesture, he was defensive and made excuses, including that the earlier seated party of 9 had a fixed menu which made it more difficult (I worked in the restaurant business long enough to know that a fixed menu makes it EASIER to deal with a large party). At the end of our dinner the owner came by to inform us of his grand generosity of taking less than 5% off the bill and lecture us that we shouldn't take the small errors out on his staff. While the food was generally good, some of it was cold and all of it was served far too late and with an insolent attitude. I understand the restaurant has recently changed hands. The new owner best learn quickly or he will soon be out of business. BTW the sommelier was great, but she just couldn't make up for the timing disaster. There are other great places to eat in Golden. Check out Eleven22 and Whitetooth Bistro - both offer great food AND great service.