Cottage Bistro

The food here is quite tasty but the portions are ridiculously small for the high prices. The garlic and brie comes with 4 tiny slices of brie on four tiny slices of baguette, and it cost 12 dollars! I might buy these portion sizes in some for dining experience but not at the cottage bistro. Sad rip off.

My review of this place is based on what you expect from a pub. Clearly it’s not four stars as in fine dining, but it’s four stars as in ‘Yay! Im a fan’ like four stars is described.
This bar has a feel like it used to be filled with smokers, but they recently spent some time doing it up a bit and it looks a lot better. They have good live music come in and it isn’t too loud that it ruins the atmosphere, but rather nice jazz or light music.
You would expect this place to have a poor choice of beer, but they actually have a really nice selection of craft beers and now have cask nights as well (Yay!)
The food is always what we expect. It is pretty cheap, especially if you get the deal of the day, and it always does the trick when paired with our drinks. I like the baked brie with roasted garlic balsamic reduction… but how could you really go wrong with that. The fries are pretty average if you get something like a burger or chicken strips. They taste like they maybe came from a frozen Mccain bag. The pizza is tasty though and the meat and veg specials.
I also enjoy a place where you can play pool or darts and the place actually has room for a pool table unlike some places (Toby’s). They also have a poker room where I know my neighbors go up once a month to use.
The service has always been great, and the servers have always been very friendly. We have always had a good time here. Also a bonus is that they have a 24hr parking lot out back which we have had to leave our car in a few times.
There always sees to be space to accommodate bigger parties as well which is nice! If you are looking for a relaxed atmosphere, with some nice live music (which isnt always easy to find in van) then this is a good place. Especially since places in this neighborhood are limited when it comes to bars.

I went there last night and really enjoyed this amazing jazz performance. I would have given this place a solid five star review if I just sat there and listened to their music.
BUT…
The food, on the other hand, was beyond horrible. I never leave food in the restaurant and I always pack away if I have to but I usually finish my meal. Pretty much always.
But I left food and the shake (if I can call that dairy chunk a shake) behind.
I ordered spicy fried wedges and chocolate milk shake.
The wedges were pretty disgusting with awful smell of garlic. It was so strong and disgusting that my friend started hating (joking) me and they were begging me to take it back to kitchen if I am done with it.
Chocolate milkshake… it is actually insulting to call that dump a shake. If the shakes from sophie’s or white spot hear me calling that dairy chuck «a shake», they will get very insulted. I couldn’t taste any chocolate and there was a chunk of ice cream at the bottom and other weird bland liquid were just floating above that chunk. That was not a milk shake.
Horrible Horrible food.
and I got a stomachache… total waste of money.
Never order food there.

My band played here several months ago and it was great to play in a place where you felt appreciated as a musician (even though we’re just amateurs, doing it for fun). Drinks were fine, the food was OK — nothing special, but certainly fresh enough. Fun atmosphere and would happily play here again.

Unfortunately I can only give this place two stars.
Everyone is really nice here, and I want to like it more. To be fair, they were super busy. Me and three friends came here on a Friday night for dinner.
We were all satisfied with our meals, one of them came out cold, and my friend almost cracked his teeth on a rogue olive seed. Not cool.
We also waited a while for our food too.
Again, nice place, good people.

If I were gambling, I’d put money on the food coming out of a box. It is decent tasting and relatively cheap, but my chicken burger and fries just had that look and feel of warm-​up.
No matter, however, as I usually come here for events, not a gourmet tasting menu. Ideally you’d have awesome local talent like poets (Teen Angst and serious ones), comedians and bands along with a flavour adventure, but you can always just stick with drinks and dessert while enjoying the evening’s entertainment. I have also found that the Bistro has good sightlines to the stage from most tables, and the staff know how to handle a crowd.
We need more live venues for arts in this town, and friendly little Cottage Bistro is doing a great job at hosting them.

We’ve been going to the Cottage Bistro for a number of years, mainly for the live music, and often have a meal while we are there. The place has a nice, relaxed ambience, and the food is decent. We generally go there on Saturday afternoons to attend the blues jam (3 to 7 pm) which is a well-​run, friendly affair, with a range of musicians from professional to amateur, but all are welcome and encouraged. One of our favourite casual spots in the city, and recommended for both musicians and fans of the blues.

So, the first thing I want to say is to be vigilant about what drink they are serving you and to check your bill carefully.
We passed this place lots of times, and it always looked fun as there are regularly live bands playing, so decided to go there with some friends. The blues band were good, and the (ageing) clientele were having a great time. The place has a nice atmosphere.
The service could have been better though. It wasn’t a busy night, so there was no excuse for slow service. At one point, we didn’t even see the waitress for about an hour!
Here’s why I was annoyed. I ordered a high ball. The menu offered single or double. I simply asked for a highball, and chose my liquor and mixer, which to my understanding, unless I ask for a double, would just be a single. After four of these I was starting to feel rather drunk, which is weird as four vodkas over four hours wouldn’t normally make me feel like that. We got the bill and I noticed that I had been charged for doubles! That would explain the drunkenness then! I didn’t ask for doubles, so refused to pay for doubles, which they eventually accepted.
So, the moral of the story is… make VERY clear to the servers what you specifically want, and check your bill carefully.

Come here to meet my general contracter for lunch and dinner sometimes. He seems to love it. I get a sense that they treat their Regulars very well and by assosciation, their Regulars guests very well.
It’s a small but homely place and their bar food is like any other bar food. Beer is standard prices and their food was just run of the mill bar food.
No Free Wifi :(

So say you dream of going to the Copacaban in it’s prime and dancing the night away to the best Jazz in the most elegant setting, well that’s not going to happen in Vancouver. Now say you love great music in a really friendly setting that is affordable to do several times a week. Well I’d call you a genius, want to shake your hand, and tell you to meet me at the cottage bistro. Check your snobbery at the door and you are in for a great spontaneous night. Solid food and well priced drinks, great scotch list, and one of the warmest owners I’ve ever met. Five stars for keeping a unique, live music venue going in a tricky neighborhood. Go for the Jam at the beginning of the week and come back for featured performers on the weekend.

I wish I could have given this a better rating, but it just didn’t deserve it.
Went there on a Thursday night for live music. Music was great, ambience was fantastic, food was not bad, but that’s about all I can say for positives.
The waitress was not very familiar with the menu/​establishment, which I could forgive, however she had to come back at least three times to ask me another question about my chicken burger (it was even the special). She got it correct in the end, but it sure took her awhile.
Everything was overpriced too! My boyfriend was the dd, and they charged him for each refill he got on regular coke. Eight dollars later… I’m sure we would have forgiven this had someone at least warned us…
Then they passed around the container to collect money for the music (no harm there), which I proceeded to put $ 4 into, however it had a «five dollar minimum». I thought that was a bit pushy!
Then when I went to pay, they suggested you tipped 18% after all that! I was quite insulted by this point!
I’m not sure if I’ll ever go back, but if I do I won’t go hungry, and I’ll suggest the dd to get water instead.

The spring rolls are delish! I really like the laid back vibe of this place.

Saturday afternoon jam session and the place was packed. Food was pretty good but come for the music! 3 till 7 every Saturday. Nice variety of musicians that change up every 20 mins or so (including a sax and trombone)

Surprisingly inventive ‘Nightly Specials’ menu, coupled with a standard dinner menu and abundant wine list make for a fun meal. As usual, I substituted extra veg for bread/​carbs with ease.
Came in on a night with a fun event, «Say Wha?» and had a blast!

The only reason I can figure that this place has a three star average is because it was once a decent place but must have changed ownership.
I had pretty close to the same High Ball drink special problems as a previous poster and for some reason my highball did not qualify for the highball special. I hate being nickelled and dimed to death and this place excels at it.
The service was rude to the point of being hostile, and I had to wait for ages before anybody even came to our table to offer me a drink. My water had lots of floaties in it so I couldn’t even drink that while I waited.
The place was almost empty so I don’t know why the service was so slow and why they would screw around with the drink special. I ended up not having anything to drink and the only food I saw delivered to a table was sent right back.
It makes me so mad that the owners would run a place like this, great location, not bad décor, good live music but the food, drink and service were bottom of the barrel.
If I could have given ½ star I still would have been over rating this one.

****THREE AND A HALF STARS****
We must have at least 30 or more places bookmarked on Main Street on our ‘to-​try’ list and this wasn’t one of them. Main Street sure has a lot of interesting places on it, that’s for sure. A buddy of mine who I refer to as ‘my brother’ was playing here tonight so we had to come for a meal, a drink, and some music.
Nice place. Well set up. Fully stocked bar and interesting menu. Reasonable prices. We opted for the burger and beer special for $ 12. A little bit of an ‘oops’ when the vinegar bottle’s top came off and spilled onto my plate. Mentioned it to them and not 100% sure she really got it that it was broken. Got the same feeling when we ordered dessert and it was taking so long we wondered if the order had been misunderstood and then it appeared… MALIBUNANAs. Decadent.
Overall, a decent, fun, and relatively inexpensive few hours out.

First, it should be noted that the night I went, there was a spoken word performance happening, so it was very busy.
THAT SAID… :-(
The food really was sub-​par. The patty on the «deluxe mushroom burger» I had tasted like one of those preformed patties they sell at Costco in cardboard boxes of 24. In fact, I’m pretty sure it really was one of those burgers. Maybe a Safeway box, but definitely had that over-​fatty, over-​seasoned taste.
The burger came with fries which were COATED with garlic. I’m not talking about a lovely roasted garlic hint, I mean big chunks of early raw garlic cloves. I could smell an offensive amount of garlic before the plate was down on the table. Literally.
The rice in my date’s butter chicken had the consistency of glue and the chicken tasted like one of those pre-​formed «chicken breasts» they use at Subway. You know the ones they keep warm by storing it in warm water? Yeah. That kind.
And on top of that, we watched as a couple was seated beside us – about five minutes after we sat down — and got their food about 10 minutes BEFORE us. One of the two had completely finished her meal and our appetizer still hadn’t arrived.
Our server was lovely and seemed apologetic, and we felt bad for her. When she came to take our plates away, and noticed we both left about 2/​3rds on the plate, she gave us the «Was everything okay?» question. To which we answered: «No, not really. It was kind of gross.» She went to the kitchen and came back about five minutes later to tell us that the manager wouldn’t refund any of the meals. We hadn’t asked for a refund, and it was nice of her to go to bat for us, but what kind of restaurant manager actually says NO to that when it’s clear the patrons didn’t enjoy the food!
It’s a tough room to move around in – one big room up front, then a thin hallway with tables jammed all the way down.
I can’t take «It’s because it was busy» as an excuse. If you know it’s going to be busy (this was a monthly event that always fills up the house), you BRING IN MORE STAFF.
On the bright side, their decaf Americano was served hot. :-/

I am not understanding why this is getting as high ratings as it is unless they changed ownership and I am the first person to review this established since the change over. I was here for a Teen Angst Poetry reading, therefore, I can here ’cause this is where the show was taking place and more likely would just walk by it on Main street thinking nothing much of it from the outside. Although the interior was nice and had some charm, that is where it fell flat.
Service: The service was terrible. It took literally 30 minutes just to be served a drink, let alone 25 minutes for appies each. Every time the waitress came over to us it felt more awkward than helpful. She wasn’t doing anything specifically wrong, her presence and the way she conducted herself just made me feel weirded out. She also seemed to have no clue when it came to serving, keeping tabs on the other patrons etc. Granted due to Teen Angst it was a really full house, however, my date and I got there 45 minutes early before show time, therefore, there was no excuse. When we arrived, the owner tried to sit 3 people at a 2 person table and expected my friend Kent to eat and drink on his lap which was rude. He warned us that it would be busy and we informed him politely that we came early to drink & snack and that we would welcome anyone to join us at a full table. We ignored his suggestion and sat at a 4 person table anyway which worked in the end awesome come show time.
Food: The appies tasted and seemed like frozen foods that you would get from Superstore and pan fried. I’ve had nachos and if you’re wondering how someone could fuck up nachos, the Cottage Bistro did for sure. There was less than a tbsp of cheese, the nachos were Tostitos and the salsa watery. You got less than 2 cups worth of nachos for $ 6. Decent price, however, if you want more sub par quality nachos rather than the poor quality that we experienced, check out the Furniture Warehouse on Granville street where you get a small amount of higher quality for $ 5. As for toppings, there were very very little onions and nothing else. We paid $ 6 for chips and salsa. The spicy wedges were Superstore Fries. I know this ’cause I buy them all the time. Their idea of spicy was crushed garlic with garlic mayo. I had a craving for cheesecake knowing that it was Superstore Brand, which seemed decent… after all, it was Superstore brand.
Can someone reading this please tell me why the fuck it has an average rating of over 3 stars? Am I missing something or is my culinary observation too refined for the masses?

This place reminded me of a tiki bar.
Clean bathrooms, reasonable priced beers and the food (asian and veggie) was decent.

I remember the first time I poked my nose in the door. I had a very homey impression. Feels like the kind of place where they would remember your name or what you like to eat.
Tonight I returned for an event. They have a small stage in the front and it’s a very intimate setting.
The game was on the screens until our show started, at which point the tele was promptly turned off and I don’t even know who won.
*checks canucks​.nhl​.com*
doh !
&*^*& – damit!
Sighhhh…
The menu is strongly Asian food influenced with dishes like the braised Tofu with vegetables in a red chili sauce.
It was alright, fresh but not terribly exciting.
Prices reflect the casual atmosphere and I like the mature crowd. I’ll probably be back for a show again, but maybe not for a meal.