Daily Review Café

Daily Review is closed. Owner Janice Beeson has been suffering from Parkinson’s disease for the past 6 years. The Daily Review will be missed. Hope some one will be able to obtain it and make it great again. The original owner was Claire Smith who returned to Houston and is the owner of Canopy and Shade. These would be nice alternatives.

The Daily Review is no longer in business. The phone number is no longer in service and the website is no longer available.
They also did not bother to contact the people with reservations for large parties to inform them that they would not honor the reservation.

Great food but SLOW service, at least when I visit there a few times on weekend for brunch. I always seat outside and bike there with friends.

This place needs Restaurant Impossible to come help them. Its a cute secluded little place with tons of potential. Unfortunately, it seams like the staff and management doesn’t care. The owner needs staff that will care and take ownership as if this restaurant were theirs. management and staff… what a disappointment. I’ve never felt so bad for a restaurant. One of the mangers seemed to be obviously under the influence of alcohol and some other type of paraphernalia. Just Sad!!!

I hope all the negative reviews are wrong … I’m not optimistic
(2 hours later)
LESSON ONE
Listen to most recent Unilocal reviews, If the reviews say this place isn’t worth the time or money, It probably isn’t.
LESSON LEARNED.
I won’t write about my experience. It was actually detailed quite well in earlier reviews
TWO STARS I S GENEROUS

Terrible. It is time for Daily Review to shut its doors. What was once a delightful bistro with quality service, food and patio is now an unkempt yard, with no customer service and short order cook Sysco quality bulk food at best.
45 minutes to be served
Twice wrong order.
Bill wrong
Eggs overfried.
No crab in crab cake.
Hollandaise drowning plate
Waitress couldn’t remember order.
25 minutes to get bill.
Southwest egg rolls were good
Lobster tacos okay for canned lobster.
Lots of angry patrons looking for attention.
Five more minutes or I’m walking tab.

Nice place. Very big terrace. But food nothing spectacular.
Order migas and my wife benedicts. Missing flavor.
Didnt like Blueberry muffin too much dough

Perhaps they were having a bad night, but this was a bad experience for our party. During the course of our meal several couples got up and left due to poor service.
The difficulty seemed to arise from a large party in the back part of the restaurant that absorbed most of the resources of the staff. This group was not seen because of their location but the amount of cars gone by the time we left indicates they were indeed present. After waiting an interminable twenty minutes to get our orders placed we waited an additional twenty to receive our salads. Our waiter brought out entrées out an appropriate amount of time later. Drink refills seemed in short supply unless we haggled our wait.
Now the menu is rather good and the meal was savory. The service was terrible. It was a cold evening for Houston (45° outside) and it was freezing in the restaurant. We inquired if the heater was broken and our wait told us the thermostat said it was 78° inside. It simply was not, everyone in the place was wearing coats still.
Another patron commented that he is regular and this was uncommon. Perhaps it is but it is simply inexcusable.
The location is nice and the concept is fine. Parking is okay. Not sure I can recommend to others.

Sadly, I think Daily Review is on the decline. We had dinner here with friends last Saturday night and at 7 pm, on a beautiful clear fall night, there were very few customers. I now see why.
During the course of our dinner, we experienced numerous problems such as raw piece of tenderloin that was ordered Medium, the waiter knocked over our bottle of red wine into my friend’s plate, once the food was served the waiter disappeared, there were roaches in the 70’s style bathroom and the food was bland. Our sad crème brûlée had a soggy sprinkling of brown sugar with no attempt at caramelization.
As for the atmosphere, while the garden area still is charming, listening to the best of the Mama’s and Papa’s and then 80’s showtunes enhanced the past-​its-​prime vibe.

Steve did a great job taking care of us tonight (12÷14÷12). I had the southern fried chicken and my wife had the potato mahi mahi!

We ended up here for lunch because our original choice — Backstreet Café — had a ridiculously long wait. The front of the restaurant is cute and the outdoor space is lovely on a spring day. However, the service was slow and not-​so-​friendly, and the food was a heaping pile of meh. We got their burger with blue cheese and caramelized onions served with «spicy» fries. The blue cheese portion was generous, but the burger was cooked to oblivion. Crumbly and flavorless. The fries were similarly beyond crispy and flavorless. We also ordered the chicken pot pie that the waitress recommended. The crust was yummy, but the pot pie contents were a viscous mess that seemed too heavy on the flour, filled with stringy fennel that looked a bit unappetizing, and — are you sensing a theme yet? — totally devoid of flavor. Needless to say, we did not linger and will not return.

What happened?
This used to me our go-​to restaurant and now I am like well it has good coffee???
I am not sure anymore.

This restaurant is located near the intersection of W Dallas and Dunlavy near a gas station. I always get the Southern Fried Chicken Breast. It is so delicious and it’s my favorite thing on the menu. My sister always gets the Chicken Pot Pie and the Pumpkin Bread for dessert. If it’s a nice day, I’ll sit on the patio if there are any seats available.

I’m seriously over Daily Review Café. I’ve eaten here numerous times, put up with atrocious parking and mediocre service, because I liked their dinner menu quite a bit, but after tonight, I’m done.
I made reservations at 12:07PM for 6PM and specifically told them that I had a Groupon (and to a restaurant I actually like!). We chose to sit indoors and were one of two tables inside. Apparently, if you sit indoors when most people sit outdoors, you’ll get piss poor service and/​or ignored. We were seated at 6:10 and did not receive our appetizer until 20 minutes later.
When we finished our appetizer, our plate sat on the table with our languishing water glasses. Someone *finally* noticed and refilled our water glasses and took away the plate.
And then we waited.
My mom and I ordered the peppercorn steak. HOWEVER, our waitress failed to tell us that if we had a Groupon, this was an item we could not order. So while she served our food, she told us that our entrees were not covered by the Groupon.
Nowhere on the fine print did it say certain items were excluded *except* for the large cheese plate. When we said we’d pay the difference, she said that management no longer permitted this. It’d be really awesome if this was all disclosed when the deal was offered. Furthermore, it’d be equally awesome if the waitress didn’t have the audacity to blame me for not telling her I had a Groupon. WTF? I made reservations specifically stating I had a Groupon — it’s in the fine print!
When I explained all of this, she said she’d find out what they could do. We did not touch our food. During this time, we saw the waitress service other tables. My mom and I sat there for at least five minutes. When the waitress saw us still waiting not eating, she then went to the kitchen to find out.
And we waited again.
My mom and I are pretty patient people. We just wanted to have a nice dinner with each other since we wouldn’t spend the holidays together. By then, we had completely lost our appetite and left our steaks untouched (it takes 10 minutes to figure out what to do — are you kidding me?). We left a $ 20 for the crab cakes and went home. The clock read 6:50PM.

I’m getting ready to just give up on the Houston area — feed and entertain myself at home.
Was served lox, cream cheese, etc., with an ENGLISH MUFFIN. I asked for the menu again to see if it was their mess up or mine (although I strongly suspected theirs — I think I would have noticed if it said English muffin on the menu!), and it was theirs. They did comp it, but it should never have been brought out in the first place — have they never heard of asking if the customer minds a substitution?
Then they charged me for a drink I had already paid for at the bar, which didn’t hit me until after we had left.
I am so tired of the Three Stooges that is Houston restaurants and entertainment. Unfortunately, I do not have the option to leave.

Love this place! Been here for dinner and brunch and loved it every time. Super quaint neighborhood spot, gorgeous patio reminiscing of tiny boxwood but much more affordable and awesome service.
The bagel and loxwas just ok, but the ambiance and service are winning attributes. Ahi tuna was amazing, my go to place for sure when I don’t want to spend a lot. Closes on Monday and parking is pretty terrible but again, absolutely charming spot.

Been here MANY times. Always enjoyable.
Tonight the 3 of us all had less-​than-​favorable entrees (pasta w/​onions not fully cooked; steak that was the quality of that from HEB w/​tons of gristle; duck breast that was so fatty.) after a pseudo-​appetizer (a drizzle of brie on bread).
We can only assume this was an off night but…
For a Saturday night, inside close to full of diners; patio had only a few tables of diners.

I called to make a reservation and told them about my Groupon deal and this place was more than great with service!
I called on a Tuesday to make a reservation the same day and luckily they had open tables indoors. (I want to come back for a brunch to check out their patio.) I ordered the grilled salmon which is on a tostada with brie then covered in cabbage and pico de gallo– it was delicious but maybe they could not put too much cabbage on there next time. My boyfriend ordered the southern fried chicken and that was totally up his alley since he’s a «meat and potatoes» kind of guy; he said it was good and I took a bite and that was one of the best bites of fried chicken I’ve had in my life.
We ordered a bottle of wine to go with out meal since we were hoping we could take advantage of the «Tuesday is half-​off bottles of wine under $ 50» deal they had going but alas, because we were using our Groupon deal we couldn’t take advantage of the wine deal. No worries, there’s always next time!
For dessert, I ordered the crème brûlée and my boyfriend ordered the chocolate chip pudding cake and let’s just say that as I’m writing this review, my mouth is watering all over again just thinking about those desserts. I would come back here again just for dessert!
The service was very friendly and professional. The one minor complaint I have is that the kitchen is incredibly loud with the banging of dishware and cookware. It got somewhat annoying but after a few seconds of that, it calmed down then we could continue our chat. It kept happening throughout the dinner service so when you come here, ask for a table away from the kitchen or on their patio.

Blech

Our waiter was so rude… we had a deal that we wanted to show him before we ordered. He kept pushing it away and saying, «Okay, okay, I’ll get it later.» Okay, we got it. No need to get fiesty. Then, when he took my friend’s order, he didn’t ask how she’d like her eggs. She told him, «Oh, I’d like to have it sunny side up…» And he just laughed and said, «Okay, okay.» Was there a joke somewhere? If so, I don’t get it.
He just sounded really condescending. Not sure if it was because we had a deal, we were younger, looked younger, etc. I mean I still have money to pay for my meal, so I don’t understand why we are treated any differently. It’s not like Daily Review’s a super fancy restaurant.
Anyways, if the food was good, all might have been forgiven. But the food was small portions and bland.
We started with the lobster tacos, which turned out to be one small-​ish lobster burrito. Not really meant for sharing, or picking up. Lots of lobster chunks, but tasted more on the not-​so-​fresh/​frozen side. The yellow creamy sauce was good though.
I ordered the jumbo lump crab cakes with mixed salad. Note: JUMBO and LUMP. There were two and about slightly bigger than the size of a quarter. That’s fine if the cakes were mostly lump crab meat. But it was 50% stuffing, 50% lump meat. In which case, giving only two quarters of crab cakes really is disappointing. Not to mention that the rest of the plate was an overly dressed mixed greens salad, where the greens didn’t look very fresh. (And I hate how they pre-​dress it for you. I don’t want my salad drowning in dressing.)
My friends got the 4 oz. tenderloin with potatoes and fruit. They forgot the fruit for both of the dishes.
To top it off, they overcharged us by applying the deal incorrectly. Overall, I had a good time with my friends, but the restaurant was a disappointment.

We had a late lunch at the Daily Review Café. Parking is limited and the single valet guy just pointed to an area and told us to park there. We sat inside but there is a very pretty patio area. The service was fine, nothing to write home about.
I ordered the Southern Fried Chicken Breast. It came with mashed potatoes, green beans, corn, black eyed peas, and candied walnuts. The chicken was covered a tasty gravy sauce. It was good and I would have said it was better than good if the chicken was so incredibly salty. My husband ordered the grilled chicken sandwich that comes with a jicama/​corn/​carrot side salad. At first he enjoyed the sandwich but after while it just wasn’t very good. The jicama salad was covered in vinegar and not really edible. The price of the meal was less than I expected ($ 31 for two entrees plus two sodas), so that was good. I would probably go back, but it may be a while.
I realized as we walked in that we had been there many years ago for dinner. I guess that meal was unremarkable as well.