Room and Bored

400 Olive is a decent hotel restaurant -- but certainly not a destination in itself

Comments (0) By Rose Martelli Wednesday, Jun 29 2005

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Nothing good was happening on a plate of Jamaican barbecued chicken, just a boring piece of poultry beneath a smear of sweet, blunt barbecue sauce that may as well have been taken off a supermarket shelf, accompanied by stiff and stale fried plantains and a too-salty edamame succotash. Even the wispy curlicues of sweet potato "confetti" tossed on top of the chicken weren't very lively. Citrus-spice seared tuna, with chilled French green beans and Yukon gold potato salad, was a dingy-tasting take on salade niçoise. The exterior of the cut of tuna looked washed-out, while the inside was an off-putting bubblegum pink, with all the flavor of already-chewed Bazooka.

What's for dessert is cake, usually four different kinds. Chocolate cake was chocolate cake, right down to frosting exactly like that out of a Pillsbury canister, with sugar crystals you can hear ringing in your ear drums as you bite through it. Tiramisu cake was definitely not tiramisu, but rather a whitish-yellow cake with a white icing (like what you get at the bakery for kids' birthdays), and a single chocolate-covered coffee bean that was the sole acknowledgement of genuine tiramisu.

Jennifer Silverberg

Mixed feelings: 400 Olive's menu contains some triumphs -- and some mistakes.

Location Info

Map

400 Olive

400 Olive St.
St. Louis, MO 63102

Category: Restaurant > American

Region: St. Louis - Riverfront

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Details

Corn and crab chowder $6
Eggplant lasagna $7
Veggie club $12
Jamaican barbecue chicken $19

314-554-7098. Hours: 6:30 a.m.-2 p.m. and 5-10 p.m. Mon.-Sat., 6:30 a.m.-2 p.m. Sun.

400 Olive Street (inside the Hilton St. Louis Downtown)

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400 Olive is surely sufficient sustenance for the Hilton's guests, but that's faint praise. Too many hotel restaurants play down to their captive clientele, out-of-towners who don't know where else to go for a meal -- especially in this corner of downtown, blocks away from any other fancy sit-down restaurant.