The Bellows

Really nice place to try out different Whiskeys, The Bartenders are very knowledgeable about the different types. I got to sip on some Elijah Craig barrel aged whiskey while my date was in traffic. We shared a couple of flat breads, we went with the ‘Bianco’ w/​Smoked Prosciutto & Wild Arugula and also got the Prosciutto, Gorgonzola, & Dried Plum. One was on the salty side and one was on the sweet side so they balanced out very nicely. They were a good deal normally 15 bucks, but only 10 during happy hour. My lady friend got the whiskey Burger and enjoyed that, washing it down with a couple of happy hour Moscow mules. I washed mine down with a couple of Whiskey sours on the happy hour menu. Everything was great, good service, good food and great conversation, we will be back for sure.

Great food and great service! My husband and I just ate there for the first time and we’ll be back. The food was perfect and our waiter was super attentive. Go check it out!

What a wonderful dining experience we had tonight. Our server Kyle gave us a top notch guided tour. From the short rib pot roast to the banana bread beignets, he did not steer us wrong. Outstanding service!

Went in July 2015, glad I took my husband here before he passed away, he loved the pâté and I enjoyed my burger. Will be going back again this coming July.

I’ve been here a few times now and really like the place. Most recently, for International (National?) Whiskey Day, we ended up driving almost 70 miles to find a place we could actually get into, and wound up here not long before closing time. The bartenders did not seem to mind anyone arriving so late and very kindly welcomed others arriving after us. That late, only the bar was open, but that was fine with us — we had a really great time.

This place surpassed my expectations! The appetizers were amazing and the chicken Marsala was the best I have ever had!
The waiter was so professional and attentive and deserves to be recognized by management (he’s leaving soon to do his civil engineering degree)
Well done keep it up

I’ve been to The Bellows a handful of times, and by now I think I’m ready to make an accurate assessment. It’s okay. The restaurant décor falls along the lines of what is current trending — the DIY upcycled industrial look. It’s a bit played out by now. The staff is courteous but nothing that blows my mind. The food is mediocre; nothing too memorable.
–the chorizo flat bread is bland
–to pork belly appetizer was not cooked properly
–the pot roast was cold when served
–the prawns were overcooked
–the steak was decent
the only thing my family and I really enjoyed were
–the burger
–the fries
–the paté
–the beer

Been here on several different occasions, dinner with friends, dessert with girlfriends and late night drinks with husband. One thing that’s always consistent are the drinks. Every time I have been here, the drinks are spot on. They have a great whiskey collections. The bartenders are also very knowledgeable.
Dinner was also delicious. I ordered one of the flatbreads. Everyone else also seemed to enjoy their meals. The Hazelnut Brownie is so darn delicious!
I think they are trying to sell themselves as an upscale restaurant, but its not really in the right location for it. Offering valet doesn’t make you upscale either. I have walked in there wearing flip flops and never worried about being kicked out.
Will be back for the drinks and dessert!

Great place. An upscale pub by Cal State San Marcos. Happy hour included a bunch of their signature drinks along with Moscow mules, whiskey sours, and prosecco to name a few. And $ 10 flatbread!
Great place for a group. Staff was very attentive.

OMG! Love it here food is amazing. Service was exceptional. Highly recommended to anyone who looks for great flavors. Amazing
We will be back and recommend it to everyone

Discovered this place quite by accident on a family vacation. Was planning on going out in Escondido with a party of 8 for a 13^th and 75^th birthday celebration. We couldn’t get reservations at the spot we were looking at at a time that would accommodate the 5 year old in our party. So we searched and found The Bellows. BEST MEAL EVER! We aren’t an easy group, we have a gluten intolerant member, a vegetarian, a 13-​year old foodie with Chron’s disease and a 5 year old. The staff met every need we had and then some! My 13 year old aspires to be a chef — Bellows Chef Schular (sorry if I misspelled your name) gave my son a tour of the kitchen and introduced him to the kitchen staff. Quite an event for an aspiring chef and above and beyond on the part of the staff. Made his birthday and he LOVED the banana bread beignets.
My flatiron steak was delicious. The pommes soufflés are devine and the aoli is absolutely fantastic. I’m not a cauliflower lover, but the cauliflower steak was quite tasty. The mushroom appetizer was fabulous as was the grilled sourdough. My son loved his salmon and it was cooked perfectly. Only letdown was the lamb sausage — just didn’t have much flavor and the texture was a bit blah — but hey, one out of all that we ordered is still a very high batting average. Dessert was phenomenal! Again the banana bread beignets are delicious. The dark chocolate and the espresso gelato are amazing.
All said we liked the restaurant so much we returned 3 days later (and down a couple of folks who had to return home). Too bad San Marcos is about a half a state away from home for us or this restaurant would become a regular for us.

Wow! I can’t believe I haven’t tried The Bellows sooner, when it’s walking distance from my house! This place is incredible and I had one of the best meals I’ve ever had. Outstanding food, drinks and service! Definitely the nicest restaurant in San Marcos.
My boyfriend and I had reservations here for 6:30pm once we arrived we noticed free valet parking, which we didn’t decide to do since there was a lot of parking spots available. It’s definitely a small lot though. We got seated right away and decided to sit outside, the patio is very cozy and nice.
I starred with the Whiskey Sour, wow absolutely delicious! Best whiskey sour ever I had to order a few of those. For dinner I started with the salade lyonnaise then the oven roasted prawns, my boyfriend started with the wedge salad then the whiskey burger. My salad was so delicious the egg on it was excellent and cooked perfectly. Next up dinner, one of the best meals I’ve ever had, it was absolutely delicious. The crispy Brussels were so crispy and had tons of flavor, the prawns had a unique flavor and it was excellent and tender. Everything about that dish was outstanding and I will definitely order it again! My boyfriend also loved his burger and salad, he thought his fries were great and tasted fresh.
Overall this was a great time, and I will definitely be back soon! The service was excellent, our drinks came super fast and we were frequently checked on. Our table was also rocking and our waiter tried twice to fix it, he was outstanding. 5 star food and service. They have now gained a frequent visitor!

I am sitting here outside on a Wednesday during happy hour. We got an amazing happy hour flat bread w bacon, goat cheese, onions, etc.
I then proceeded to eat the entire flatbread. It was amazing. Happy hour prices are decent.
I had a tasty IPA and my wife got the forge which is one of their specialty bourbon drinks.
All in all it was a good experience. Nice and attentive staff.

I believe that The Bellows could be a great restaurant under the right circumstances and for a certain type of person but my experience was just okay. I’d bump it to a 3.5 stars if I could but can’t warrant giving it four stars based on this visit.
First, I wouldn’t recommend hosting a large party here. My friend recently planned her birthday party for a group of about 20 people. We had reservations at 6:30, and the majority of the party was present, but we weren’t sat until 7. When we were finally sat, we ended up being at two tables, which is understandable for such a large group, but made it feel like we were two separate parties. Not the restaurants fault by any means but something to consider if you’re wanting to book a large party.
But my main issue with hosting a big group is the restaurant’s refusal to split the check. It stated on the menu that they couldn’t split checks for groups larger than six or eight (I can’t recall). It seems like it would make it easier for both the waiter and the diners to create split checks at the beginning of the meal rather than try to sort through a large receipt and run multiple cards at the end. I would have thought that the restaurant would have at least split the bill per table but no, both tables were together on one check. It must have taken our group about an hour after the check arrived to do the math and wait for the cards to be returned. Our poor waiter even looked overwhelmed at the bulging billfold with a stack of cash and an assortment of cards to mix and match.
Aside from my concerns about the party size, I also don’t think that I’m the right person for The Bellows. As a self-​proclaimed picky eater, the menu was overwhelming. Even a few of the other people at the table mentioned trying to pick out a dish with the least amount of unknown ingredients. At first I thought that I’d try a flatbread and thought the Caprese looked relatively safe. But then I noticed the description contained a roasted red pepper-​tomato coulis and I wasn’t sure what that was and didn’t want to take the risk of not liking it if the flatbread cost $ 15, which is also a bit steep for a flatbread. Instead, I went the safe route and ordered the Yukon Gold Pommes Souffles, which were basically thick-​cut potatoes, like jojos. The potatoes tasted great but I wasn’t a big fan of the aioli that they are served with.
One of the girls at our table asked for a side of BBQ sauce to go with her flatbread and the waiter came back with a fresh made batch that he said the chef just prepared per her request. We were impressed that the chef would just whip up a batch right there but even more impressed when we tried it. It was delicious and paired well with my potatoes.
My boyfriend ordered the Rustica flatbread and someone at the table ordered the grilled sourdough, which I tried a piece of, and would definitely recommend.
Basically, I’d recommend giving The Bellows a try if you’ve got a small group and are a bit of a foodie but I’d skip it for large parties or if anyone is a picky eater.

I was extremely sad after my visit here. I called ahead and made a reservation for Friday night at 7 not knowing how busy they would be for Valentines weekend. I arrive a little after 7 and was sat right away. We sat down at 7:06. By 7:22 no one had walked by and acknowledged that we were there or that someone would be with us shortly to be our server. So i had to get up an find the hostess and ask her if she could find someone to be our server. After about another minute a server came up. He basically threw the hostess under the bus and blaming her for not letting the servers know to wait on us. Cardinal rule of customer service is to always get your coworkers back and if someone drops the ball you apologize and make it up to them… Simply throwing someone under the bus and then give a lame excuse isn’t a good way to start… He said since you have been sitting for a while what would you like to drink since you have been sitting here for a while…
So we ordered a Manhattan Bourbon and Kentucky Mule. The Kentucky Mule wasn’t good at all. It was all simple syrup and lime juice so i sent it back after a couple of sips and ordered a beer. We ordered the Brussel sprouts as a starter. They didn’t take too long to come out. They were not that good at all and were undercooked. The small chunks of bacon that came with them was extremely fatty. For such a nice restaurant i was surprised at the low quality of the Brussel Sprouts.
For our dinner we ordered the Sausage with Apples, and Short Rib Pot Roast. The Short Rib Post Roast came with potatoes and horseradish. They pot roast was extremely tender and tasty. It was rather a large cut of meat sot here was plenty to eat. The potatoes were pretty flavorless and nothing special about them. The sausage and apples was pretty good as well. The cooked apples were a nice touch and the sausage was pretty flavorful and tasty. The potatoes that came with them was pretty flavorless.
Outside of the actual dinner food the whole experience was an extremely disappointing and probably won’t waste my time coming back when i can find better drinks and service at many other places around town.

I came here for one of my closest friends birthdays on a Sunday night. It’s a cute little restaurant/​bar in the corner of a small plaza. There is spacious parking.
I ordered their chopped salad. Not a bad portion for the price. I also tried their burger with the extra egg. Medium rare is best and it’s very tasting, but honestly I wouldn’t recommend it for the price. And they do charge for sauce. if i remember correctly, 50 cents for a little ramekin.
Also, take note that the kitchen closes at 9pm, but the bar is open until 11.
The food came out in a timely manner and drinks come out right away.

Best selection of whiskey’s!
This gastropub offers a respectable selection of craft beers, great tasting food and an amazing variety of whiskey’s that are sectioned of by types, rye, bourbon, scotch, etc. They make an amazing whiskey sour and old fashion, It’s a lot like seven grand in North park only with like 95% less attitude and pretentiousness. A very laid back setting with super friendly staff. Looking forward to trying out more of their specialty cocktails.

For all you Bourbon fanatics, The Bellows is a great place for high end bourbon pours. We sampled some of their charcuterie, hummus, and cheeses which were on point. Also, I had some bourbon mixed drinks with some Jefferson’s Reserve and ginger beer! We even had some Macallan 15 year old whisky neat since they actually carried it. The only disappointing thing about this place is that it took forever to get our drinks. The bar appeared to be understaffed especially with a full house. Not great if you are parched.
According to my friends, they are usually busy necessitating reservations if you want table service. Otherwise, you will be relegated to the bar as we were.

My wife and I came here for lunch to escape the triple digit temps outside. It was Friday and not too busy inside. We chose to sit at one of the hi-​top tables for two.
We split:
* Whiskey Burger w/​fried egg ($ 15)
* Golden Beets appetizer with Goat Cheese ($ 7)
* Pizza Port Trashkannon ($ 6)
* Hibiscus & Orange Peel Cream Ale ($ 6)
The burger was fantastic and large enough for us to split. The beets were good too although I wished it had more goat cheese. The beers were good too but boy are there a lot of IPAs on the menu. Would have liked to have seen more diversity. At least there was one Barley Wine but at 13.9% I would have been seeing double.
I had to dock a point because it was so warm inside. We were hoping to escape the heat outside for a nice air-​conditioned gastropub but it wasn’t the case.
The Bellows is very nice inside however. Definitely upscale with prices to match. I wouldn’t mind coming back to try the dinner items… but when it’s cooler outside of course.

Definitely 5 star on their fennel sausage plate. It’s a little bit pricey but its got a nice hip atmosphere. They also serve Almanac beers (My favorite). At $ 20 per beer I doubt they will be selling out soon. Almanac is usually around $ 14 so $ 20 isn’t too much of a stretch.
Anyway I always enjoy this place I’ve been here a few times.
I highly recommend the sausage plate, it brings me back! Other things on the menu are good as well and worth trying. Such as their little flat bread pizza’s, great.
Its a upscale place and atmosphere, enjoy.
I will put a picture of my beer on Unilocal as well as it costs more than my lunch ;)
Happy eating!