Scratch

Reviews 5

NO

Noel Reidy

This place has really gone downhill lately. Its been around 8 months since I ate here and before then I had been a reasonably regular customer. Throughout this period of regularity I was impressed overall with the standard of drinks, good service and nice food. BUT having eaten there last night I can attest to the clear deterioration of Scratch. When I called to enquire about a table, the person on the phone insisted I needed to make a reservation but when I got there the restaurant was mostly empty. Our server had a most unpleasant disposition, its quite clear she was thoroughly unhappy with being there and her knowledge of the wine list was abysmal. I asked if there happened to be a sommelier around but she said the sommelier had gone home for the night (at 8.15pm). The winelist contains zero information about individual wines so I needed to get my smartphone out to compare wines to help with our selection, time that I would have much preferred to spend conversing with my family. We ordered a non-alcoholic drink for my wife and the best the server could suggest was a non-alcoholic mojito (which was akin to paint thinner). Not only did I assume the drink would be palatable but I also assumed they would have more than one non-alcoholic cocktail suggestion.... For food we shared the mussels in coconut milk which were pretty good. The wine arrived but it was a 2012 release (list stated 2009) yet the price was still the same (should not have been the case). Main course was ok, I had surf & turf. The lobster was decent but the steak had nowhere near enough sauce to go with it. At one point I was asked if I was all done, despite having knife and fork in hand, with a mouth full of food. This is my single most hated peeve about eating out, and this did not please me one bit. For the price I paid I expect much, much more and its safe to say I wont be going back. Avoid Scratch, there are better alternatives in Mountain View and surrounding area.

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A

A Private User

FOOD = 5 stars I went with a group of about five people during Silicon Valley restaurant week, and the food was tasty and prepared cleverly. The Caesar salad had a flat crunchy ring of fried/baked Parmesan cheese around the salad itself. The macaroni & cheese (highly recommended) was hot, cheesy, gooey, and a little buttery. (Mmmm!) My oysters were presented beautifully. If you get a chance, get the bacon-wrapped chorizo-stuffed dates - the spice of the chorizo plays well against the softer sweetness of the dates. My friends rib eye was huge and very tasty. Oh, and the scallops were cooked perfectly. I have to give a shout-out to the drinks list. Its possible that in the future Ill come back just for the circular bar, as this place has Arrogant Bastard (along with a list of other very good beers) on tap. SERVICE = 2 stars Oh dear. Where to start. Let me put it this way: We made a reservation for 6:30. We got our appetizers at around 7:30, and our entrees around 8:40. The only good service we got was from the water servers. Our main server was never around for us to even ask where our food was. By the time my entree was placed on the table (5 minutes before the rest of my friends), I was loudly asking "Okay, where the **** is our food?" ATMOSPHERE = 4 stars This place is beautiful. I love the circular bar, I love the horizontal lines of the window treatments/blinds, and the bathroom is gorgeous. TL;DR - Great food, terrible service. Come when you have 3 hours to kill for only 3 courses.

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JO

John Hsu

I have occasionally ordered food for takeout for years now, and I am usually very happy with food quality and service. Considering the cost, the quality of food is in general pretty good (above average compared to lots of restaurants on Castro), but once in a while I see non-trivial but expected variations in quality of food (e.g. different ways of preparing lobster for a dish for instance, etc.). I would have stayed as a regular repeat customer, until however, the last time I ordered a cauliflower vegetarian dish, the vegetable was a bit on the mature side (i.e. slightly rotten and vinegary in a very repulsive way) I should have noticed the cauliflower was black in some areas before I took an unfortunate bite followed by rinsing out my mouth with nearest potable liquid. I called the restaurant and the manager voided the transaction, which is reaonable-ish. But that was probably the last time Ill order from them in a long long long while... unless they can explain what the heck happened to the usually good quality food provided, replaced by unexpectedly bacterially-vinegary experience. Id say out of 15 orders, only about 2 orders have (tolerable) variations in quality, the other 13 are pretty good. And about 1 in ~50 order was when I experienced the anomaly with food that obviously tastes and looks expired. Those are the rough odds from my experience, good luck!

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GO

Golden Rules of Wine and Travel

When I am in this part of California, I am traditionally here for work. Let me translate "work" for you. "Work", in this case, means that I am ordering room service at the Sheraton in Milpitas late at night because I have convinced myself that fries and pizza are an awesome idea, as I have talked so much that for some reason I cannot feel my legs anymore and my brain is mush. Also, I am also going to watch The Bachelorette. The last time I was in Mountain View, I got swept away by a friend in a convertible and we landed here. It was a little miracle to score a table when we did, but we got the last two-top and went at it. The restaurant is modern. It is high end. The environment is also surprisingly warm... or was the night we were there. It seemed that everyone who was eating around us was having a good time. I cant say that the service helped things, but they also didnt hurt them. They got to the brink of too-much-time-away, my-drink-is-too-low and you-are-talking-too-long, but then recovered. The white sangria was perfect for a light summer drink. I had perfectly cooked scallops, which (lets be honest) never happens. The onion rings are magical. Go here. Call first.

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NI

Nikki Hackborn

What I like about Scratch are the booth tables. The menus are difficult to read because the font is small and the restaurant lighting is dim. The restaurant is not as loud as many others in Downtown Mountain View. I will never order the lobster roll again. I am used to the one at Sams Chowder-house (served hot with drawn butter) and the one at Scratch was very small, cold and smothered in mayonnaise. They can be a little weird about substitutions for allergies and suggested that I call ahead, however I am often a spontaneous eater. The food is pricey for what you get. You have to ask for salt and pepper if you find you need it, which I do not like because I dont know that I need it until I have tasted my food and then it takes time to get it from the server and my food gets cold. Oh, sometimes the menus are misleading. On one dish it said it came with "deep fried waffle-cut potatoes" which turned out to be two potato chips. The menu description might sound like you are getting a little salad when you get two decorative leaves of fancy lettuce. They really should call these things a garnish rather than making it sound like they are a side.

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