September 21, 2008
Lake Louise Village Grill And Bar
Lake Louise was the highlight of our Canadian Rockies trip, and our premium tour group got to stay at the lake-side five-star Chateau Lake Louise. However, the budget did not extend to the food, and the fancy restaurants within the Chateau resort were out of the question for dinner. Instead we went to the more modest family-style restaurant in the nearby mini-mall. Turned out the restaurant was closed to normal diners, the whole place being totally booked by various Asian tour-groups for the night. And not just one seating, either, as another group was just packing up and leaving as we arrived, to be replaced by a third group soon afterwards.
They'd billed this as the fancy Western-style steak dinner highlight of the tour. But after seeing the tourist-trap leanings and the general mediocrity of the tour grub so far, I wasn't holding out much hope. I ended up being pleasantly surprised, though, the benefit of low expectations, I suppose. The beef was fairly decent, a Sizzler-ish cut of a sirloin, but not tough like the usual cheap stuff. Canned-tasting mixed veggies were blah, but I'm willing to concede a bit there in exchange for better beef. White rice instead of mashed potatoes for the Asian tourists, which was fine with me. I don't demand too much local authenticity from my side dishes. Plus the rice actually worked pretty well with the gravy.
Yeah, the steakhouse in the Chateau probably would've had even better food, and I might even have ponied up if it were just the two of us. But it might've cost us a couple hundred loonies for the privilege. As it was, we had a perfectly pleasant meal with a big group of familiar folks for casual dinner conversation on a rainy evening in Lake Louise.
Lake Louise Village Grill & Bar
Samson Mall
101 Lake Louise Drive
Lake Louise, AB
403-522-3879