Darling's Diner

At first glance Darling’s looks promising. Great 50’s coffee shop décor, excellent location, and a wait to get in. Take a closer look and you will see that this is crap wrapped up in clever hipster packaging. While waiting for a table I noticed that they were still selling pieces of different cakes all fashioned for Valentine’s day. All well and good except for the fact that Valentine’s day was almost a week ago. Next, we were seated in what resembled a store room in the northeast corner of the restaurant. The only thing on our table was a salt shaker. All of the other tables had a napkin holder, salt and pepper, sugar, sugar substitutes, and an assortment of jellies. After waiting approximately 15 minutes our server came by. I ordered a bloody Mary and my wife ordered coffee. After the waitress dropped off out drink order I had to go to the front of the restaurant to find sugar substitute. I explained to the person at the hostess stand that our table did not have anything except for salt on it. She gave me some pepper and a few packets of Splenda. The bloody Mary was subpar...I guess I’ve gotten spoiled with the bloody Mary’s at North Third and Silk City. I had the steak and eggs. I ordered the steak medium rare…it arrived very well done and the English muffin wasn’t even toasted. The eggs had an off flavor to them almost like plastic. The potatoes were o.k. The waitress didn’t venture into this far corner of the restaurant very often so I ate most of the shoe leather pieces of steak and one bite of eggs. When the waitress finally came back over to take our plates I explained to her about the Steak and English muffins. She asked why I didn’t tell her sooner. I said that I didn’t say anything because obviously she was too busy to stop by and check, also I told her that if a line cook doesn’t know the difference between medium rare and cooked to the point of carbon, what would be the point in sending it back, the cook couldn’t even toast bread! Then she brought the check… $42.00 for a two person breakfast with one crappy cocktail. I have a feeling that after all the hipsters realize that they are paying for the location only, this place will be closed within a year.

Seriously where else in the city can you go and order Salmon with sateed spinach and mash potatoes to order at 3:00 am on a monday morning. Service is excellent the ambiance is great.The place is so cozy. Most impressive is that its all glass and you can see any part of the restaurant. Aside from the impecable service and wonderful Boar Ragu the fact that a Diner tokens themselves on clealiness enough to have everything in open is beyond note-worthy, its pioneer. Bananas Foster !! A must !!!