Brownstone Restaurant

Kamloops, BC

Brownstone Restaurant has been on my list to visit for quite sometime but as a family with very young children, we were unsure if it was a family friendly restaurant so we stayed away from it.  We usually dine with our kids wherever we go but on this night, we ventured into the Brownstone Restaurant without them.  But allow me to say something about this before I move on to talking about our dinner experience.  Brownstone has high chairs but they do not have a kids menu.  However, our server informed us that the kitchen can prepare pretty much anything that we would like the kids to eat.  Although it eased any of our concerns, we would still like to see a kids menu at Brownstone Restaurant.  

Now on to the food.  For an appetizer, we ordered a Wild Mushroom Risotto with Short Ribs ($12) to share.  The Short Ribs were delicious and I loved its melt-in-your-mouth texture.  The risotto was prepared perfectly, as it was smooth, creamy and very flavourful.  So far so good!   iLove2Shop’s Butter Chicken ($18.00) was a juicy and fleshy piece of roasted chicken thigh (bone-in) along with cauliflower simmered in butter chicken curry served over the most fragrant fluffy basmati rice.  Naan was also provided.  I had the pleasure of finishing this dish as it was too much for iLove2Shop.   I ordered the Lamb ($29) marinaded in oregano and garlic.  It was served on basmati rice and came with seasonal vegetables (carrots, snap peas and beet).   The vegetables still had bite and retained their bright colors.  I was a bit skeptical about the lamb, but wow… what a great and yummy dish! It was fork tender, slightly rare, and the garlic oregano marinade took it to the next level.   This perfectly cooked Lamb dish is by far my newest favourite in Kamloops.  One of my concerns coming into the Brownstone Restaurant was the portion sizes.  Will I have to make a stopover at a fast-food joint drive thru to ease my hunger?  Not at all, all my concerns were unfounded as their portion size was just right and I enjoyed every bite of my meal and more.

Fortunately, the meals were great as there were some disappointments and irritations that came close to spoiling our dinner experience.  My disappointment was with their interpretation of my most favourite cocktail, the Singapore Sling ($7).  It tasted terrible and came no where close to what I knew as Singapore Sling.  The lime and mint simply over powered the taste of the drink to the extent that I thought I was drinking a pink mojito.  My advise to their bartender is to Google the recipe for a Singapore Sling!!  Our irritation and annoyance stemmed from the amount of black flies that were circling our plates (two of them actually landed on my plate but thankfully, not on my delicious dinner).  An open door by their kitchen leading to a small garden area is possibly the reason for the black flies infiltrating the dining room and if it is not, I hope they can pinpoint the source of it and eliminate this unpleasant condition.

All in all, we were pleasantly surprised and very much enjoyed our meal.  However, we have yet to decided whether or not we would bring our children with us for a return visit.  Lack of a kids menu and the high prices may not be ideal for a family outing. But perhaps, we would return for another mommy and daddy date night.