Portage Bay Cafe in Ballard

Friends came from South Carolina. Decided they should enjoy the brunch experience at Portage Bay Café. Across the street from the beloved dive bar The Sloop in Ballard was the closest. First and foremost: at this (and every) Portage Bay location reservations are absolutely necessary. Open Table app is a much easier option than trying to get someone on the phone especially if you're actually doing the same-day reservation. You'll always get voicemail. They're just that busy. Went an hour and a half before our reservation time to request a table for eight at 1:30PM. We arrived 10 minutes before our reservation and checked in to make sure everything was tracking. Fast-forward: it would actually be another 35 minutes before we would get to sit down. I share this because as I was leaving I heard another couple say they were 25 minutes behind their reservation. If you regularly go to Portage Bay Cafés across the city, you know that a longer wait is not unusual (but it's helpful to know if you aren't accustomed). But here's how we managed that time delay in that neighborhood. We had four kids between the ages of four and 11 so we decided to take a walk down the block to visit the Danbo troll in front of the Nordic Heritage museum. A great place to pause for photos. Then, what is not as well known is that there is a cool full-size labyrinth behind back. So we went around back through the parking lot to the back entrance to explore another great PNW tradition: the walking labyrinth. We and the kids walked the labyrinth -- turned out to be a super cool experience that the kids took to right away. They had never done one before. We had a hard time pulling them away and had to suggest we return maybe after our lunch. At 90 minutes on the dot we went back to the restaurant and we were told they were waiting for one table to get up so that we could be seated together. Due to no fault of the staff another 25 minutes passed. At that point a couple in our party indicated they might have to leave... because they were not sure there would be time to for them to sit and eat their meal once they had ordered bc they had to get to their next commitment. I mentioned this to the host/hostess team and they sincerely apologized because they realized it had been quite a while. Luckily with fresh turnover they were able to offered us the option to sit outside. That actually suited us well because it gets pretty loud inside, and when kids are hungry and overstimulated it's nice to be in the open air. We indicated we were happy to sit in the fresh air. We were offered blankets to help with warmth. The outside seats have umbrellas to keep you dry which was helpful since it was drizzling a bit bit today. We had our orders all ready to go and placed them immediately. And they came out with in 10 minutes! The kitchen was very prompt; our server Erin understood our situation and was great about taking our orders immediately and bringing everything out as quickly as possible. What was also great was the kids took to climbing on the squid bike rack that is in front of the restaurant and that kept them occupied for the 25 minute delay. Then they had a field day visiting the breakfast bar with their pancakes. They came back with their plates loaded: fresh strawberries, fresh blueberries, fresh raspberries, chocolate chips, fresh whip cream… It was like heaven. The pancakes came out as Mickey Mouse w/ the ears, and the kids appreciated that because they had been to Disney World earlier in the year. That pancake is a great excuse to get kids to eat fresh berries. With the adults the grapefruit and orange mimosas were very popular. Eggs Benedict is my traditional go to for breakfast or brunch but here they have something called the Seattle Benedict. Two of us ordered Seattle Benedict because the base is crab meat. The Huevos Rancheros came out tasting great with chorizo. We ordered some bacon and sausages on the side, maple pork sausages. The bacon had some nice pepper on it which I loved. The kids inhaled the pork sausages.

The hosts/hostesses were a joy! Had an overall good experience, but unfortunately the food has gone a little downhill. The famous v/gf banana pancakes aren't what they used to be! And my friends Buddha bowl dressing did not have enough salt. Sad!

Busy place but absolutely great brunch with amazing service. I honestly could have married our server, Andrew. He was so incredibly friendly, helpful, attentive, and witty!!

Rude staffing

Came for the first time ever this Saturday for a late brunch. Patiently awaiting, I checked in early seeing the line and was told a wait of 35minutes. Walked around the locks for 40 min. When I came back, an extremely passive aggressive front of house mouthed me off stating another 15. The same front of house host (named Estelle) obviously had a personal problem with my group and I. As we ended up waiting over an hour, we witnessed extreme unprofessionalism by staff member Estelle including blatant stares, unpleasant remarks and obvious moving down the reservation list. Beyond this experience. The food was amazing. The avocado toast with poached egg was great and the rest of the service staff were absolutely amazing. This is an amazing restaurant yet I hesitate to recommend until the host staff are changed.