Chain Leader

David Farkas

Mixed Review
December 7, 2006

Darden Restaurants began building a casual-dining eatery in Cuyahoga Falls, Ohio, with a Smokey Bones in mind. But somewhere along the way, officials changed their minds and opened, in early November, a lodge-like concept instead. They dubbed it Rocky River Grillhouse.

I had dinner there the other night with Dennis Lombardi of WD Partners, a Columbus, Ohio-based design firm. The polite training crew was still in place, and would be for another two weeks, a waitress tells us. That’s when, Dennis joked, the employees the training team hired would begin to leave. It isn’t much of a joke really, because he believes the challenge for a chain restaurant is when employees who received the first round of training are no longer there to pass on their knowledge.

My initial impression: Rocky River looks a lot like a scaled down version of a Claim Jumper restaurant with its thick wood tabletops, fireplace, fieldstone columns, overhead beams and copper gutters. On the menu, Rocky River offers a Seven Layer Chocolate Cake ($5.75); Claim Jumper is famous for its eight-layer chocolate cake. But where Claim Jumper creates excitement because of its size, lighting and finishes, the smaller Rocky River Grillhouse seems a bit dull by contrast.

By compounding “grill” and “house,” you’d think Darden was emphasizing the concept’s cooking technique. Perhaps it is. Yet, beyond the name, there’s no evidence of it apart from the menu: no billowing smokestacks, display grills or aroma of sizzling animal flesh.

The menu, of course, features grilled steak, chicken and seafood items. Portions are not large, though neither are they disappointingly small. Some dishes, notably steak, offer a choice of a larger or smaller portion--a nice touch.

How’s the grub? A dish of fire-grilled tilapia ($12.75) and an 8-ounce New York strip ($14.50) were both overcooked. So was a slow-roasted slab of prime rib. To the kitchen’s credit, however, it does an excellent job roasting a half-chicken and pairing it with mashed potatoes and fire-roasted corn sauté. Best of all, it’s only $9.

That’s the thing about this menu: Its prices widely range, possibly making it attractive to different budgets. (The place was packed when I was there.) Pasta and chicken dishes run from $8.50 to $15.75. So-called Grillhouse Specialties--mainly fish and steak--are priced from $15.50 to $19.50.

Interestingly, the kitchen smokes salmon, which it serves as an appetizer; it’s one of the most expensive at $9.75. Its presentation needs work. The delicious fillet is merely plopped on a white plate and served with a lemon slice and sides of tartar sauce (huh?) and horseradish-spiked mayo (much better).

The restaurant also grills pears, which it slips into a good spinach salad ($8.25) that also includes toasted pecans, grapes and blue cheese. But a $5.50 dessert, said to contain grilled fruit, features instead warmed-up strawberries and gooey apple slices tinged with cinnamon. That’s sad.

Not that my visit was dismal. On the upside, servers were friendly and outgoing; red wine is poured into big wine glasses; the drink menu features a tasty frozen Cosmo; and employees unfailingly bid adieu to customers on their way out the door. I might even be back.

Posted by David Farkas on December 7, 2006 | Comments (0)