Cutter’s Bayhouse – a restaurant review

We got an interesting marketing device in the mail a few months ago, a gift card for 20 bucks to a local restaurant, Cutter’s Bayhouse. Actually it seemed like a good idea, a way to drive traffic in from locals who might not normally visit your restaurant. We needed a place to have dinner downtown a few weeks ago and this restaurant was located at the Pike Place Market, so that was close enough for us.

We went to an early dinner, we met there at 6pm, even though the place was half empty we still had to wait about 15 minutes for a table which I thought was very odd. My first impressions were not good and we almost left to go somewhere else. All I could think as we waited was that it seemed to be geared to the market tourist traffic. There was nothing specifically touristy about the place it was just a vibe and a glance at the other customers who screamed tourist.

Disclaimer: There is nothing wrong with tourists. I’ve been a tourist in other cities and in this one as well before we lived here. However, the type of place that caters to the tourist is rarely the type of place that we enjoy.

Regardless of our reservations we went ahead and were seated. We looked through the menu and found it to be fairly limited and not very original. We started with a shrimp cocktail each for the appetizers. It came in the traditional martini glass with shrimp and cocktail sauce on top of shredded lettuce. There were two major things wrong with the appetizers. First, there was too much lettuce in the glass, you couldn’t get at the shrimp without knocking lettuce all over the table. Second, the cocktail sauce tasted only of horseradish, no matter how much was on the shrimp the only flavor you got was horseradish.

The entrees arrived and for some strange reason we had hope that they would be better than the appetizer course. Bryan had ordered the crab cakes and I ordered the seared scallops. Bryan’s crab cakes were full of crab, but neither of us thought it was real crab – it tasted more like mock crab to us. My scallops were over done and tough.

If the food had been decent it would have been a nice addition to the view. If you are lucky enough to face west out the large windows you have an unparalleled view of the Puget Sound, the ferries (not fairies) and some of the islands. However, if you are unfortunate enough to face out the south windows you will have a great view of not only the Pike Place Market, but also the homeless people who live in that little park. I saw several transactions that could only be described as drug deals while we ate dinner. The interior of the restaurant is poorly designed with the tables crammed closely together so as to maximize the number of diners. Typical of places I think of as catering to the tourist crowd, it creates a loud and hectic atmosphere. Not somewhere you can linger over dessert and drinks, this place is interested in turning tables.

About a week after this unpleasant experience we received a gift card to another restaurant owned by the same people. It went straight into the trash.

One and a half out of five stars and that’s being generous…