Ali Baba Steakhouse

I admit, my perception of my dinner and evening out was tainted by previous dining experiences a few years ago before Ali Baba's was re-imaged as "Encore".

It's obvious that a lot of money has been invested in updating the decor and food. Money well invested.

Atmosphere and decor: Great improvements. The bar lounge area is ultra modern, yet comfortable at the same time. The fireplaces embedded in the walls are a nice touch.

On Friday evenings they have jazz music (a nice touch). The musician actually did quite a few decent covers of other songs which were nice to hear (music wasn't too loud to drown out conversation).

Food - Although the menu might not be as robust as other steak restaurants in KW, the basics are there (including options for vegetarians). Our table ordered a salmon special (which came out covered in chopped herbs which we assumed to be the blue cheese sauce). We also ordered a burger with a side of onion rings. The onion rings were huge and great for sharing. Their black pasta with seafood is highly recommended (the mussels and prawns were fresh and the pasta was not overcooked). We didn't order dessert as the portion sizes were generous.

Service - our server was incredible polite. The only 'beef' we would have is that it seemed like a long wait until our meals arrived (no appetizers were ordered, but it was a while after bread was brought that the mains came).

Overall - Would definitely recommend this place as a cozier alternative to other high-end steak restaurants if you are looking for a place for a group dinner or snacks and drinks.

I haven't been to Ali Baba's in a really long time. We decided to give it a try as I've been intrigued by their slow shift to the newly branded "Encore". I made reservations the day before (Thursday) and let them know we were celebrating an engagement.

When we arrived we were given a table that was right at the edge of the stairs. I could see myself being run into all night - so they moved us to a booth in the small room off of the main area. It was a little weird at first, but turned out to be a great place. It was quiet, private and made for a really nice evening. I was pleasantly surprised to find out we were checked on very often.

We ordered drinks to start, sharing a bottle of Riesling between us two girls and corona and a caesar for our guys. They brought us endless bread and we were happy to wait patiently for our meals. We both ordered the table caesar salad and had a chance to talk with Paul(?) part of the ownership about the transition to the new Encore and the history with Ali Baba's. It was really great. I loved watching them making the salad from scratch. And let me tell you - it's worth the $7.50pperson!

Dinner came and was excellent. The guys ordered the Rib Eye Medium rare, though it was served more medium well. It was so tender that it really didn't matter to either of them. I ordered the pickeral and it was excellent. The other party member ordered the salmon special and wasn't very pleased with it. Though she never complained the waitress knew and offered a dessert on the house.

We ordered the onion rings for a side - which were forgotten when we received our meals. Without hesitation, our waitress mentioned she would get them out and they wouldnt be on the bill.

The night was very busy and so I give them a lot of credit for taking so much time with us. There were a few hiccups but they were so accommodating and wanted to make it right with us.

We will be back - and it's definetly worth a visit.

hello all, looks like this place had a few bad reviews but looks like all dinner reviews. Well i decided to have lunch a few weeks ago there since I havent been in years. and i must say i love the new menu and the lunch chef seems to really know what they are doing. Had a great lunch special for 9.99 pork shnitzel with a warm german potato salad. i must say it was to die for, you can tell it was freshly made and to perfection, it just made my mouth water. the pork had really good seasoning and was not dry at all. my other guests were also very extremly happy with their meals. We will return for lunch again and pass the word on about the wonderful food

After a long week of entertaining an out of town co-worker My friend and I took him to Ali Baba’s for dinner. Despite him having visited the Keg the night before we assured him that this was to be the best steak he would find in a 100km’s. What came from the evening was an embarrassing (for his hosts and Ali Baba’s management) and horrible (quality, service, food) dinner which has in one evening turned me from a fan and a promoter to very much the opposite.

We called ahead and looked to book a last minute table hopeful that there would be room for us on a busy Friday night. I was surprised (little puzzled) that there was room for us at 7:30. When I hung up I thought it was odd they didn’t take my name. When we arrived we found the restaurant almost empty with perhaps 5-6 other tables visible. It seemed odd since 203 months back on my last visit it was fairly busy. Regardless of the sample space we were pushed into the benched anteroom where we ignored for 10+ minutes.

We all found our waiter (same person who I called, and who seated us) to be all smiles and thinly friendly but very much unavailable. Our drink orders took 10+ minutes to be taken and another 10 to arrive. All which would have been very easy to forgive if this had been a busy Friday. We received our bread and was then ignored until our meal came. It seemed an afterthought that we were there.

The Spicy Thai Beef soup was sweet and not overall so-so. When asked how it was we commented that “it was good, but very, very sweet.. almost sugary” to which we received an awkward smile and something akin to “oh well”. Customer service / handling was clearly not in our smiley friends repertoire.

When the steaks arrived 2 rare one medium our Guest (medium) found his cool (bordering on cold) and rare. It is most certainly the cardinal rule that of anything that could be done incorrectly in a steak house the steak should be at the very least cooked correctly and come out at a reasonable temperature. When we were able to flag down the waiter it was taken away with limited apologies and returned as a different steak in much too much short order to be a refire. We feel bad as this was likely one of the 3-4 remaining tables (at 8:15) steak.

One of my favorite sides had been their onion rings. This order was burnt and very, very greasy. I am not shy in raising concerns in a restaurant, but the service was so abysmal by that time that I didn’t think it worth it. My Veggies were perfect and my peppercorn steak was cooked to my liking, though not nearly as tasty as it had been during previous visits. My garlic mash looked “held over” and tasted nothing of garlic.

We decided to skip dessert, coffee etc to leave as soon as we could. I am very glad we skipped having the table side Caesar Salad so that I didn’t have to have that memory destroyed.

Bottom line: I will be going to the Keg from now on. I have told all the friends I have seen over this weekend of the poor experience and I will **not** be providing any further recommendations to friends/co-workers (RIM) going forward. I realize that every place has an off night in some regards but Ali Baba’s tanked very hard in every aspect of the evening. To cap the experience off all three have felt ill over this weekend. The worst occurring within 2 hours of eating the Thai soup which restrained that unlucky party member to his bathroom for the entire weekend.

Went there for a VAlentine dinner with another pair.
Got stuck with three options menu overpriced and small portions,nothing fancy and special.The bill was wrong in the first place but corrected "with apologies".We paid $290 for 2 couples and had a 3 course meniu plus one bottle of wine.Never again!!!

I had heard many great things about this place until I went and experienced it myself. They ask that you dress nicely but was sad to see the local gangbangers with the low jeans and the to-the-side baseball cap yo yo yoing it up at the table next to me. The menu is way overpriced for what the food is and the service could be better. Maybe or maybe will not return.

Their website is 4 years out of date. The Caesar salad for 2 advertised at $9 per person turned out to cost $15 per person. When we ordered wine, the glasses were absolutely filthy and we asked the waitress to bring new ones. A bit cleaner, but no cigar. The smoked salmon appetizer consisted of 3 pieces of salmon. The rest of the food ( fish and steak) were acceptable, but not outstanding. My wife and I (both in our 60ies) were addressed as "my dear" and "my friend" by the waiter. How professional is that?

A Dreadful and disappointing experience‎ - ‎ - 2009-11-21
There were four of us and we all had a poor and embarrassing experience. The service was poor and unbelievably slow and two of our meals were so bad we couldn't eat them at all. The owner showed us to our table and made a point of telling us how wonderful they were and the awards they had won. He also ran down all of the local competition in the process.
Our waitress was new, pleasant and tried hard but she didn't have a hope given the lack of care and awful food. We waited a long time to get appetizers and my escargot were forgotten. After an hour with nothing for three of us, I asked for mine and it finally arrived. However it was smothered in cheap cheese and the snails were cooked together with bits of shell. It was the worst I've ever had.
In the meantime, we were told that although the Caesar salad was on the menu at $10, the price of lettuce had gone up and it would now cost $15! Do they really expect that they can charge 50% more because of a bit of lettuce? Besides it was listed on the menu at the $10 price.
We were the guests of the other couple who were becoming embarrassed at this point. One of us ordered an entree and asked for french fries with it as described in the menu only to be told that they were extra and not available. When she protested, the waitress went to check and came back to say they would make an exception this one time, but not again. Unbelievable.
Two of us ordered their specialty, roast beef. It arrived one and a half hours later and was stone cold. There was no gravy for the cold dry Yorkshire pudding and the meat was so tough that we had trouble cutting it.
We spoke to our waitress who left to get the owner. He never appeared but the manager did. He apologized, defended their policy about the 50% charge for the lettuce and offered to get us two more meals. Since we had waited far too long and received something inedible, we declined.
No other compensation was offered and the manager made a big deal of telling us he wouldn't charge us for the two meals we couldn't eat. How kind.
The gracious, attentive owner never put in an appearance and we all left vowing never to return.

This is the worst dining experience I have ever had.

When we walked through the door, there was no one to greet us. We waited for about 5 minutes before I even saw a server in the dining room.

We reserved a table earlier in the day, and when we told them what name the reservation was under, they said that they didn't have a reservation under that name. The way that the hostess spoke to us was almost argumentative, and I felt like we were really putting her out.

The service was terrible throughout the night. The wait time was way too long for a nearly empty restaurant. The owner, [name removed], was lumbering around the restaurant barking at the servers, and being completely unprofessional. As a former server, I found this appalling. The thought of seeing him again is enough to make me never entertain the thought of returning.

The food was terrible. It was cold when it arrived, and it looked like the vegetables were frozen. The prices are really unreasonable considering the poor food quality and preparation.

Even worse than the awful owner and rude hostess, was the decor. Anyone who has experienced this restaurant, knows what I am talking about.

Horrible service. Horrible food. Horrible experience. I definitely do NOT recommend this "restaurant".

We have eaten here many times over the past year, but this was probably our last visit. The service has been getting worse each time and was really slow this time. There was only one waitress in the whole place. Paul the Manager/Owner was helping but they needed at least one more waitress to keep up. You could tell the very cute waitress was trying very hard but there is only so much you can do on your own with 6 or 7 tables of people. Our main dishes of food were overcooked, and cold when it arrived to the table. The exception being the lamb chops which were good as always.