The Cave

Great, cozy, place to knock back some drinks. The service was a bit slow at times, but they were kind enough.

Was expecting so much more. The wine was ok, and the service was excellent. But undercooked pasta, too salty olives and a plate of risotto that looked like_​_​_​_​_​! Plus Scallops that were undercooked. All for $ 170! Won’t be back ever! Should have read the reviews first.

After reading many 2 and 3 star reviews, I was a little skeptical and decided not to let these reviews (from people’s first review ever) keep me from my own experience. 3 hours before they started taking reservations for that day, I called the Cave to make reservations for that evening at 6:30. I was told 8:00 was the only option! I then called the event manager for the show that evening (11÷5÷15). He took my info and said he would call me back. 15 minutes later I received a call from David and he told me I had reser’s at 6:00 for 2. GREAT! Checked in at. 6:00 sharp and was seated within 3 minutes. (keep in mind there was a sold out show that night at 8:00).
Immediately was served chilled water, and bread on the table with olive oil, balsamic and butter balls right away. Within 5 minutes Waldo our server was telling us the specials and taking drink orders. My wife ordered a pretty martini (yummy ladies drink) and I ordered a Rob Roy. There was a normal wait time for drinks (server is doing both jobs). Her drink was great and mine… Well after a funny look and a small sip, I was served a Roy Rogers!
After a return to the bartender and a laugh, I realized our server had never heard of a Rob Roy! No Worries…
At that point I ordered for my wife and myself and asked for 10 minutes before he put the order in to enjoy our cocktails. 10 minutes had gone by and the waiter caught my glance with a nod and I new we had an accord.
Her bruschetta was brought out and smelled amazing. The tomatoes were firm and the garlic firm and freshly cut. Our waiter noticed the appetizer almost finished and promptly brought my Arugula salad out as planned. My wife and I both commented how fresh and firm the baby Arugula was with an amazing flavor and scent. The balsamic dressing was perfect. The wooden bowls are cool also!
When my salad disappeared, there was a perfect amount of time that passed before my wife was served her fried Calamari and I was served my Scallops. Her Calamari was fresh and lightly crusted, hot and a nice portion. The 2 sauces, 1 jalapeño and 1 chipotle were both a great choice. My scallops were very large and served with more of that amazing arugula and paired with a spicy sauce. The scallops were firm and were very close to being perfect. If anything a little under cooked, but I would rather have under cooked than over cooked. It is hard to judge that large of a scallop as they will still cook on the way out to you. No Worries! The scallops were very tasty, and I was pleased.
My wife also ordered the Bianca flat bread with Ricotta cheese that we both sampled and had to take home. It was to large to even start to eat at that time. We had it for breakfast the next morning and it was delicious.
I gave it 4 stars because it is billed as FINE dinning, it was way to loud from the close proximity to the lounge to be considered fine dining. It was a pleasant surprise to have a nice dinner and a very good experience after being a little Leary from other reviews.
We spent $ 150.00 for the dinner, 3 cocktails with tax and tip. A little pricey, but very convenient!
If you have never spent $ 35.00 for 5 scallops, you may want to read the menu online to prepare yourself. $ 13.00 each per her cocktails.
Overall I would say we had a good experience, the food was very very good and we would go back again.
On a final note, upon departure, our waiter thanked me by my last name which I thought was a nice touch…

So, I was a little apprehensive after reading some of the reviews, but we were going for a show and I figured we could just leave and get a hot dog or something if things went wrong. I had reservations for 5:30 (you have to call, I couldn’t find anything on the web site), but didn’t need them. We were seated immediately. The service was very attentive. I got the ribeye and my girlfriend got the lobster gnocchi. I ordered my steak medium rare, and when it was served she asked me to cut into it to check, and it looked fine. As I got into it, I realized the center was more rare, and just then the manager happened to walk by asking how things were. i told her, and she offered to take care of it, but I didn’t really care… I’d rather a good steak be a little underdone than over.
Some people complain about the price. This place isn’t cheap. We wound up spending over $ 200 for a few glasses of wine, two salads, or meals, and one dessert with a glass of port. If $ 50 for a steak with no sides is too rich for your blood, just don’t go… they don’t deserve lower ratings because you didn’t read the menu. There are several much less expensive places to eat at Pala.
I’d go back. I had a great time.

My husband and I went to the Cave, and they served the most delicious and remarkable Fettucine Alfredo. I could not wait to go back and have it again. What a disaster that was.
They served a blob of sticky light brown pasta that was not possible to eat. This is supposed to be an Italian restaurant, they failed miserably.
My advice, hire a chef that knows how to cook. If he can’t cook Fettucine Alfredo, he doesn’t belong in your kitchen!

I hope one day Unilocal can give us an option for negative stars…
For my birthday, My hubby took me to Russl Peter’s stand up comedy show which it was on 08÷07÷15. We made a reservation for dinner for 6 people after the show. We got seated and everything was fine at that point. We ordered an expensive bottle of wine for the table and each one of our party ordered an entrée. My husband ordered the Salmon dish and the fish came out super dry and way over cooked. My husband is not the type of a person that would complain about his food, he just simply doesn’t eat it if he doesn’t like it. I knew he was hungry and when I saw him didn’t like his plate, the waitress happen to stop by and ask us if everything was tasty. I was honest and told her the salmon was over cooked. She was so apologetic and offered to take it back to the chef. My husband said no it’s ok… twice. She insisted to take his plate so we were like ok fine. Less than 5 min later the chef comes out with our plate in his hands… basically yelling at us in the middle of the restaurant and telling my husband that he ate too much of his plate and refuses to comp his plate. We all thought it was a joke or somehow we were getting pranked. Literally everyone was looking at us while the chef continued to make a scene. It was so embarrassing to behave the way he did. Who does that? that’s like unheard of…
All we did was give our honest opinion about that $ 35 piece of tiny salmon plate when the waitress asked how was our food. She’s the one that insisted to take the plate back. We never asked the waitress for them to comp his plate. Obviously he would’ve loved to have another plate that’s not over cooked. So the chef walks away with our plate in his hand, my husband said to him excuse me… where are you going with my plate? are you just gonna throw it away? the chef says well you didn’t like it so i’m taking it away from you. LOL so the chef doesn’t want to make a new plate for my husband, he doesn’t want to comp it (which we didn’t ask for) and as a punishment wants to take the plate away from us? WTF is that??? what are we in kindergarten? Then I asked for the manager because we were really really pissed off at that point. The manger was useless and she kept offering us coffee… really? you think your coffee will make up for that pricey 5 oz salmon? We have traveled the world and dined in the most elite places, this was by far THE WORST EXPERIENCE EVER! my company always hold conferences at Pala Casino and I’ll do my best to have them change the venue. I do NOT want to step one foot at that place as long as this snobby Italian chef is there. After we left that nightmare restaurant, we talked to some staff at the bar and we told them about our experience. They all had bad things to say about this chef and non of them were happy with him. Apparently, we’re not the only once that he’s done this to.
Do yourselves a favor and spend your money elsewhere… unless you would like to be embarrassed in front of everyone in the restaurant…

DANIELLE WAS AN ABSOLUTE PROFESSIONAL! We ate here for the first time… Menu was full of options yet for some it would be confusing if your not well versed in foods and unique items ! I had simple pasta served in a beautiful handmade wooden bowl… My husband chose the Italian sausage ravioli over the boar meat! They were the thickest ravioli we had ever eaten and they were superb! The restaurant is definitely pricey but while my pasta portion was tiny and my Moms was double that the food is good!
The dessert is a must have!!! The lemon mouse with meringue was so amazing… tiny portion and all you need! I had the donuts with tiny pot of Nutella…*****! AMAZING!

Nice staff. The music was by Desert Rose. They are easy to enjoy. Pala is a nice place. Seems nicer then Pechanga too.

I had the most memorable experience that I can remember in a restaurant in quite a while. The food was excellent, the service was great, even the Chef came out to talk to us. I will return no doubt.

No ambiance whatsoever, I was so excited to enjoy a fine dining experience, sadly this didn’t happen. The restaurant is wide open into the casino, noisy & distracting. We loved Mama’s and hoped the menu would still have some of our favorites, not to be.
Our party of 4 had several appetizers & a kale salad, 4 different entrees including the Lobster Ravioli special. Not one item was remarkable. The food was served in clunky Flinstone type bowls (ugly). The lobster dish had bits of lobster in the Ravioli & the sauce tasted like tomato soup, no zing.
Dessert was good.
We all agree that we will only go back for the bar drinks & that the service is perfection at the Cave. (No cave, that’s another issue)
BTW: The «private» dining area is a fishbowl!

The Cave is fantastic. Over the weekend my wife and I had a fabulous evening! The chef came out and talked to us the food was equally great. Just a great time we had. After dinner we visited the wine Cave downstairs and relaxed with some of my favorite wine and enjoyed the music. The atmosphere downstairs is just breathtaking. To think it is just amazing a few months ago it was a hole and that evening we were enjoying a fantastic evening. Thank you to the Pala team for providing us another great place.

I wanted so badly to like The Cave. i was more than eagerly awaiting its opening, as Pala casino is one of our favorite places to go and went to Mamas Cocina more times than I can count.
The cave took the place of Mamas for a complete face lift, new menu, etc. Same Chef and staff but the Cave was supposed to offer a whole new dining experience. So we waited, and waited… 4 months later, on the 23^rd of may, the Cave opened.
We decided to give it a week before making reservations, as I thought it was going to be packed. We made reservations to celebrate our anniversary here this past Saturday night. I truly thought by the pictures and all of the talk about what «The Cave» we were going to be transported to this magical underground experience to win and dine. Unfortunately that was NOT the case. We had reservations at 7:30. Our table was right when you «walk in» which you really don’t even walk in. The restaurant does not have doors to walk through, just a big open floor plan, where we sat staring at people playing a slot machine and eating a doughnut from the café right across. Not really the ambiance I was looking for. My husband, who is the most easy going human alive, was very dissapointed with the layout and where we got sat. It was so noisy, no table lights, and the sounds of the casino really drowned out any conversation we were trying to have.
Right when we sat down, we asked our waitress (who by the way was great and so attentive. Her hospitality has nothing to do with this review) if there was a n underground cave to all of this? She stated that the «Cave» is a lounge and that we could access it by walking out of the casino/​restaurant and going down a flight of stairs. .You can imagine how surprised we were, when we really thought our dinner would be served in this awesome underground cave, when in reality i ate in the open with people 25 feet from me playing slots.
The menu is very pricey. I’m taking about a $ 48 filet with no sides… JUST THE FILET!
I saw these prices beforehand, and was fine with them because I thought we would have this amazing dining experience.
They offer very few wines by the glass, i believe they offer two types of each. Although the Lounge does offer any kind you could every dream of, at dinner we were limited… If you want to buy by the glass that is. And most people, when there are 700 wines on the bottle list, do not want to just stick to one type… They want to try out a few.
I had the Rose… very good! Husband had a Noir. He enjoyed as well
We started with the Charcutterie first. For $ 20, we received 3 slices of spicy salami, 3 pieces of ham and 3 pieces regular salami. About 4 very small rough torn pieces of Parmesan and some crackers that came from a box. With a side of orange marmalade. I couldn’t believe that Mama’s antipasto used to come with so much more and for less money! For dinner I ordered a Kale Caesar… I could not justify anything else because if it was anything like the meat and cheese plate, I would be so dissapointed! Caesar was fine. Very small and had store bought croutons… I hate store bought croutons at a fancy restaurant!
My Husband ordered the Duck. He ordered this Medium and received it very rare. We didn’t make any mention of it, as we were pretty much over it at this point. My husband was served a spoiled glass of Cab and the dinner was pretty much over with.
Our dinner was over $ 150. Such a disappointment cause I was so excited. the staff is nice and the chef comes around to talk with people, but if the FOOD doesn’t stand up to the prices and the detail explained then it is all for nothing.
Maybe this is just because it is brand new? But the staff and chef are the same, so i don’t really get it?
…Oh and we did check out the lounge. At 9pm on a Saturday night, there was a guiy playing the guitar inside and about 10 people sitting around. I would rather get a glass of wine in the casino and watch the entertainment on the stage.