Metro-West Dining with a bit of Ambiance - Ken's Steak House
Written: Jul 06 '06
|
Product Rating:
|
|
| Food and Presentation: |
 |
|
| Ambiance and Decor: |
 |
|
| Quality of Service: |
|
|
|
Pros: Ambiance, Service, Decor, Menu selection, Overall Quality
Cons: Expensive, Limited appetizers and salads, Hit-or-Miss food quality
The Bottom Line: Ken's is a place for a relaxed, yet upscale dining experience and is a good choice if you are having a special meal or hosting bring business clients.
|
|
|
| jps246's Full Review: Ken's Steak House |
If you’re looking for a nice place to spend an evening dining in the Framingham/Natick area, a trip to Ken’s Steak House can be an enjoyable excursion.
It’s important to note though that a dinner here will be expensive and while the meals are good, better food can be had at comparable or even less expensive prices elsewhere if you’re dining on food quality alone. The ambiance is what sets Ken’s Steak House apart from other neighboring restaurants. While it is the home of the Ken’s Steak House Salad Dressing you find in grocery stores, the kitsch factor is limited to various bottles of the salad dressing displayed as you enter. The rest of the restaurant reminds me of an older home – not quite colonial in feeling, but more unique and warmer than you’ll find in most chain restaurants.
Where to find Ken’s Steak House
Ken’s is located on the westbound side of Route 9 in Framingham, Massachusetts, just past Shopper’s World and just before Wal-Mart. It has a large parking area, especially since the neighboring Border’s Book Store closed, opening up the entire lot for Ken’s customers.
When can you eat there?
Ken’s is open for lunch and dinner throughout the week and weekends, staying open till 9pm Sunday through Thursday and until 10pm on Friday and Saturday nights.
The lunch menu is less extensive than the dinner menu, but also has a wider variety of sandwiches that the dinner menu does not have.
What can you get at Ken’s Steak House
Steak, steak and some seafood and chicken.
As the name suggests, most people come to Ken’s Steak House for the steak. Both the lunch and dinner menus have a variety of steaks, with the favorites tending to be the Sirloin, the Filet Mignon and the Prime Rib.
For a restaurant like this, I’ve always been disappointed by the appetizer selection. While none of them are bad, it’s a very basic variety of appetizers than seems to lean towards seafood options and since I don’t like seafood, my options are more limited. The fried mozzarella though is very good – they bread a thick slice of mozzarella and then fry it. It comes out looking almost like a grilled cheese sandwich and tastes wonderful with their marinara sauce.
The soups are limited to clam chowder, an onion soup and the soup of the day. While not a chowder fan, I’ve been told that the chowder is good.
The salads choices are, as you’d expect for a restaurant that invented its own salad dressing slightly more extensive than the appetizers or soups, though nowhere near as extensive as some other restaurants. In addition to a basic house salad, there’s also a Caesar salad, a caprese, a baby spinach, a wedge of iceberg and a cold tenderloin salad. We’ve only ever had the house salad or the Caesar salad and both are decent but not outstanding. Obviously Ken’s Steak House Dressing is used and a wide variety of dressings is available.
When it comes to steaks you’ll find the old standbys – filet mignon, prime rib and sirloin, along with others like steak tips, London broil and chateaubriand. The steaks are what I enjoy and I’ve had a few different ones here – my favorite being the sirloin and my least favorite being the chateaubriand, which was highly disappointing. The port wine reduction wasn’t that flavorable and the meat was overdone and not as tender as I would have expected. The sirloin on the other hand tends to have more flavor and hasn’t disappointed me when I’ve had it.
If you’re not interested in steak, there are several chicken dishes including a chicken marsala, Florentine and parmesan. There are also a couple of pasta dishes that include chicken or eggplant. I’ve been disappointed with the chicken dishes besides the roasted chicken. Most of the dishes are Italian dishes and while decent, are not as good as you’d get at an Italian restaurant.
Finally there’s the seafood selections which I’ve always steered widely around but at the same time, I haven’t heard any complaints from people I’ve been dining with who have had a seafood dish. You’ll find meals like baked scallops, stuffed sole, baked stuffed lobster, shrimp scampi and Alaskan king crab legs.
All of the entree meals (beef, poultry or seafood except for the pasta entrees) all come with bread, soup or a salad and two sides. The pasta entrees come with bread and soup or salad only. The sides include potato (mashed, baked, fries), rice pilaf and different kinds of vegetables.
Drinking?
Ken’s has an extensive wine list, has several different beers on tap (and in a bottle) and offers various cocktails and mixed drinks.
What can I have for dessert?
I’d expect a place like Ken’s to have some very distinct desserts, but they don’t. There’s an apple cobbler, an ice cream sundae, cheesecake and a dessert of the day. However none of them are outstanding and aren’t any different from ones that you’d find elsewhere.
What am I going to pay here?
This is where Ken’s is most different from neighboring restaurants in the area. Expect to spend at least $30 and more like $40 to $50 a person with most dinners when you factor in drinks, appetizers, dinner and dessert.
For lunch, expect to spend around $20 per person.
Ken’s is definitely not somewhere you go to eat cheap. You pay for the ambiance of the restaurant and the service you receive while you are there.
How’s the service?
One of the best parts of Ken’s Steak House is the attentive service you receive while you are there. Waiters and waitresses are backed up by a fairly extensive wait staff and they all pay attention to the diners in the restaurant. Water along with other drinks are refilled quickly and if there is a problem, it’s easy to have someone come over and take care of it.
The overall speed of the dining experience at Ken’s is what I’d consider “relaxed.” Expect to spend at least an hour and a half if you’re having a full dinner with appetizers, entrees and desserts. The wait staff does not rush you and tends to time the courses more conservatively than other restaurants. Meaning there will probably be a wait between the appetizers and the salad and then the salad and then main course and then again between the main course and dessert.
Ambiance
Ken’s excels here. You won’t find any of the hokey stuff you’d find at lots of the chain restaurants. The décor is basic and elegant, as are the table settings and the building in general. Everything is kept in good repair and kept very clean.
More so than the food, Ken’s is about the décor and the ambiance. This is the kind of place you’d want to take someone for a special night, or the kind of place you’d go with business associates when you don’t want to be interrupted by moose singing happy birthday to the party next to you.
Anything else?
Ken’s can host various functions from parties to weddings and offers special function menus to make planning easier. There’s also a lounge and bar that offers the full-menu should you want to dine while listening to the piano play.
Vegetarians would probably have a tough time at Ken’s. The only entrée I can think of that is even remotely vegetarian would be the Eggplant Rollatini.
My thoughts
Ken’s is the kind of place I think of for dining when I’m looking for something that’s a step up from you standard chain restaurants or more basic restaurants. The menu is big enough that just about everyone can find something they like, the ambiance and service is enjoyable and in the end, while it’s not the best food I’ve ever had, Ken’s does offer a nice mix of service, ambiance and food for what you are paying.
Do I go after I’ve been shopping all day and I just want something to eat? No, Ken’s is something I think of beforehand and get ready for. It’s reserved for more special occasions or if I’m looking for somewhere to take someone for work if I’m in the area.
The best example I can think of is a recent one. One of our friends had gotten a $200 restaurant voucher from where he worked and he could only use it once so we were looking for a place where we could spend about $200 for four people. Now you know that no matter how hard you try, that would be difficult at a place like the Outback Steakhouse or the Olive Garden. However, Ken’s was one of the first things that popped into my head and I suggested it. Neither he nor his partner had been there and so he and his partner along with my partner and I ended up at Ken’s. With an appetizer, entrees, some alcohol and dessert (and tip) we ended up spending about $210 without trying too hard and could have easily spent more than that if we had gotten more expensive entrees or had more wine.
I look at Ken’s as more of an occasional treat. It’s a place I consider when I’m looking for something a step above your basic restaurant and what a bit of ambiance to go with my dining.
Final Thoughts
If you’re looking for a restaurant with ambiance, excellent service and fairly good food, consider stopping at Ken’s Steak House for dinner one night. It offers a fairly wide selection of entrees in a more relaxed and upscale atmosphere than other neighboring restaurants. It’s a great place for a more relaxed dining experience and is a good choice if you’re looking for a place for a special meal or somewhere to bring business clients.
While the prices are higher than at other restaurants and the food, while good, is not outstanding, the ambiance, décor, service and dining experience make up for any of its shortcomings.
Recommended:
Yes
Kid Friendliness: No
Vegetarian Friendly: No
Notes, Tips or Menu Recommendations Go with the fried mozzerella for an appetizer
Best Suited For: Business
|
|
|
|
|
- Add to My Yahoo!: 
- Add to Google Homepage: 
© 1999-2009 Shopping.com, Inc.