I rarely write restaurant reviews, especially negative ones. I've worked in restaurants for many years and have a lot of compassion for how difficult the industry is. I also have friends and family throughout the food world, from kitchens and front of house to ownership, so I understand how much work goes into creating a dining experience. That said, our birthday dinner at Matilda was deeply disappointing.
The space itself is beautiful, the kitchen and architecture are gorgeous, and the cocktails were excellent, truly the best part of our meal. Unfortunately, the rest of the experience did not live up to the level of care, warmth, or intention I expected from a restaurant presenting itself this way.
From the start, the service felt oddly tense. The host greeted us and went to get our table ready, and almost immediately someone who seemed to be a manager stepped in to ask if we had been helped. It didn't feel warm or hospitable. It felt like he was anticipating a problem that hadn't happened, which set an uncomfortable tone right away.
After ordering drinks and six dishes, we walked outside to see the garden for a moment, which seemed like a major part of the restaurant's identity. Instead, there was a garden structure with no real greenery, herbs, flowers, or seasonal plant life. In mid-May, in the Catskills, that felt like a huge missed opportunity. Two of my guests work professionally in the environmental field, and all of us are familiar with restaurants that thoughtfully connect food, nature, and location. The lack of a living garden made the concept feel underdeveloped.
The pacing was also a major issue. Our bread and cheese did not arrive until we had been there for close to an hour, and we wondered later if the butter was actually margarine due to the lack of flavor. After we finished our first round of drinks, no one checked on us for quite a while. We waited more than 45 minutes after the bread for the rest of the food, with no check-in, no reassurance, and no real opportunity to order another drink until much later. We were also not offered dessert or another round of drinks, despite being there for about two hours, most of which was spent waiting.
When the food finally arrived, everything came out at once, even though we had ordered appetizers and entrees. We were originally told we could customize how things were coursed, and we declined thinking we'd naturally get our apps first. Instead, five of our six dishes hit the table at the same time. For three people sharing six dishes, the portions were much smaller than expected, especially after we were told the dishes were shareable.
I'm more than happy to enjoy small portions as long as they're worth it, but more disappointing than the portions was the food itself. We ordered the beet salad, pork stuffed cabbage, potatoes, confit tuna belly, and mushroom entree, and nothing felt particularly memorable, seasonal, or restaurant-level in flavor. It felt like a pantry meal you make the day you realize you're running low on groceries.
Everything was one-note and surprisingly uninspired for the price point. None of the dishes reflected the garden or the surrounding landscape in a meaningful way. We were still hungry enough afterward that we stopped for Taco Bell on the way home.
Overall, Matilda has a beautiful setting and a concept with so much potential, but the experience felt like a polished facade without enough substance underneath. The final sign of that was noticing FAKE plastic shrubs out front as we were leaving... In a place surrounded by actual natural beauty, and at a restaurant that seems to lean so heavily on a garden and nature-driven identity, that detail felt disappointing and oddly symbolic. For the price, location, and reputation, I expected much more warmth, intention, seasonality, and care. read more