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  • Reading Room Restaurant at The Bar Harbor Inn

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Reading Room Restaurant at The Bar Harbor Inn
Reading Room Restaurant at The Bar Harbor Inn

Reading Room Restaurant at The Bar Harbor Inn Details

  • Dining Style: Casual Elegant
  • Website: http://www.barharborinn.com/
  • Phone: (207) 288-3351
  • Hours of Operation: Breakfast: Daily: 7:00am - 10:30am (April - October); Dinner: Nightly: 5:30pm - 9:30pm (April - November)
  • Payment Options: AMEX, MasterCard, Visa
  • Cuisine: Contemporary American
  • Executive Chef: Lou Kiefer
  • Dress Code: Smart Casual
  • Accepts Walk-Ins: Yes
  • Additional Details: Banquet/Private Rooms, Bar Dining, Bar/Lounge, Beer, Entertainment, Farm to Table, Full Bar, Gluten-free Menu, Non-Smoking Restaurant, Private Room, View, Wheelchair Access, Wine
  • Entertainment: Live piano nightly from 6-10 p.m.
  • Special Events & Promotions: For special events please contact Nicole Wallace, Group Sales, at 207-288-3351 ext. 317. Thank you!

Getting there

  • Parking: Private Lot
  • Parking Details: valet parking available
A word from Reading Room Restaurant at The Bar Harbor Inn
Refined pleasures await you in the Reading Room Restaurant. You will enjoy a dining experience where the delicious cuisine and attentive service are surpassed only by the breathtaking ocean view. Our menu includes fresh seafood, choice cuts of meat, daily specials and memorable desserts.

…Please note that we are unable to guarantee window tables You can request a window and we will do our very best! Come join us and the nightly live entertainment of grand piano music which provides the perfect ambiance to the fine dining experience. Dinner is served nightly and the dress code is informal.Continued
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Diner Reviews
  • "Elegant, stunning view. Fine dining with very classy atmosphere. Service is great. We really felt pampered and special. Great choice if you want a break from the 'tourist' ambience everywhere else."
    Dined on 7/30/2013
  • "Chose this restaurant as it was one of the few seafood places still open in late October and my hotel gave a discount. It was a great meal, definitely more tasty than I expected for the moderate prices. The petit filet might have been the best beef I've ever had! Cooked perfectly, so tender, and minimally seasoned. I can still taste it if I close my eyes! Service was great and, yes, the view is beautiful. I arrived in time to catch the sunset. Would dine again for sure!"
    Dined on 10/30/2013
  • "We read a review in the New York Times online when looking for somewhere when we arrived in Bar Harbor. The dining room is nice and has views of the harbor/ocean. The choices on the menu & food itself were excellent - great starter, swordfish and blueberry pie! Good wine list. Service was attentive. Live piano music. Hotel has good bar and lounge area too."
    Dined on 10/15/2013
  • "lovely view, great ambience, very attentive staff, however the food when served the first night was almost cold, the soup was fine , the potatoes were miserable, cold and clumpy, lobster was luke warm , desert was terrific . The second night was a little better but the potatoes were still miserable."
    Dined on 10/29/2013
  • "We stayed in the greater Bar Harbor-Acadia NP area for a week and picked the Reading Room for our anniversary dinner. It did not disappoint and we had a wonderful meal there. The setting is gorgeous, the room is grand, and the service was outstanding. We enjoyed the organic field green salads followed by the Petite Fillet and Maine Lobster Tail. Th wild blueberry pie with ice cream was a wonderful way to finish the meal.The little touches like the complimentary cantaloupe appetizer, the sorbet between courses, the piano player, and the candles in our pie helped make this a memorable meal."
    Dined on 10/26/2013
  • "We had 7:30 reservations. We were not seated until close to 8. The food was basically thrown to us. We had barely finished our appetizer when the entrees appeared. Dessert was served with the check. Couldn't even get a second cup of coffee. Just a terrible experience."
    Dined on 10/13/2013
  • "My wife and I chose this venue for our 30th wedding Anniversary dinner. Such a historic place that dates back to the 1880's leaves you in wonder of all the gents and ladies who have celebrated special events there. Atmosphere is truly elegant. Costly? Yes, but, you don't get to dine in this grand a place every year!"
    Dined on 10/16/2013
  • "This dinner was our last night in Bar Harbor & what a wonderful place to spend it. Food, service & overall experience was fabulous! This was part of a package we had purchased at the Bar Harbor Grand Hotel and we are so glad we did that. Hope to return to Bar Harbor and will definitely return to the Reading Room!"
    Dined on 10/9/2013
  • "The Reading Room has a very nice selection of seafood, meat, and vegetarian dishes. The menu is a la carte so you are not locked into a big meal. My onion soup had the right amount of seasoning, not too salty, but had less cheese than I expected. My wife and I shared the baked haddock entree, which was excellent. The service and ambience were perfect, and the live piano music was pleasant. We would definitely eat here again, and recommend it to others."
    Dined on 10/15/2013
  • "first time there. outstanding experience. tremendous menu. we will be back next time in Bar Harbor."
    Dined on 10/13/2013
  • "We celebrated my wife's 70th birthday at the reading room, and as always, the atmosphere, food and the service was in keeping with past dining experiences at the BH Inn,...... Wonderful!!! In addition, the beautiful Fall weather and the peak foliage made our week along the coast of Maine and the Bar Harbor area a special memory maker!!!!!"
    Dined on 10/11/2013
  • "Could not have asked for a better experience. Excellent food, excellent service, fantastic view."
    Dined on 10/8/2013
  • "We loved our dinner here. Everything was top notch - the food, the service, the wine list, the acoustics, the live piano music. Lobster bisque and the asparagus strudel were great starters. For entrees, we ordered surf 'n turf and the special of the night, sole stuffed with lobster. Everything was great."
    Dined on 10/1/2013
  • "We have only dined at dinner time. The food has always been delicious and the presentation outstanding. The service is top notch and the piano entertainment added just the right touch to a great evening."
    Dined on 9/29/2013
  • "We had a fabulous dinner to go along with the fabulous view."
    Dined on 9/27/2013
  • "This restaurant is a rare find in this day and age. It reminds me of how restaurants used to be 40 - 50 years ago. The staff were gracious and professional in attitude, dress, and performance. They made us feel like royalty. The food was absolutely delicious. As for ambience, I can't imagine better. The restaurant itself is beautiful in a grand room, the outside wall is all windows which provide a beautiful view of the harbor and islands. There was a pianist playing on a baby grand piano, and the music was at the perfect volume and complemented the ambience of the dinner and mood. I will remember this experience for a long time, it was perfect."
    Dined on 9/6/2013
  • "Food was good although the lobster was a little 'rubbery'. Great view, nice atmosphere and service was also good."
    Dined on 9/17/2013
  • "Nice atmosphere and good service but food was so so. Tuna appetizer was not very fresh and all in all everything was good but not great. Wine list was well priced."
    Dined on 9/22/2013
  • "The service was very good,ambience also, food left us flat. The clam chowder, well I have had better out of a can. The lobster was tough and potatoes only luke warm, and the corn on the cob tasteless. My wifes lobster pie was only average. We were totally underwhelmed."
    Dined on 9/18/2013
  • "Lovely ambience, excellent service and wonderfull lobster. Dining Room is setup to allow all tables semi circle window views of Bar Harbor. Elegant architecture. Highly recommended."
    Dined on 9/13/2013
  • "If you are looking for innovative cutting edge cuisine or a worldclass wine list, this is not the place. It looks like it hasn't changed in over 50 years. On our recent visit, the dining room was full and the average age of the diners had to be somewhere north of 70. That is part of the charm of the place. It is where you ate with your parents during those great youthful Maine summers. It helps mark the passage of time. It evokes fond memories. This is a dependable dining place where you will never get a bad meal. It also continues to have one of the most spectacular water views of any restaurant I know. This is old school Bar Harbor and it remains solid in doing what it has always done."
    Dined on 9/13/2013
  • "Restaurant had an old-fashioned feeling - it felt like jackets should be required. There was live piano music which was nice. The view was amazing. Try to get a window seat before dark."
    Dined on 8/31/2013
  • "We chose The Reading Room for our last night in Bar Harbor. The asparagus and walnut strudel appetizer was good - served hot with flaky crust. And the bouillabaise was excellent!"
    Dined on 9/7/2013
  • "Excellent service and awesome food. Professional staff and great atmosphere"
    Dined on 9/9/2013
  • "Romantic setting and views at Bar Harbor are hard to beat, service was great, had table right next to window, piano music, food presentation/taste/portions were perfect in our opinion. The location at the end of main street allows you to stroll up the activity there to walk it off. It was a special occasion for 2 and it did not disappoint, highly recommend..."
    Dined on 9/8/2013
  • "If I was just rating my 2 dinners, I would have given 5+ stars for service. The food was well presented and outstanding! However, the 5 breakfasts we had were a different story.... It ranged from outstanding service(Renee), and getting what we ordered in a well prepared delivery to non attentive sloppiness and indiference(Sarah & Dillon), which resulted in incomplete orders, wrong food, and little to no checking in to see how things were or for coffee refills. The service staff that cleared tables, refilled waters, etc. we're all wonderful people...always greeting you with a smile(Aimen)"
    Dined on 9/6/2013
  • "Great food, elegantly served with wonderful live piano music.Topped off with a marvelous view of fishermans bay. Could not ask for more"
    Dined on 9/6/2013
  • "An average dining experience in an old tired setting. I am shocked to have read all the very positive reviews and that is what prompted my selection of this restaurant. if this is the best that Bar Harbor has to offer, then it is a sad restaurant town. The offerings are the typical ones you would find in a classic conservative American resort dining room (lobster, salmon, steak, etc). Perhaps the Terrace room outside would have been more fun with essentially the same menu."
    Dined on 8/31/2013
  • "in case you are in bar harbor and look for a formal place with scenographic view, te READING ROOM is the place to go. Food is excellent, the ambience elegant, the only critic I sd make is that the hotel where the restaurant is part of, is a bit old and decandent, it should need a good restyle. But for the restaurant all is fine, price is within the range 50/60 $ per person tip included."
    Dined on 8/26/2013
  • "beautiful place, nice classic service. the food however was very boring and average. We did not, I should say, order lobster which seemed to be the star of the show."
    Dined on 9/1/2013
  • "This is the quintessential resort hotel dining room. wonderful view, formal service, traditional selections and a lounge pianist who can play every show tune and standard you can remember. They don't make them like this any more. Go and appreciate it all."
    Dined on 8/29/2013
  • "Everything was perfect, book a reservation around sunset to take advantage of the location. Probably the best restaurant in Bar Harbor."
    Dined on 8/26/2013
  • "Enjoyed a fabulous dinner at the Reading Room. Hard to imagine that the food could compare to the beautiful surroundings, but it did. Just wonderful. Recommend the Lobster Bisque and the Lobster Pie. Very friendly and attentive wait staff."
    Dined on 8/24/2013
  • "We really enjoyed our meal at the Bar Harbor Inn Reading Room Restaurant. From the live pianist to the view to the expertly prepared food, we have nothing but praise. We will definitely be back and can recommend it for a nice quiet and delicious meal..."
    Dined on 8/26/2013
  • "This is a highlight of my yearly visit to Bar Harbor. Very attentive but unobtrusive service, excellent seafood, and an unbeatable view of the sound. LOVE this place!!"
    Dined on 8/25/2013
  • "Very nice place. View of the Harbor from expansive windows is wonderful. With live piano music we really enjoyed our dinner. My appetizer (asparagus in phyllo) and baked lobster dish were very good. Husband's salad was excellent but his chicken, while having a good flavor, was a bit dry. Desserts were mixed, chocolate cake was very good, but lemon tart was not great. Overall, we would return and will also recommend for total experience."
    Dined on 8/23/2013
  • "Since high school, I have longed to dine in The Reading Room. It was everything I imagined and more."
    Dined on 8/16/2013
  • "The food was great, the live piano was wonderful, and the service was friendly, respectable, and kept the plates coming. My biggest issue was the lack of dress code. While most patrons were well dressed, there were a handful walking through in t-shirts and jeans. For the price (which is reasonable for the quality), I found that the restaurant could do more to ensure that t-shirts aren't next to dresses and oxford shirts. Furthermore, I found some of the seating congested. We were sat next to a table. Someone's back was about a foot away from me, and as you could imagine, it's hard to have dinner and conversation with someone right next to you. That said, definitely the fine dining I was looking for in Bar Harbor."
    Dined on 8/15/2013
  • "Overall it was nice. The food was good but not what I would want for a special dinner out. It is a lovely setting and had nice piano music in the background. Would I go again? No. Would I recommend it to a friend? Maybe - it depends on what they are looking for in a restaurant."
    Dined on 8/14/2013
  • "Came here on our last night of vacation. The view is incredible, the ambiance is very romantic (beautiful open room, right on the water with a piano player), the food was mediocre catering hall food at best, but the service was outstanding. Our waiter, Wayne, was one of the best servers we've ever had."
    Dined on 8/13/2013
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