Acacia

We really like Acacia. We always sit at the bar and Cole takes good care of us. The calamari, deviled eggs, monte cristo appetizer are very good. For dinner the pork schnitzel, shrimp and grits are my favorite. The bar is small, but Cole is a great bartender and we have met some great people while there.

Of the four restaurants run by Fountain Rock, Acacia is my least favorite. Asian-​American fusion sort of falls on it’s face here… Great service and enthusiastic bartender. The food is good, but way over-​priced.

Loved the calamari and lobster bisque. Lamb leg steak was gamey and the mussels didn’t have Great flavor.

Why does this place not have better reviews? I always walked by this restaurant and thought it was very small but once we walked inside I was surprised to see how far back it went. The ambiance is nice and romantic and there is patio seating.
Everything we ordered was good. I really like the fact that you can make a tasting menu out of all the times so that you can try a small portion of multiple dishes. The scallops were buttery, the fried green tomatoes had a nice batter and very good sauce, the salmon with couscous and salad was on par as was the steak. The only compliant is that the potatoes that came with the steak tasted like they were reheated from the day before.
Make sure to try the acacia mouse for dessert, so good.

Acacia is a very sweet «white tablecloth» place to enjoy a cocktail and a quiet and lovely meal, with attentive and gracious service and interesting selections. We had a very nice dinner here on a Thursday evening recently. The menu seems to change with the seasons and was chock-​full of choices that definitely fit the bill as comfort foods for a rainy autumn night.
We started with cauliflower fritters dressed with Indian flavored sauce… delicious! I had the sea scallops served on a bed of kale and quinoa, with sweet potato purée and a mustard glaze, done perfectly. My husband had a pork chop entrée which was also delicious… thick, smokey, also perfectly grilled. Our shared dessert was a take on Boston cream cake with a caramel sauce. Yeah… we inhaled it… and found desserts here to be reasonably priced, too. The freshly brewed coffee to end the meal was wonderful.
My only complaint about dinner was the Caesar salad for two… which arrived lukewarm, wilted, and totally uninteresting. Funny how a lovely restaurant such as this, can meet the challenge of presenting well done and interesting main courses, yet leave its customers wondering how they lack the attention to detail to put together a fresh salad for two… on a very quiet mid-​week evening.
Acacia is a neighborhood jewel, and we’ll be back… but I can’t give them 5 stars when little things… like a freshly made salad… are allowed to fall by the wayside.

OMG this place sucks. Over $ 2100 in meals with a party of about 50 people and everyone will spend about $ 1200 here in alcohol…
You would think with such service that the new york steaks would be cooked and not cold as ice… the rice pilaf for the Maine salmon was soggy and flavorless…
And we still have yet to sample the chocolate cake or strawberry coulis…
So far this place blows…

This restaurant has a romantic atmosphere and pretty good food (albeit a little overpriced). Our waiter was courteous and was understanding about my allergies. My only complaints would be that the server wasn’t too attentive to our water glasses and the food took a while to come out, even though we were the only ones in the restaurant.

Duck, Duck, Duck was absolutely amazing. Duck bacon, duck egg and duck BBQ cooked perfectly. Both main courses cooked to perfection! Veal piccata and pork. Apps of Brussels sprouts and another one of tempura squash blossoms were perfect. Awesome meal in a great atmosphere.

Frederick has fast become a Mecca for fine dining. With new restaurants popping up this bistro is a must dine. You enter this place not knowing what to expect only to walk through to the rear backyard patio that accommodates our party of 10.
We ordered a host of appraisers to include mussels, calamari lightly breaded to perfection with a unique dip. Also add the fred dip Au jus. I also has two spicy bloody Mary’s. Best drink in town. Friendly and knowledgable staff. Try this bistro it will not disappoint.

Acacia was amazing. Had the cheese board and the filet. Wow! Also, awesome service by Kevin!
Thank you to all involved, can’t wait to come back!

We ate here for Easter brunch (4÷20÷2014). From the time we walked in the door I felt like things were just a bit off. After we were greeted, we were led off to our reserved table. As we walked through the front section of the restaurant, the odor of the restrooms surpassed the scent of brunch. I visited the men’s room after we ordered our meal and found the conditions to be somewhere between gas station and public restroom at a DC monument. The smell of urine was overpowering.
Our waitress made several tip-​hunting comments. Letting us know just how hard she was working. It’s not something one should need to point out.
As for the meals, the lamb was served sliced and was gamey even for lamb. The ham was the saltiest meat I’ve ever tasted and it was difficult to slice with a steak knife it was so tough. We sent the ham back. The waitress tried to convince us that’s just how ham is, as if we’ve never had ham before.
The steak and eggs was alright. But the eggs could only be ordered scrambled. Fried eggs were unavailable, which seems a bit inflexible.
The Crabenedict (Eggs Benedict with crab meat) was good, as was the regular eggs benedict, once the same over-​salty ham was removed.
The schnitzel and spaetlze was just OK. I’ve lived in Germany, so I’m used to the meat being pounded much more thinly and a more buttery flavor. The meat was tough and the spaetzle was on the bland and mushy side.
When asked how the replacement meal for the returned ham was, our waitress’ body language, lack of response, and immediate turn to serve another table was the essence of our experience. She asked because it’s required, but she didn’t really care.
We live in Frederick and eat downtown frequently. We won’t visit Acacia again.

Me and my wife went to this restaurant on Valentines Day we like to try different restaurants. When you first get there it doesn’t look that grand but as you get to the back the dinning area is nice. All the tables are side by side I didn’t like that but we were seated at a table in the left corner that looks down on all the tables in a roll it felt like VIP treatment we loved it! A server came after 10minutes and poured us water than 10 more minutes later out waiter came. We ordered our drinks and waited and waited. If your hungry don’t go here they check on you every 30 minutes. That I don’t like, our waiter was ok but the food and drinks were wonderful !! Everything is fresh from farms in the area and it was all cooked to perfection. Overall the food is great !

Hands down, in my top 3 favorite Frederick Restaurants. The lunch specials are fantastic also.

This is our favorite place in Frederick, really good imaginative food presented with a smile.
Since we have started eating here about a year and a half ago we have been there maybe 15 times, usually for dinner but also Sunday lunch.
I think it says something that before we discovered Acacia our go to place was Tasting Room, and in the last year we have not been back to TR. Their food is also great but not presented with the friendly comfortable service that we always find at Acacia.
We prefer to sit in a certain portion of the place and they have always been able to accommodate us.
Also they have been great the five or six times I have taken my 92 YO mother there on a Sunday. The last time she asked for a basic omelette, which was not on the menu– but they easily and smoothly handled the request.
Their wine list is reasonably prices although I do wish they would have a night early in the week where wine was 50%.
In summary I can not remember a meal that we had that was not great, with good to great service.

One of my brother and sis in law’s favorite places to go, they took me here for dinner… it was good, yet I’m only 3 starring it.
First off, they hit one of my pet peeves: when restaurants don’t have salt and pepper on the table. I don’t usually use the salt, but I do like pepper! I don’t like when restaurants think they are too hoity toity for salt and pepper. Don’t assume to know how I like my food seasoned! Blah!
Since my brother loves to order apps, we got the bruchetta (yum) and cheese plate. I went and ordered the duck shepherd’s pie, but there was hardly any duck!!! :-(Seriously, like barely any. Very sad.
Acacia definitely hit the mark for dessert though. We ordered two because we’re fatties and split it between the 3 of us. I don’t even really like sweets, but I gobbled it up after saying «ok this is my last bite» 5 times.

It’s about time I move Acacia up to five stars since we’ve been going there quite a bit lately and is always the place I recommend to out of towners. Everything, down to their ice cream, is made in house, fresh and local. You can’t beat that. The menu is creative and delicious. The service is always top notch. Forget the hype from Volt, go here instead!

This place was fantastic. The care they took to make sure we enjoyed our experience here was 2^nd to none. Our server was nothing short of personable, and the management went out of their way to make sure all the guests were taken care of. From the time we walked in the door and was greeted by the hostess, the experience was perfect.
My wife had the arctic char with the pinot noir mash, and I had the lamb shoulder with the pesto and goat cheese mash w/​ratatouille. I had a chance to taste all of it, and while those were combinations I certainly wouldn’t have thought of, they were absolutely to die for. All the food we had, from the appetizer, to the dessert was perfectly prepared and served with care.
I’ve seen and heard some of the other reviews in which they said the service was slow, and I would tend to agree that the food was «a bit» slow, but that said, the care they took in serving up perfection as well as giving us a few mins to finish each course was perfectly acceptable to us. It was about the overall enjoyment, and not about how fast they could turn the table. We didn’t think it was slow at all, if anything, it was perfectly timed for the overall experience.
We will be returning here shortly and suggesting our friends do the same.

Cute little place in downtown Frederick. I went on a Sunday for brunch — it’s definitely not casual, but I’m glad I was wearing something a little bit nicer and not jeans. White tablecloths, cozy seating (could hear our neighbors conversations quite clearly), and the waitstaff’s attire made for a less-​casual ambience.
A good number of vegetarian options, and many gluten-​free or adaptable-​to-​gluten-​free choices. I had the tomatobenedict — poached eggs were delicious, and the basil hollandaise was awesome. $ 13 for the entrée, and the rest of their menu looked to be priced similarly. One nice touch was our «amuse bouche» — little chocolate donut holes. They were tasty, but had black salt on them and the waiter didn’t give an explanation of what the dish actually was, so the flavor was a bit of a shocker for my date.
Service was good, they were friendly, and I’d like to go back to try some other things on their menu. Maybe the atmosphere for dinner is different, but Sunday brunch was nice.

I had only frequently ordered carry-​out from Acacia, when I finally decided to dine in with my family. The place was very welcoming and the owner, whom I’ve always dealt with before, was very pleasant as usual. The server — mmm, not so much. We were seated in the back of the restaurant where it was nice, quiet, and clean. There was a faint smell of old carpet that was a little disturbing, but not too bad.
Our food came out fairly quickly and it was delicious like always. However, you seem to get less food while dining in than when carrying out. Service was just mediocre.
I do enjoy the fusion dishes and that many of them of are healthfully prepared with ingredients from local farms, as much as possible.

It was a mid December Saturday night, we’d made reservations for our meal, but enjoyed a stroll through town in search of holiday gifts. We arrived on-​time & were immediately seated in the back dining room. I admit that I was already concerned as every diner in that room was at least 30+ years older and the dining room’s interior design was considerably in need of an update. We both wondered what we were getting ourselves into.
Our waiter was young and obviously eager to have a change of pace for the evening (especially obvious after the «lady» to my left SLAPPED his hand away when he tried to clear her empty plate!) We asked for his suggestions and let him lead the way. I received a salted caramel martini along with the market st. melt appetizer, which included a cheddar fondu /​apples /​sausage /​potatoes /​baguette bread slices (quite tasty!) Our meals consisted of 1 special, the duck saltimbocca with some amazing handmade noodles in marinara and 1 menu item, the g. maine salmon — spaghetti squash primavera /​roasted beats with a substitution of Mac & Cheese, instead of the spaghetti squash. Our meals were fabulous! The only negative side-​note would be that the Mac & Cheese was slightly over salted. But the meals themselves were inventive and fresh!
I have to admit that date night with the Hubs was a wonderful expereince, and we’d love to make a repeat appearance.