King Crab Oyster Bar & Grill

First of all excellent efficient service, and a very nice waitress who we tipped well. Unfortunately one comes here to a high priced restaurant for the food, not the service. The ambiance is frankly non existent. For these prices I at least expect linen on the tables. I notice alot of reviews rave about the service and not so much the food!
It was a birthday celebration. We shared the Oysters Rockefeller to start — they were okay — nothing special and over priced at $ 20. considering the oysters are TINY. Then we had the Caesar’s salad. My partner liked it, I did not. It was far too lemony for my taste. Some slices of rye bread were presented along with a dish of oil and balsamic vinegar. UGH. We tried it and set it aside requesting some butter. The bread had been around for several days, I’m guessing, as the crust was like hard tack — inedible.
For the mains we had Lobster Alfredo (no longer on the menu, but they made it anyway) and the Surf and Turf. The Pasta was quite good, just an average size serving. The surf and turf was another story. The lobster was not completely cooked all over and so there were some raw parts — nasty and slimy. It was steamed, nothing fancy. Better like that I guess than overcooked and rubbery but with the number they prepare you would expect them to do it blindfolded. The turf — Advertised as a strip loin, French cut — Well, it was NOT a French cut strip loin as I pointed out. It was more like a large thick hunk of sirloin. There was zero marbling and so it lacked flavour, it was also chewy when it should have been tender. It was ordered medium rare and to give you some idea at least a good half inch of the outside was grey without a hint of pink. Only the very centre was dark pink. Did I say overcooked? The strip loins we buy at the supermarket are far superior to what I was served and the entire plate was heavily salted. The sweet potatoe wedges were very nice except for the two pieces that were undercooked. The vegetables — I LOVE vegetables and go for them first, were so under cooked you could not even get a fork into the carrots or parsnips.
Dessert was the Hazelnut brownie. It was okay if you don’t mind paying $ 8.00 for an overly sweet chocolate brownie (cold not warmed) with a thimbleful of vanilla ice cream.
This restaurant is so over rated it isn’t even funny. I doubt we will ever go back. It’s Monday tonight and there was a 30% off special, so it helped make up for the lack of quality. Interestingly there were only 4 tables including ours with customers, and they were all deuces. (2 people). The restaurant was mainly empty. High prices and NOT fine dining! Since King Street Trio is owned by the same people, I doubt we will ever risk that one either.

The rainbow trout as amazing and generously sized, and the crispy skin salmon was pretty good too though a bit small. The caesar salad was good too. The escargot tower was a bit disappointing. The chips that were in it were way too salty and kind of ruined the dish. The service was friendly and efficient. The atmosphere doesn’t really reflect the prices that they ask but you’re going here for the food. Still it was a bit hard to stomach the high prices even considering that the meal was pretty good.

King crab oyster serves «fine-​dining» prices, yet the quality of food and ambiance is way under the standards. Although I admire the open-​kitchen concept, the dining room is very disorganized with tables of all sizes scattered around. The waitor that served us that evening was friendly, but was not knowledgable about the wine selection. He presented the bread after our oysters appetizer. One main dish was the lobster&striploin.all i can say is lobster was simply «steamed» served with garlic butter on the side. Nothing extraordinary. Another dish, shrimp alfredo, was average as well. If you are wondering between king crab and its sister restaurant, king street trio, definitely opentable at king street trio!

Just had a really nice dinner here. Salmon was very good, but I especially enjoyed the crab cake. It is blue crab meat served with tomatillo chow chow. It is pricey but a very generous size. The service was friendly and the ambiance is nice in a casual and comfortable way. My friends enjoyed their meals as well. A very good experience overall.

I think I just had the best service experience ever! All of the staff members were incredibly friendly at every interaction, from the moment i walked-​in and the greeter spoke to me, to the second before walking out, when several of the staff thanked me for coming, and wished me a good night… I even had another table’s waitress topping-​up my water, that is beyond my expectations! And MY WAITRESS… she was the friendliest waitress i’ve ever had, yet completely professional… so attuned to making sure that I was having a wonderful dining experience, making suggestions, checking on me, offering more bread and so on, that if I hadn’t noticed the other tables getting the same kind of service from their waitress, I would have sworn that my cute waitress had a huge crush on me! LOL
Seafood chowder and oyster Rockefeller were very good, but no one can make oyster Rockefeller taste as good as my mom did …

My wife and I had a great pre-​Christmas dinner here, and it was wonderful! Our reservations were made on-​line quickly and without hassle on OpenTable, and when we had to change it, it was a few taps on the iPhone OpenTable application, and everything was all re-​arranged.
The restaurant is cozy and inviting. The host confirmed our reservation and we got a great window seat. The restaurant is laid out as an open kitchen concept, so we also got to see the food being prepared, and it was very enjoyable Our server Sinead was attentive and knowledgeable, which was a real plus!
On to the food: My wife ordered the Atlantic Lobster Alfredo. She said it was the best dish she had ever had in Kitchener-​Waterloo. Period. I had the Surf and Turf, and it was superb, and included the half of a Whole Atlantic Lobster, great taste and excellent value. Everything was cooked to perfection and served beautifully.
I could not have asked for a more perfect meal out after a hectic day of pre-​Christmas preparations. Thanks King Crab Oyster Bar and Grill for a wonderful evening.