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Last Update: May 22nd, 2017
Chart House Fort Lauerdale

Chart House

3000 Northeast 32nd Avenue
Fort Lauderdale FL, 33310
954 561-4800
Overall Rating
1.9
Food
Service
Ambiance
Value
Last Review
05/08/2015

Details

Hours: Sun-Th 4pm-9:30pm, FriSat 11:30pm-10pm
Attire: Dressy
Parking: Valet, Metered Garage
CC: Yes
Alcohol: Full bar
Outside Dining: Yes
Reservations: Yes
Delivery: No
Happy Hour: M-Sat 4-8pm, All Day Sunday Reduced price food and drink menu

Pros

Waterfront Location

Cons

Expensive
Not Much Fish at Lunch
Nickel and Dime Ingredients
Creepy Decor

Critic's Review

I hadn't been to the Chart House if a few years, and for some reason I decided to try it again today. The decor keeps me away; it was a nice day so I was going to sit outside. I entered hoping they'd remodeled, but it's still the same dysfunctional bar with ugly decor and tiny TVs from the 1990s.

Chart House Fort Lauderdale Bar

It's a long walk to the outside space; you have to zig-zag through the bar lounge and the restaurant. Interestingly, I got the table that I'd photographed on my last visit. Just a couple of tables occupied. Not many people even know this place is here.

Chart House Patio

I knew what I was ordering in advance, but I humored my server by ordering a tea and saying that I needed some more time. I always have to be sure that the actual menu matches whats on the website. Funny how Landry's always has a current menu on their Chart House restaurants but don't have a location specific menu OR prices for Morton's. Morton's is designed to soak those with more money than brains; this place is more mainstream.

They don't cheat you on the lemon here; although this is where the generosity ends.

Chart House Iced Tea

I ordered the New Yorker Salad, which features blue cheese and "NY Strip Steak".

The view is unfortunately obscured by big green shades, which are completely unneeded until late afternoon. It's too bad, because the view could be very nice on such a beautiful day.

Chart House Patio View

Music is oddly disjoint, with Little Boots and Lisa Shaw mixed in with Elton John and The Police. I'm not sure what they're going for.

No bread. I got bread at lunch last time I was here. This is what I'm talking about people. WHY do we let them do this? Complain. Stop going to places that cut, cut, cut while still raising their prices.

You can guess my first impression when they put the salad in front of me.

Chart House New Yorker Salad

WHY do restaurants insist on serving salads on flat plates? There's a reason the Salad Bowl was invented. Another immediate impression was that the "NY Strip" steak was cut up, a clear indication that they were serving me scraps and/or leftovers. Meat doesn't come out this color unless it's cooked more than once. Maybe left over prime rib? Steaks that were sent back? Steaks with big sinews in them that couldn't be served?

They apparently forgot to pickle the red onions, because the onions on the salad were raw. Grape tomatoes. This is supposed to be a premium restaurant?

Next was the dressing. The container isn't as big as it looks; it's a thick container.

Chart House Salad Dressing Container

There wasn't enough dressing for 1/2 a salad. I was going to have to get more.

Chart House New Yorker with Insufficient Dressing

I got another and it was barely enough.

There was a group next to me celebrating a birthday, and as the Water Taxi passed by everyone on the taxi yelled out "Happy Birthday"; clearly something arranged by their server.

Chart House Water Taxi

They had a nice cake but didn't offer me any.

My seat was right in front of the service station, and my server flew by 3 times while my glass was empty. This should never happen.

Chart House Empty Tea

Overall a fairly pedestrian experience. The salad wasn't nearly as good as it could have been, if it actually had pickled onions, a couple of nice slices of steak and some real tomatoes.

Conclusion

With all things considered, the Chart House is just a damn shame. They have such a prime location, but it's just a disappointment from head to toe. It's so ugly, the bar is awful, it's expensive (VERY expensive for dinner) and they run it like a typical, bad corporate restaurant. There's no USDA prime or dry aged beef, yet it's $30 for a small prime rib. The lunch menu is toned down so much so that it's not even a premium restaurant at lunch time.

I'll get criticized for not having dinner here, but the truth is that I wouldn't want to come here for dinner, much less pay their dinner prices.

Review 7/20/12

I'd only been to Chart House for happy hour, and I've looked at their menu quite often but never seem to pull the trigger. They're only open for Lunch on Friday and Saturday, and I have lots of other place to go at dinner time when I do go out to dinner. I'd been to Bubba Gump of the same owners the other day, so I thought I'd try it on a Friday.

Inside, the Chart House baffles me. The decor is downright ugly in a cheesy sort of way. Turquoise and yellows, hotel carpeting and mirrors at head level in the booths.

Chart House Fort Lauderdale Interior

What baffles me is that I don't get how you can possibly get a consensus on such decor. There's always an eccentric owner with wacky taste here and there, but in a chain where multiple people have to sign off on it, how can this happen? Another oddity is the bad music: Owl City, Caro Emerald, Will Young. Garbage. The place is mostly older ladies at lunch time. Why would they play music like that?

It was too hot to eat outside; on a cooler day or evening the view is very nice here.

Chart House Fort Lauderdale View

I'd decided what I was having before I left, so I made it easy on my server. The soup sampler and the fried asparagus appetizer. He brought over some bread while I waited.

Chart House Fort Lauderdale Bread

The bread was a smallish, oddly shaped roll, but it was very good. Nice soft butter. No wireless here, but a good 3G signal. The soup and the appetizer came out together, which was fine with me.

Chart House Soup Sampler

The "Best of Soup" menu item is a sampler of their 3 soups. Lobster Bisque, New England Clam Chowder and Gazpacho. I tried the lobster bisque first. Very good. With little bits of lobster; nicely incorporated sherry. A pretty good version. Then I tasted the gazpacho. Whoa! An unexpected kick. Calling this a tomato soup isn't fair; this is more like a salsa. The cucumber stick in it was needed; this is spicy stuff. As I was finishing it, I literally felt like I was eating a medium salsa. Spicy, lots of raw onions. Then I tasted the signature clam chowder. I didn't like it. It had some strange aftertaste. There were some spices in it that I didn't like.

I'd seem some pictures of the asparagus on the 'net, and most were pretty well breaded. The ones here weren't really breaded at all.

Chart House Fried Asparagus

I liked the asparagus dish. If you don't like asparagus, it should be noted that you can hardly taste it in this dish. The sauce is pretty powerful; a blue cheese butter sauce they call it.

The lunch prices here aren't too high, but frankly I wouldnt eat in the creepy dining room again. Outside on a cooler day is the way to go. They charge 2.85 for a seltzer which seems like a lot for carbonated water, but it comes with a lime.

A pretty ho-hum lunch. They have a valet, or you can park on the street if you have enough quarters.

Happy Hour Review 8/11/10

Charley's Crab is gone and Chart House has popped up in its place. Both brands are owned by Landry's Restaurants, and they decided that Chart House had more national brand recognition than Charley's Crab which is a regional brand. Its not clear why they'd want to replace one high priced seafood restaurant with another high priced seafood restaurant, but they did.

To those of you who've been to Charley's Crab before, you won't see much that's new. The inside is the same as it was before except its been given a color makeover. The new colors are green and yellow and various shades within. As a straight dude I have to say it doesn't appeal to me. I liked the decor better before.

They never actually closed Charley's Crab; the transformation took place while remaining open. On Monday they opened as Chart House, with the same staff and a different menu. While it might be good for business to stay open during remodeling, the downside is that all of the things wrong with the old place remain with the new place. They still have the same 24" TVs at the bar that seem so very 2003.

Charthouse bar

I stopped by for Happy Hour to find that their Chart House happy hour is exactly the same as the Charlie's Crab happy hour, with the same bar menu and specials. Also the same regulars; a 65+ crowd. I hadn't sampled the bar menu so I ordered up some Firecracker Shrimp and Fish Tacos. The Shrimp are $6 and the Tacos are $5. They're special happy hour apps and are proportionately smaller to the price. Blue Moon, Yuengling and Stella Artois are $4.

Charthouse apps

The shrimp are tempura fried and served with a kim chee sauce. They're pretty spicy. While they were ok, its not the kind of appetizer I'd expect to get at a high-end restaurant. Its something I might expect to get at Bonefish Grill. I didn't care for the tacos at all. They were simply devoid of taste. They're served with a double soft taco shell which was too chewy; I don't think they were stale but they were too stiff. I would have liked to shed the outer shell but they were stuck together with some sort of sauce, so you can't separate them without making a mess.

The menu includes both fish and steak and the prices are quite high. I can't see anywhere that they advertise that they serve Prime or even Dry Aged meat. If they're selling a choice 8oz Filet Mignon for $31. and a choice 10oz Prime Rib for $27 then their prices are pretty high compared to other choices.

Comment Policy Add Comment
Administrator
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The Chart House will not Re-open.
Mactalent
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Other Charthouse locations I've been to - like the one in Coconut Grove (which has awesome location) - have a great salad bar. I was disappointed this location does not.

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