The Firefly Restaurant & Bar

A pleasant surprise for a Hotel based restaurant. we would go back when in the area. Local Sea Bass, lettuce wrap, Brussels sprouts, flourless desert were all good and worth the price.

Not the greatest. We are staying at the hotel, and nothing else was open within walking distance being that it was New Year’s Day. So much was wrong with this place. Soggy buns on a $ 17 burger. Lemonade that was so watered do, it tasted like dish water. The convenience is not worth the price. Get in your car and find somewhere else to eat.

Hotel sports bar and restaurant with fine dining prices. I wouldn’t drive more then five minutes to get here. Food is good but for the prices the ambiance is lacking. No booths.

Good food! Small menu. Small place. But, great ambiance with live music outside to enjoy. Not convenient to have to walk to another building to use the restroom though.

Nik is my new, favorite bartender. He is WORLD CLASS! I am a proud martini snob, with totally unreasonable expectations when it comes to making this quintessential cocktail. Nik is the one and only bartender which not only nailed it, but got it right in part, by asking me how I like it.
1) After asking what the house gin was and noting my grimace, he went through the list of the usual suspects. He then introduced me to a locally distilled gin, which was different and great.
2) After I asked for it ‘dry’ he asked «How dry?»
3) He asked if I’d like olives; not assuming yes or no or twist.
4) Because he knew I wanted it ‘up’ and ‘dry’ HE STIRRED IT instead of shaking the buhjeezus out of it, like most show-​boating bartenders.
5) Most importantly, he explained what he was doing and why to a trainee to ensure a continuation of quality.
Nik, you are the best. I would stay at The Dana again, just to have this great experience again.
Finally, the only reason I’m not giving The Firefly 5 stars is because the food was mediocre. The pan fried brussel sprouts were surprisingly good. The asian pork lettuce wrap was overcooked and tasted ‘off.’ Not Nik’s fault.

Service was good. Food was poor. Calamari was burnt and chewy. The seabass was overcooked and very dry. Kids Mac and cheese was straight out of the box and crème brûlée lacked flavor.

No star would be even better. I can’t speak to the quality of the food since we never were able to actually order. Long story short~We were staying at The Dana and thought we’d give the breakfast a try. We were seated promptly — but once seated it was like we didn’t exist. It was not busy at all and we saw plenty of wait staff wondering around cleaning etc. We waited 15 minutes and left.

My husband and I had three meals from here and all of which were terrible. Our first meal was Friday happy hour and we waited at least an hour for one round of drinks and an appetizer. We ordered the Duck tacos which were dry and the hummus. The carrots on the hummus plate were slimy and disgusting. The service was awful as we had to wait long again for a second drink and long to get our check.
The second meal was Friday night dinner delivered to our room. We ordered a bottle of wine, a Hendricks martini, the Sea Bass and the Linguini Sausage and two orders of the Crème Brûlée. When we got the martini it was a well vodka martini, the sea bass was as dry as can be and the linguini barely had any sausage and the pasta was all stuck to its self. The «Crème Brûlée» had no custard texture like it should, it was more of a bread pudding and the flavor was awful.
The third meal was Saturday night which we had in the restaurant and again the service was as slow as can be. We ordered the Chicken with gnocchi and the Beef Spare Ribs. The chicken was so dry and the gnocchi was some how dry yet oily. The Spare Ribs were cooked well but the sauce was way too salty and the mashed potatoes had some sort of green oil in them that made them taste awful.
We spent hundreds of dollars on food that was not finished because of one reason or another and the worst service I have ever experienced. I have included pictures of all the food we got. There was no reason for the slow service either as the restaurant was not busy and they had plenty of staff walking around.
I gave one star because I had to.

The service was great! Daniel was attentive and friendly. The food could have been good, but was poorly executed. The brussel sprouts were bland, nothing like the ones at Stone. The short ribs were not tender at all! I had a tough time sawing through them with my knife. The flavor was good, especially with the parsnip purée.

We’ve eaten here twice and love it! The service is great, the food is incredible, and the prices are reasonable. (Dinner for 2, with coffee, dessert, and a drink each was $ 80.) I am lactose intolerant and the chef even made me a dessert that wasn’t on the menu to accommodate me. Highly recommended!

This place was decent. I dined here twice while staying at the Dana hotel, once for breakfast and once for dinner. Breakfast was your pretty standard fare, nothing to write home about. I got eggs, toast and potatoes with a mimosa. The toast was gross and they only have white bread. The eggs and potatoes were decent. For dinner I had the burrata as an app with the lentil kale salad for dinner. Vegetarians beware! There are no vegetarian options as a main entrée. The salad and burrata was good.
The restaurant overall had excellent service (that’s too be expected at a hotel restaurant), but the food was so-​so.

This place sucks the service is horrible the bread is rock hard and the people are weird

Honestly, for my family of four, this restaurant was cheaper than eating at Sea World!!!
The Sea Bass with mushroom risotto was to die for. It was the best risotto, I have ever tried.
The kids meal cheeseburger is also very large and beefy! That kids meal costs $ 8, but we had a hotel coupon for a free kids meal. So that was quite nice :)
I also recommend the children’s menu chocolate chip cookies desert. You get three warm and goey cookies that are giant. You also have the option of it coming with vanilla Ice cream covered with blueberries. Really great dessert for sharing ;)
Another thing I liked was that they offer sodas for $ 2 and I hate it when restaurants charge $ 3 or more for a soda. This was a nice surprise when I got my bill.
Tomorrow we shall try the breakfast buffet.

First experience I had here a year ago was horrible. I figured it’s been a year try it again with me and my 7 other family members but once again service was horrible and no employee had a smile or was courteous. My family and I are very kind and courteous so it’s not like we are those picky rude people that im sure they get. So for them to be like that with us is very poor for business because alot of people even the hotel the dana mission Bay hotel staff which I am staying at told me not to eat at the firefly that’s just sad and I still went well now I’m the dumb one. Wish the pearl they use to have was still open great place to eat when staying at the hotel.

Ate here twice while staying at The Dana, the food was good, probably would have tasted better if it weren’t so expensive… Felt cheated on portion size. Maybe this could be remedied by making the kids menu cheaper? Kraft Mac and Cheese shouldn’t cost so much. Even the hotel’s «coupons» only gave a 10% discount if you ate there during off peak hours. My drink on the other hand was strong, large and reasonably priced :)
Service was friendly but not memorable, so I guess that is a good thing? If I stayed at The Dana again, I would only come here for appetizers and drinks.

There aren’t a whole lot of dining options in the immediate Dana Point area, so I was somewhat skeptic for a Monday lunch at this hotel restaurant with my family. The Firefly really positively surprised me!
The service got off to a rough start — took unnecessarily long to flag down a server at our outside table. But it was smooth sailing from there. They have a pretty good on tap selection — unfortunately they were out of my first choice (30^th St Pale Ale, Green Flash), so I had a Hired Hand (Iron Fist Brewing Co) pint instead. It was tasty. For food, I had fish and chips myself and my kid had spaghetti. Plentiful and tasty portions.
They have a weekday happy hour for brews (and cocktails?), along with a different special each weekday. For example, on Mondays they have $ 5 appetizers that are awesome and generously sized for sharing.
Totally worth a visit to The Firefly if you’re in the area.

Blah food! Service was ok! I went with 3 friends and my husband and neither of us were impressed.

The clam chile was solid but the Brussels sprouts were way to salty and greasy. I had to rinse them in water just to consume them. After the meal, I called to have the tray picked up from the associated hotel room, and the person completely forgot. I had to call again in 3 hours to get the dirty dishes picked up. There is definitely something that needs a bit of tweaking here.

This place was pretty good I truly enjoyed it.
I got the see bass with the wild mushroom risotto. The view is a 5 star. The only reason I gave it 4 is because my fish was a smidgen over cooked and the risotto was a hair under cooked. Other wise service was amazing and the place over all was great

2.5 stars
The food was good. We had the calamari and Brussels sprouts for appetizers and I had the scallops which were delicious. Our server also made some pleasing wine choices for us.
However, the before and after part of the meal is where the review starts losing stars. Word to the wise, if you make a reservation using OpenTable as I did, make sure to indicate whether you want to sit inside or outside. When we arrived for our reservation, the hostess asked us what we preferred. Since it was chilly, we chose inside and she said, oh, we don’t have anything available. I told her I had a reservation and she said that I didn’t indicate which I wanted. There isn’t a choice to do that! She said, yeah, the website isn’t too clear about that.
We sat outside at a fire pit which turned out ok except she also let someone wait at our fire pit with us while he waited for his table. Um, what is that? Our first server was fantastic. She left for the night and the server who took her place was not.
Also, in my OpenTable notes I requested the check be brought to me since we were entertaining friends. The hostess acknowledged this and yet, our request was not granted and it turned into an awkward moment when all we wanted was to have the check taken care of for our friends without arguing over who was going to pay.
We still had a great time due to the company we were with, but you can get just as good of food and better without having to worry about poor service.