I went to Arbutus on Friday evening - with much trepidation - having followed this thread keenly - we sat at a round table by a large window - which seemed to me one of the nicer tables - but I'm not sure this restaurant HAS many nice tables - it feels a bit of a corridor (wherever you sit you end up looking at a wall - and your guests of course - but who wants to look at them?) and very bright - it was fairly empty - the atmosphere was clinical - a bit cold - rather than convivial - the service was amiable I thought - to start we ate, amongst us, the lamb boulangere with dates which I thought very good, the squid and mackerel 'burger' (their punctuation not mine - why, i'm not sure - it seemed a burger rather than a 'burger' to me) which was very delicious (thai-ish) and asparagus with a poached egg - the poached egg did not make an appearance (by my observation) - but the person who had the asparagus insisted the menu stated asparagus with poached egg sauce - which seems very strange to me and i refuse to believe it - in any case, other than the absent egg, it was unremarkable - for mains, we had saddle of rabbit with cottage pie - the saddle was served in a sort of rolly thing (that's the most technical description I can give) but wasn't very tasty - the cottage pie was delicious - but oversalted - a companion had salt beef pot au feu with vegetables - which was excellent - very tender meat with lots of flavour served with vegetables and a clear broth poured on top - really very good - and another companion had lamb with ewes cheese tortelloni - which was also very very good - for dessert we had cheesecake - which wasn't baked (does ANYONE bake a cheesecake anymore?) but unspeakably, heart-stoppingly wonderful - the crust was YUMMY - and we had a parfait - I've completely forgotten what it was - but it was also very good - the bill was extremely reasonable - about £40 each for two and a half courses, an aperitif (a champagne cocktail with cherry liqueur which was a lot of fun) and a couple of glasses of wine - for me, the food was great, overall - very very worth returning to - I only wish the atmosphere had been a bit more fun - eating at this price, it would be nice to be somewhere loud, cosy, fun, wine-stained - it was a bit staid I suppose...
