Sonoma Bistro

We come here often, both for dinner and brunch and we always have a great meal. Many of the dishes are not your run of the mill standards. For example for breakfast/​brunch I always get The Goldilocks. It’s Challah bread topped with Nova Scotia Salmon and cream cheese and scrambled eggs. This also comes with a nice side salad. For dinner I love their Churassco with an excellent Chimichurri sauce. My wife gets the Filet Mignon with a creamy mushroom sauce, both are excellent cuts of beef and both also come with a side salad. The service is always good, nice young servers that work hard to make your dining experience good. The word must be spreading about how good Sonoma Bistro is, Sunday Brunch and week end nights are starting to get very busy. Calling ahead for a table might not be a bad idea.

My first visit was okay, only thing is that the dish is too salty which I can understand. But today when I come in to pick up a to go order, the waitress charged me then ask me to wait. I saw something wrapped already, so ask her if mine is ready. Only answer she gave me is give me a sec. Again and again, after 20min, I give up, ask another waiter, then find out that is really my order ready 20 min ago even before I came in.
P. S. All refill will be charged additionally without notice, so if you order ice tea, don’t try to get a free refill, no matter how salty your dish is.

This place always has amazing food, the chef is the owner as well and does a magnificent job! Whether you want breakfast or lunch the food is always great. Today I got the vegetarian sandwich with French fries and it was delicious. Being a vegetarian, sometimes places make food blind but that is not the case here! It is full of flavors! They have delicious sauces like the chimmichirri which is a personal favorite. The people who work there are a pleasure and very attentive. They try to help you as much as possible and as how you are doing through the meal hair invade you need something else. I highly recommend and will be coming back here!

I didn’t even get to try the food here today. I was looking forward to a nice brunch on Memorial Day. I arrive and am told I have a 30 minute wait. That’s fine, I anticipated a wait. Another couple arrives after me with a young child and gets seated mere minutes after I arrived all because some other nosy couple told them they shouldn’t have to wait since they have a young child (who may I add was PERFECTLY BEHAVED). I was annoyed but still wanted brunch. A few moments after we get seated next to the aforementioned couple, I was asked to get up because 2 ladies who were SITTING AT THE BAR wanted to sit at a table. Do you actually think that inconveniencing someone TWICE who hasn’t even been to your restaurant is a unique method to retain customers? Next time I’ll strap a baby to me so I can get preferential treatment. You’ll never get my business again.

Delicious brunch food! Good service. Nice casual atmosphere. Priced well. I’d definitely recommend this spot to others. Don’t forget to bring the bubs for mimosas!

I moved to Rutherford about 4 months ago and have been coming here every weekend for breakfast since the first time I visited. Love the food! Everything is fresh and delicious, and very reasonably priced. I’ve tried more than half of the menu and have never been disappointed by a meal. Also the meals are neatly presented and the atmosphere is homey, with a flat screen TV displaying food network and old school jams playing in the background. I wouldn’t change a thing. Not even their coffee, which is also much better than the usual coffee you get at a breakfast place.

My search for the best Huevos Rancheros ends here! It’s a little spicy which is perfect for me! Definitely recommend coming to try

Went here on a Sunday early evening with my friend. There were a few couples inside on this beautiful day, but we decided to sit outside on Park Avenue. Our servers, Danny and Manny (not kidding) were there within a minute to set our table and pop open our BYO beverages.
We ordered the guacamole, which was tasty and sizable with plenty of chips. Oh, they also start you with a few varieties of bread and an interesting cherry butter.
My friend ordered the burger and she couldn’t finish it because it was so big. She said it was perfectly cooked and juicy. I had the tender steak sandwich on crusty bread.
The service, food and perfectly sunny day was a great way to end the weekend. Will no doubt be back.
Thanks again to our waiters, Daniel and Manuel. You guys were a lot of fun.

Stumbled into this lovely bistro last weekend and now can’t get enough of it! Food is yummy and wonderful service will be coming back again soon!

Been coming here since they opened. Service has significantly improved. They have a great crew right now.
After many visits, I’ve finally realized that every thing I’ve eaten here as been delicious. Brunch, salads, burgers are all great. They do an awesome eggs Benedict that’s consistently good.
It’s byob which makes it the best brunch in town. It’s loud but usually because it’s packed with people enjoying themselves.
Any time friend/​visit, this is the place we bring them.
I’m hoping they do a menu update eventually. Some of the specials should be everyday items.

Cool little breakfast/​brunch spot in Rutherford. The first time I went here it was back-​to-​back days, so that should explain how much I enjoyed the food. The omelets are rather sizable and the home fries were on point. The second day I went I got the Huevos Rancheros and it was absolutely delicious. Abundant flavor and great textures throughout. I highly recommend asking for a side of the Ranchero Sauce as you can slap that on just about anything on the menu. Both times I went the service was perfectly fine, so based on other reviews, I guess the service is just hit-​or-​miss. 5 stars.

Since writing the original review, I’ve come back 3 times, each and every single time the food was great, the 2^nd and 3^rd time service was much better which would have earned them 4 stars on this updated review, but just now on this last visit the service was eh.
The waiter today was nice and not nearly as bad as the 1^st time here, but just forgetting things we asked for, taking forever to clear our plates /​give us the check, leaving empty drinks on the table without stopping by to ask if we wanted refills, not giving us a steak knife when we had ordered filet mignon.

If they can improve on the service I would be giving it 5 stars easily. Their food is really good and I find it ashame that the service can’t step it up.
I just discovered they have brunch on the weekends and I was so happy. I ordered off their daily special. I got the Texas toast filet mignon eggs benedict w/​pico de gallo and home fries and it was wonderful… belly was very happy. My kids loved the pancakes with fresh strawberries.
Here’s an example of bad service:
I requested they split the order of pancakes so my kids can share. It came out on 1 plate so we asked for an extra plate (so annoyed by this) then the waiter goes back but then starts to open a bottle of champagne for a customer next to our table and we watched him with disappointment when he literally just said «I will bring you another plate». And at the same time our kids are starting to whine and wants to eat… almost crying… OMG don’t make a kid wait for their food especially a toddler.
Their brunch menu sounds great… I even posted pictures. It’s metered street parking. Place is clean with about 20 tables. BYOB… but the service ugh… get it together Sonoma! They even took forever to give us the check and it wasn’t even that busy.

Good customer service. Brunch is good. (Pancake is good) Their dinner is what is HORRIBLE. I order beef ribs. After one bite I swear it felt like my blood pressure went up. The ribs did have some good flavors but it had too much salt. Worst French fries I’ve ever had. The French fries was very stale and tasted old. I will not be coming back to this place.

I have a soft spot for «in-​betweeners» — restaurants that look and serve food better than an average, greasy diner, but not in the price range of classier, hipster restaurants. Sonoma fits comfortably in this category with its friendly service, large serving portions and really good food that offers something for everyone.
I enjoyed a nice date night with my husband here, bringing over our favorite bottle of white. Started off with a plate of mussels which was bathed in a light sauce that is on the sweeter (rather than buttery) side. We polished off the entire dish and moved onto our entrees.
I hesitated in ordering the tuna burger since I wasn’t sure about the concept of having lightly seared tuna served in burger format, but it worked surprisingly well. The tuna was really good and the side salad was fresh — not a wilty or brown leaf in place. My husband opted for the appetizer sampler for 2 as his main dish, and he could not finish and had to take a to-​go bag. The sampler comes served with an open flame so you can further heat up the skewers as you go. The beef and chicken skewers were ok — not very remarkable, but the shrimp skewers were pretty good. The calamari was served with a sweet sauce (reminded me of Thai chili) and is unlike the usual diner calamari fare. The star of the sampler were the empanadas which had a super crispy crust but stuffed to the brim with nicely marinated meat. I would not hesitate to get the empanadas on their own in the future.
Service was very attentive.
Overall, a great meal at an affordable price point. A good place to bring a significant other for a low-​key but satisfying date. Restaurant is located at the corner of two streets and only street parking is available.

Up until recently we have only come here for their delicious brunch so based on our previous positive experiences we decided to give them a shot for dinner. Dinner was just as good if not better than Brunch! Hubby had the Italian Paella: Risotta, rock shrimp, spicy Italian sausage, green peas, clams, mussels, scallops, peppers and onions in a garlic butter sauce. It was a very generous portion and hubby said it was delicious and very unique. I had the Garlicious Penne: Spicy Italian sausage, escarole, plum tomatoes in a garlic white wine sauce tossed with Penne topped with Parmasan. This was also delicious and a nice combination of ingredients. Another very nice extra was the bread basket: it came with regular white crusty plus a really yummy sort of date and nut bread accompanied by a butter spread mixed with cinnamon and brown sugar. Outstanding and a really nice addition. Service was as good as ever as well.

I’ve been meaning to check out Sonoma Bistro since it opened and I finally got to go one night for dinner with a friend. We went on a perfect night as I was dying for some butternut squash ravioli and guess what? They had a butternut squash ravioli special just for me!
When my friend and I arrived there were only 2 other couples in the restaurant. We picked a spot by the window and the waitress came by immediately to fill our water glasses. We ordered the chicken empanadas for our appetizer and they were very good with a nice little spice to them. My butternut squash ravioli had chicken on top of it with a balsamic vinaigrette. It was very good, but after awhile the strong flavor of the vinaigrette become a bit too much. Our waitress recommended the Bucatini pasta to my friend. We decided to splurge and get the banana cream pie for dessert. It was decadent and delicious. I left Sonoma Bistro overly full, but happy.
I knew I had to return for brunch! I had 4 out of town friends visiting me the other day and I brought them to brunch at Sonoma Bistro. The place was a bit more hopping, but there was no line or wait. At first our waiter was a little overly attentive as we were trying to catch up a bit before we ordered. I ordered the veggie omelet and it was very good, there were many different veggies loaded inside the omelet. The bistro fries were pretty good, though I was hoping for a bit more seasoning on them. We ended the meal with 2 orders of Zepppoles and that was the best decision ever, they were amazing, not too overly fried with a chocolate dipping sauce.
Thanks also to the waiter for giving us some space to talk and letting us overstay our welcome. I’ll definitely be back!

Rutherford has an adorable downtown area and I wanted to explore it… what a better way to do this by having Sunday brunch here! browsing the menu, I knew immediately I wanted the goldie lox because I love nova lox anything… plus I have always wanted to try out challa bread! The dish was delicious and it was a lot of food so I had leftovers… the home fries were seasoned nicely, but not spicy although they do look it. I would recommend this place to try out but the low stars is because of the price and quality, although there were a lot of eggs and home fries on my plate, the salmon was lacking and I have been to other places priced the same with way more lox. this was about 1 ½ ounces maybe 2 ounces…

Had dinner with my fiancé on Sunday, was surprised that it was not busy. There was another couple having dinner.
Ambience– I like the setting and the painting on the wall was cute. Place looked cleaned and the restroom was quaint.
Staff– We were immediately greeted and the staff was super friendly and attentive. The chef came out to ask us how our dinner was.
Food– We shared the beet, arugula and goat cheese salad with bacon dressing. The fried goat cheese was delicious and the bacon dressing was unbelievable! I recommend this salad.
My fiancé had the swordfish with mashed cauliflower and asparagus. I had the pan seared Atlantic salmon (medium rare) with mashed sweet potatoes and julienned cut veggies. We were very happy with our entrees. They cooked my salmon perfectly and we didn’t leave a crumb behind.
To top it off, we shared the banana cream pie, YOU MUST TRY THIS!!! They make all of their desserts, that is a major plus ++++ it was so creamy and so good, we were fighting over it.
Overall, we will definitely make this our regular spot. Next, we want to check out their Brunch. Will make sure I do a follow up review.

Not bad. Not great either.
Went for lunch today and hubby ordered a Sonoma burger that came with bacon and a side of fries. The fries were very greasy.
The burger tasty.
I ordered a beat spinach goat cheese salad. The goat cheese was delicious little fried balls of goodness and each bite coated your mouth. Coated.
An order of chicken and an order of beef empanadas.
The beef empanadas was very very good. My daughter had chicken and stated it was incredible. The avocado cream served with was very good. The hot sauce was made with I think ancho chilies and while hot still had taste and that’s the way I like my hot sauce.
The only problem I had was the service. It was a late lunch nobody but U.S. There at 3 pm and well you could come by and check the drinks. Check on us etc.
Took forever to wrap the leftovers and get a check.