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Spiritland Bistro
230 E. Victoria St, Santa Barbara
Phone: (805) 966-7759

  • Category: Vegetarian
  • Hours: Wed-Sun 5:30pm-9:00pm (until 10pm on Fri-Sat)
  • Price: $10 - $20
  • Serving: Dinner
  • Reservations: Yes, recommended
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Reviews by the General Public

New young Chef starting, 6/16/2009
Reviewer: Richard Olson from Santa Barbara, CA
I plan on visiting real soon. A new young chef will assist the existing master chef. This new young chef prepared meals for our corporate functions and will be missed. I look forward to visiting soon.
EXCELLENT!, 6/9/2009
Reviewer: Gabriela Ponce from Santa Barbara, CA
I work in the restaurant industry and there is nothing better than being attended well. The service was exceptional. I was recommended by our waitress the Polenta with goat cheese with was amazing. For our entree my friend and I ordered the raw lasagna with mushrooms, which too was so good. there was nothing left. we finished off with the raw lime mousse. very good I will be back for sure
Will go back AGAIN and AGAIN!, 1/29/2009
Reviewer: Mary from Chicago, IL
Our UCSB student follows a gluten and dairy free diet. We visited last week and enjoyed every bite of our appetizer, entree and deserts. The three of us each ordered a different dish and they were equally delicious. Our daughter had now eaten there three times and raved about the food. The service was attentive and very polite. We will certainly stop in for dinner each time we are in SB. Oh, just to mention the wine pairings they have made for the entrees on the menu were spot on! Thank you Spiritland Bistro for offering such a creative menu for those who care to eat organic, vegan, gluten or dairy free.

nice idea, poor execution, 1/21/2009
Reviewer: Mike Stuart from Santa Barbara, CA
Have been to this restaurant many times. Will not return. The service is often slow and almost certainly combined with an unpleasant attitude. When you have two people in your party order the same dish - don't expect it to come out of the kitchen looking or tasting the same - or expect the waitstaff to deal with the inconsistancy in a professional and polite manner. Have talked to many people about their experience with this restaurant - all have come to the same conclusion - great idea, poor execution - will not return.

Spiritland Bistro writes: Mike, We are sorry you did not have an enjoyable dinning experience. We strive to provide delicious food with a high quality of service and we are always looking to improve. We would be grateful if you could provide us with specific details as to where you feel we did not meet your expectations regarding the service as well as the food so we can fully address the situation. You can contact us any time at info@spiritlandbistro.com. Please provide your preferred contact information so we provide you with something for you trouble. We look forward to providing you with an experience that surpasses your expectations.
Excellent!!, 11/29/2008
Reviewer: JS from Santa Barbara, CA
Absolutely flawless. Loved every bit of my dining experience and I can't wait to go back!

I Love This Cute Litttle Restaurant!!!
Reviewer: Mich from Santa Barbara, CA
Our vegan daughter wanted to have her birthday dinner here, it was the 2nd time for all of us to try this restaurant. My husband and I are not vegan. We all had a fabulous meal. Everything was beautifully presented and delicious. The desserts were wonderful. The service was top notch, a definite improvement from the first time we were there a few months ago, I think they are really making an effort to improve the service and it showed. They also have a good wine list. We will definitely return soon.
Great Experience!
Reviewer: Mary from Santa Barbara, CA
We walked in for dinner on a Wednesday night. Everything was wonderful! We were seated right away, asked what kind of water we wanted -- nothing was pushed on us at all, and we drank the free filtered. I ordered a glass of wine and my fiance just drank water all night. A basket of bread came next -- yummy warm bread with olive oil and vinegar dipping plate. I ordered the beat and butternut squash salad to start, and fiance ordered the caesar salad. So delish! I ordered the mussaka and he ordered the stuffed salmon. Everything was excellent. WE decided against dessert (even though the choices looked amazing), but they did bring small pieces of candied ginger with the bill, and let me taste one of their tonics for free. Will definately be back again. Thanks!

First and Last Visit
Reviewer: Christina from San Francisco
When I saw an ad for this restaurant I was very excited to try it out. My husband and I dined there once and were disappointed. The restaurant seems pretty run down for "fine dining" and the food and service were terrible. When we were seated by the someone who identified himself as the manager, he only gave us a wine list and no menus. Neither of us were drinking, so we sat there for 5 minutes until the manager came back to take our wine order, which I thought was odd, because wine is supposed to compliment food, and if you don't know what type of food you're ordering, then what's the point of ordering wine? The manager seemed irked we were not ordering wine, and did not have the best bedside manner. He wasn't exactly rude, just lacking in customer service/people skills. The appetizer was just OK. I had a salmon special that was way overcooked and dry. The vegetables were supposed to be cooked but were still almost raw. My husband also had overcooked fish and runny mashed potatoes that seemed like they were made from a box. We could not eat our food. Needless to say, we skipped dessert.

Spiritland Bistro writes: Christina, we are sorry you had an unpleasant experience at Spiritland Bistro. We strive to provide the best in local organic food and helpful, knowledgeable service. We would like to get additional feed-back from you regarding the short-comings you perceived in our food and service. Please contact us at info@spiritlandbistro.com so we can look into addressing matters and hopefully convincing you to give us another try.
DO NOT go here unless you have all day to wait...
Reviewer: Jennifer from Santa Barbara
After waiting an hour for two sandwiches we finally had to let them know we needed our lunches to go, after waiting another 20 minutes for them to pack it up for us we got back to our office and realized they messed up our order and the portions were miniscule. The service was unbelievably slow, they didn't seem to care and didn't even appologize!
Best Vegan Dessert Ever! Best Milkshake! So-So Entree
Reviewer: A Teague from Los Angeles, CA
Based on other reviews, we tried the Spiritland Bistro on our recent getaway to Santa Barbara and had a pleasant experience. Entrees were $16-$25. They offer a more organic upscale dining experience than the usual hippie Vegan/Organic casual places. The food presentation is artistic. The restaurant is small but sweet in the decor. Our waitress was very accomodating and friendly. The Asian stir fry entree I had was very average (as a Vegan I don't consider cutting up tofu and putting it with vegetables and rice Vegan cooking as there is so much more to being Vegan than baked tofu), however, I will say that I had the best Vegan chocolate cake of my life there! And my boyfriend thought the milkshake he had was the best ever - so this romantic little hideaway gets an A+ for sweets. Pros: Best Vegan Dessert Ever! Best Milkshake! Charming atmosphere. Friendly & Very Attentive Waitstaff Cons: Vegan Entree was very average

Excellent food - AWFUL service
Reviewer: Chris from Santa Barbara
Reading previous reviews I must assume that my experience was not an exception. I have eaten at Spiritland a few times and have always loved the food. The service however got worse with each visit. The last dinner was just the icing on the cake. I came with a group of my friends and experienced the most pompous service ever. It was utterly ridiculous. From what I read the "bottled water" push is one of the themes at Spiritland. All menu items have wine recommendations yet the server asked us immediately what wine we would like. When my friend answered that she would like to take a few minutes to look at the menu first she was told in the most rude tone that "wine is usually ordered before the dinner". Then why have wine recommendations underneath the dinner items, I ask? Especially if you give your guests no chance to actually look at the menu, including the wine menu. The server then proceeded to rattle of the specials including a desert item that he described as "amazing" only to conclude that this desert was reserved for those who ordered the special three course dinner. My friends and I all decided that this was definitely the last time we would eat at Spiritland, even though we love the food. But given the incredibly bad service we feel we are not valued customers, not to mention how overpriced the menu can look after our experience.

Spiritland Bistro writes: We are sorry to read about your unpleasant experience at SpiritLand Bistro. We are passionately devoted to serve our community with the highest quality & health conscious organic food. We try very hard to educate our servers to understand we are not here to push sales, but to provide as wide a range of selections as possible to meet our customer's different needs. One example of this is water; we provide everything from free filtered water to sparkling water and high quality artesian water imported from Norway. We are probably the smallest fine dining specialty restaurant in town, striving to include as may unique dining needs as possible for the community. Our philosophy is to take criticism as direction to continuously improve our performance here. We are grateful that you took the time to write this review, as customer feedback is the only means we have to understand our server's performance. We would deeply appreciate if you were willing to provide us the date you were in, so we can look into this matter and re-educate our server's inefficiency. We hope that you will check us out again and if you do, please make a reservation with our floor manager Margaret or nighttime Maitre d' Ken.
excellent food, attentive service
Reviewer: Patricia from Ontario Canada via Santa Barbara, CA
The menu is extensive and innovative, with careful attention to options for both vegans and vegetarians. The wine list is also very good. On our server's recommendation we tried a new wine the restaurant was featuring that is really remarkable. We were pleased with all the recommendations from our servers as well as with their taking notice of when to appear, ie to try to avoid interrupting us in conversation. The only minor criticism is that they ran out of the feature prix-fixe menu almost immediately after having convinced my husband to order it, so a bit of planning/coordination is needed for that. I am somewhat nonplussed at the previous review from Al. They open at 5:30 and you were "finally" seated at 5:34?? Four minutes is "finally"? Goodness me you do live life to the fullest I daresay if you haven't four minutes to spare for anyone.

Terrible Service
Reviewer: Al from Santa Barbara, CA
We were regulars when Joel and Gary owned the restaurant and were always happy with the food and service. Apparently they are under new ownership. We arrived 15 minutes before their 5:30 opening on 11/28. Another party arrived a few minutes after us, took a table and were waited on. At 5:30 we asked if we could go in and they told us to wait a few more minutes. When we were finally allowed in at 5:34 we sat and waited for them to acknowledge our presence by bringing us a menu and water. After waiting 15 minutes we decided to leave. So we can't comment if the food is still as good as it used to be. The service is nothing like it used to be.

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