Yes :-) Colleen's review (Jan 24th 2007)

The general rule of thumb Doug and I follow is to give a new restaurant a month or two to work out the kinks before we try it. Fortunately we ignored the rule and had a delightful Sunday lunch in the Safari Room. The space is gorgeous. Even on a chilly, snowy day the dining area is warm and inviting and there is lots to look at while we waited for our meal. While most of the menu plays it pretty safe, there are a couple of innovative items to try. The flatbread looked promising, not a pizza, and not a cracker, but a perfect rendition of the yeastless pizza crust from the 1974 Betty Crocker Cookbook. I know. I’ve made it many times. We chose a Thai Chicken/Peanut Sauce version that was pretty good but doesn’t hold a candle to Rock City’s. The Cougar Gold Flatbread looked good on its way to another table. We ordered a small wedge salad, a pulled pork sandwich, and a steak salad. All were well prepared and in keeping with Spokane sensibilities, generous. Our lunch arrived on lovely white dinnerware, beautiful against the black and bronze tabletop. The edge of each plate swooped up gracefully, but if you tried to cut a piece of lettuce outside of the 4” center, the plate tipped and banged against the tabletop. The steak salad was served in a beautiful white salad bowl, obviously from the same china line. The sides of the plate were so tall and steep it was impossible to use a knife to cut rare sliced steak. We wobbled and stabbed our way through lunch and it was kind of a relief when the dessert tray came. There were 5 or 6 homey dessert choices, each about 2” x 2” and $2.00 apiece. The Vanilla Flan was flavored with vanilla bean seeds and was so good we wished there had been more. The Nanaimo Bar was as much frosting as cookie, and was just the way we like it. The Tower is beautiful and with all the skating and media hubbub this week it is a fun place to visit. Do yourself a favor and enjoy the restaurant or park in front of the fire with something yummy from the bar. Either way it is a mini vacation right in the middle of downtown Spokane.