Ossawippi Express Dining Cars

No real concerns,just nothing verly exciting. I had wanted to go to Ossawippi for years, but just couldn't find anyone interested to go. Our food was decent, nicely presented and warm, but nothing out of the ordinary. The decorating was a little outdated, or perhaps just worn out since I think it had the look they were going for. Certainly an interesting experience and the owner was very personable.

We thoroughly enjoyed our meal in a small private compartment of the vintage train. Brenda served us well, we have enjoyed being served by her on many occasions. The soup and salad were excellent, the lamb medallions off the main menu were delicious and tasty. The pasta special with chicken and shrimp was good value, and the tilapia was good. The special included pumpkin cheesecake. We had a chance to talk with Terry the owner at the end of the evening. We have been to a group dinner there with the Probus Club, dinner was excellent value and the meal was well received by everyone.
We now have no hesitation in recommending this restaurant to our guests for the location in railroad cars by the waterfront,and for better food.

I just read the privious and thought for $139.95 pp you get Lunch, Dinner, hotel stay, boat cruise,and a theatre ticket thats a steal.... I had this package and thought it was wonderful I have been to some and the choices are even more limited , portion sizes were very filling fo us but perhaps if you are used to dining at Buffet restaurants then it would not fill your tummy, however the tastes were fine to me I just put salt and pepper on and that is what most do the chicken had a red current peppercorn glaze and the Cod a Pesto sauce . It was all good to us and What a value. We Plan on going on our own to try their full menu in a few weeks.

We dined here as part of the Best Western's Sunshine Getaway package, so were given a special menu that had very limited choices. The garden salad was good, fresh and nicely presented. The soup was average. The chicken breast was very tender but bland, as was the wild rice pilaf that came with both dinners. I have tasted more flavourful Uncle Ben's. The veggies were cooked just right, but again, little or no seasoning. The cod was good. The bread was good. The kitchen is clearly monitoring food costs very closely -- the portions were small almost to the point of being miserly. The orange shortcake and the coffee were the highlight of our dinner. The dining car is neat to dine in, and the service was prompt and attentive. As we are from out of town, not likely to be going back to this restaurant based on the blandness and would not likley recommend to others either.

WE have been to this place many times, we find the food just wonderfuland tasty everyt time to the lady that does not like cauliflour well too bad for you had the chef put too many flavours on you plate you would have complained about that too, perhaps leave Toronto Dining in Toronto whenyou go out to dinner. I go to Toronto too and find that what they do their is not my cup of tea too many flavours at some of the places I think Chris wwhom is the Chef has a simplistic overveiw like Jamie Oliver and Rachel Ray keep it simple. As For the Prices well they are priced fair and definatly cheaper than dining out at the Casino or in Toronto or even for that fact The K_g. And the Atmosphere is much nicer and relaxing.

We went out for dinner to celebrate a special occasion, having picked this restaurant because the dining car setting sounded interesting and most of the reviews we had read were good. There was absolutely no problem with the service, but the entrees were bland and uninspired, my boyfriend cooks much more delicious and flavourful meals at home. I ordered the salmon and that's all it was, there was nothing cocoa about it. The rice pilaf that came with the meal was clumpy and there was a couple pieces of steamed cauliflower and some snow peas on the side. The appetizers were the good part of the meal, the chili chocolate scallops were cooked well, though they could have amped up the sauce a bit. The escargot was good, nice and cheesy. Overall the food was far too expensive for the quality. Instead of staying for dessert we left and went to a local cafe.

I took my four year old grandaughter to this restaurant because of the train theme. Upon entering the restaurant there was a very disagreeable stench such like backed up sewer (that is a polite way of putting it). The food was tasteless, cold and poorly presented. And pricey! Do not go here, you are better off at Boston Pizza.

we were a little early and decided to look around and discovered the have a new lounge wich was once the gift shop, there are still gift items in there, great idea.
after entering the dining room we just had such an enjoyable time realxing no big fuss fuss, Certainly one of the best times out in Orillia and they have a new menu too that features some neat flavours venison, pheasant. chocolate chili scallops who would have thought they were yummy.And the atmosphere is in a train, nice patio, too bad it was not busier i think our gas prices have to do wih that.

the previous writer I think went way over board in my opinion. apparently they must be used to Toronto, as we do not like the seasoning that many restaurants use for their steaks. and the chichen dish was delicious, crisp flaky phylo seems the previous writer forgot that phylo needs butter to seal each layer together to wrap a breast of chicken . you really had nerve to write some of the things that you wrote, even though this may be a public site for reviews, there should be a limit. perhaps if you owned a business and had a unhappy customer that wrote something on utube about your business you might think differently.... We had a blast and cannot wait for our return visit to the Ossawippi

The atmosphere was great and the view was very nice as well. Our servers were great despite the problems with the kitchen.

Our night started off with most of us ordering soft drinks that tasted horrible and had to do back. We noticed other tables had the same problem. When the bread came, it was not fresh (all of the food didn't taste fresh for that matter) and was at least a day or two old. When the soups came, one of them was spilled all over the dish as the server bumped into the door when coming to our table. The other soup had a nasty dirty spoon with it. Our birthday boy had ordered the veal chop only to find out that the restaurant didn't have any. The kitchen should havd let the servers know before they took orders. When the main entree's came out, once again the birthday boy got the wrong sides with his order. One persons pasta tasted bland and reheated but more shockingly had about a cups worth of oil in it. This was not acceptable and the explanation that some people like all the oil left us shaking our heads. Three people ordered the same chicken special which was deep fried and not baked, all three of the dishes were dramatically different sizes and lacking in flavor. As for myself, the steak I ordered was cooked well on one side but not well at all on the other side. It was bland and flavorless and didn't seem to have any seasoning on it. The thing that we all noticed was that everyone had the same bland garnishes no matter waht they ordered. To top off the experience, when the desserts came after we mentioned some of our problems, one of them came with another dirty spoon and at that point we just all wanted to get out as fast as we could.

When I went to bathroom, I noticed it wasn't too clean an there were some exposed light switches that if a building inspector saw would probably shut you down. Furthermore, there was no hand drier or paper towels for when you washed your hands. The whole old train ambience I think is great but maybe getting rid of some of the water marks on the ceiling at least in the car that we were in might be a good idea as it tends to suggest mould. We briefly saw glimpses of the kitchen and was wondering how the kitchen could work with such dim lighting?

Anyway, this was the furthest thing from fine dining and the experience did not match your rates. Although we appreciated the discount you gave us, we were so dissatisfied (and myself a little sick) we actually went to another restaurant after we left yours.