Open: Sunday-Thursday 5:00-9:00, Friday 5:00-11:00; also serving Sunday brunch from 10:00-2:00.
Reservation required? Recommended. Click below to reserve a table:
Last barlinwine.com visit: 2011
Directions:
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The Meal:
We don't normally make it too far north in Napa for dinner but on our last visit we spent a night in Calistoga and decided to check out JoLe. Billed as Calistoga's best restaurant, JoLe is run by husband and wife, chef and pastry chef Matt and Sonija Spector who are transports from Philadelphia where they previously owned a successful restaurant.
The menu features a variety of small plates perfect for sharing or for eating in multiple courses. The plates are served a la carte or $50 for four courses, $65 for five or $80 for six courses. We shared a table of four with friends Jamie and Tim Smith after many healthy pours at Larkmead's release party so we decided to share a selection of plates. We opted for the Greg Barlin “food draft” option and each selected two dishes for the table one-by-one. As Greg describes it, “just like a fantasy draft, each 'player' (food item) can only be selected by one person. To keep things simple, we’ll continue with the same draft order in Round 2 rather than using a snake draft.” I have no idea what he was talking about, but we proceeded to rotate around the table with our selections and ended up with a nice mix of meat, seafood, and eclectic dishes. The menu changes often, but the items are consistently farm-to-table and fresh with selections like Grilled Cauliflower with dates, Marcona almonds, and chorizo; Pork Croquettes with a mustard vinaigrette; and Lamb Neck Stew with potato gnocchi.
The atmosphere at JoLe is chic yet comfortable. We had a table in the front window facing the street which was great. The four of us had a nice leisurely meal with courses brought out as they were ready, and we paired the food with carry-in bottles of Viognier and Cabernet from Lava Vine. We finished and waited around for a while, enjoying our conversation. Our waiter eventually came by and suggested dessert. We took him up on the offer and split a couple of house specialties. The food and atmosphere were excellent up to this point…but then things took a turn for the worse.
Out of nowhere, the maitre'd came by and told us that they had people waiting and asked if we would mind moving to the bar where they would be happy to buy us a drink. What?!? I wasn't totally offended and could understand as it was a busy Saturday night and offering to buy us a drink was nice. But the thing that offended the rest of our group was the delivery of the message (“just to let you know there are people waiting for this table…”) but mostly that the service up to that point had been VERY methodical, especially down the stretch. We probably waited 15 minutes between the time we finished our last course and the time our waiter came by with dessert menus, and now they’re ushering us out the door? If we'd been told when we sat down (or even partway through the meal) that they needed the table at a certain time, we would have made sure to pace our meal accordingly. It put a damper on an otherwise positive experience and so we just got up and left.
That snafu aside, the rest of the experience at JoLe was quite good, and I imagine that we were part of a rare poor decision at an otherwise very professional establishment. I'd be up for trying JoLe again if we stay in the area.
Ratings (out of 5):
The menu features a variety of small plates perfect for sharing or for eating in multiple courses. The plates are served a la carte or $50 for four courses, $65 for five or $80 for six courses. We shared a table of four with friends Jamie and Tim Smith after many healthy pours at Larkmead's release party so we decided to share a selection of plates. We opted for the Greg Barlin “food draft” option and each selected two dishes for the table one-by-one. As Greg describes it, “just like a fantasy draft, each 'player' (food item) can only be selected by one person. To keep things simple, we’ll continue with the same draft order in Round 2 rather than using a snake draft.” I have no idea what he was talking about, but we proceeded to rotate around the table with our selections and ended up with a nice mix of meat, seafood, and eclectic dishes. The menu changes often, but the items are consistently farm-to-table and fresh with selections like Grilled Cauliflower with dates, Marcona almonds, and chorizo; Pork Croquettes with a mustard vinaigrette; and Lamb Neck Stew with potato gnocchi.
Out of nowhere, the maitre'd came by and told us that they had people waiting and asked if we would mind moving to the bar where they would be happy to buy us a drink. What?!? I wasn't totally offended and could understand as it was a busy Saturday night and offering to buy us a drink was nice. But the thing that offended the rest of our group was the delivery of the message (“just to let you know there are people waiting for this table…”) but mostly that the service up to that point had been VERY methodical, especially down the stretch. We probably waited 15 minutes between the time we finished our last course and the time our waiter came by with dessert menus, and now they’re ushering us out the door? If we'd been told when we sat down (or even partway through the meal) that they needed the table at a certain time, we would have made sure to pace our meal accordingly. It put a damper on an otherwise positive experience and so we just got up and left.
That snafu aside, the rest of the experience at JoLe was quite good, and I imagine that we were part of a rare poor decision at an otherwise very professional establishment. I'd be up for trying JoLe again if we stay in the area.
Recommended food: There was no singular dish that has me dreaming about going back, but we also didn't have a bad pick in the bunch. Very good food across the board.
Ratings (out of 5):
 FOOD | 4.75 |  SERVICE | 3.75 |
 ATMOSPHERE | 4.25 |  VALUE | 4.50 |
 OVERALL | 4.31 | ||
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