The Merchant Tavern

My wife and I were celebrating our anniversary. The meal was very good well proportioned and prepared to our order. Service from our server was excellent as was the wait time to be seated and the wait time for our appetiser and entrée servings . He was very attentive and kept coming back to see if we were satisfied with everything or needed anything further. Presentation of our meal was excellent. I have couple bits worth noting: Your menu is very limited. While our reservation was booked well in advance the lady on reception greeted us with "we are overbooked so you will have to set at the bar", however, that was quickly resolved and we were seated at a table. In the meantime there were open tables all the while we were in the restaurant. Your prices are higher than expected. We had no drinks, shared an appetiser and a desert and had 2 entrees. Total all in cost $145.00.

Fantastic food, great venue, great atmosphere! Pleasure to dine here

The bistro style menu is a bit limited but the food is outstanding and the ambience is superb. Certainly the menu and service are the equal of any similar venue in larger cities. St. John's itself is incomparable.

The 5 course tasting menu was an amazing way to celebrate our 27th wedding anniversary. The food and service were on point.

The restaurant is nicely laid out and feels trendy, the staff are all welcoming and accommodating. I wasn't surprised to see the high prices of entrees, what I was disappointed with was the serving size. I ordered the cream corn agnalotti from the dinner menu, when it arrived it was hardly an appetizer portion, and at 29 dollars, not good value. I ended up going to the taco place down the street for second dinner. I'm a large guy, it would have been appreciated if the server gave me a warning that the portion was so small. On the other hand my wife's spaghettini was cheaper and quite large.

The food was amazing as were the special drinks and deserts that were recommended.

I want to give a shout out to Kate who was exceptional. Her attention to detail and level of service provided was the best ever.

Definitely return to The Merchant Tavern on our next trip to St. John's.

Nice environment but the quality and lack of taste in the food was not worth the high price.

Meal was delicious and they were able to accommodate dairy and gluten allergy for brunch ! Service was lovely

Family dinner/ reunion

Stupendous atmosphere and food was spectacular- my husband said the chowder was the best he’s ever had. Fun watching the chefs preparing food in the open kitchen.

Had a 1:00 booking and got in a bit early on a Friday lunchtime. Service friendly but time for food to arrive was a bit slow - kitchen seemed to be taking a bit of a break after a hectic lunch hour. When food did arrive it was delicious - the smashburger was juicy and cooked perfectly, the fish and chips fresh and moist.

Superb food, excellent service. Loved sitting in the vault.

Had a great meal for my girlfriends bday and Shona was our amazing server !

Overall a great experience, beautiful fresh seafood.

I emailed ahead to confirm that the restaurant offered a vegetarian version of their tasting menu. After the restaurant confirmed, I made my reservation. But, when we arrived and ordered -- we were told the vegetarian tasting menu was not available. And, there is only one vegetarian dish on the menu. So, our evening out became much less special than planned.

I wish Merchant would offer more vegetarian options.

We ordered the $85 tasting menu that includes 1 appetizer, 1 pasta, 1 seafood, 1 meat, and 1 dessert. The served the cheapest ingredients on the menu, meaning salmon (instead of) cod for the seafood dish, and pork (instead of steak or duck) for the meat dish. Although they taste okay, but def not worth the $. I would say it probably worth $50 ish.
If you have 2 or more people, you are better off ordering from the regular menu and share.

Appetizer biscuits were never brought out. Sever was pretty absent and had to be reminded to bring the second round of drinks as they had also been neglected. Our mains were delicious and the spirit smash cocktail was tasty.

Celebrated our elopement here. Food was delicious. Service was great. Enjoyed a lobster starter, amazing pork and cod and a delicious chocolate mousse profiterole. Will return when we are next in St. John’s.

Incredible meal, great service (albeit they initially wanted to seat us at a kitchen countertop in a half-empty restaurant but after declining the location, they did eventually accomodate us at one of the 5 open, two-person tables.

We had made a reservation for 5 PM on a Thursday. We were seated within a few moments and our server was there shortly. Service was friendly and efficient. Finished items were cleared in a timely manner. No question that the food was excellent and portion size was good.

On the whole a great place!

Great tasting menu if you're up for it. Not the cheapest way to go, but very enjoyable with excellent wine pairings.

To say this was outstanding does not do justice to the phenomenal experience we enjoyed at The Merchant Tavern. We treated ourselves to the five-course Chef’s Tasting Menu with wine pairings. The variety of flavours, textures and colours were extraordinary and the service we received from Jeremy and his team was superlative. My only regret is that my home in Vancouver is so very far from this amazing restaurant.

This food here has always been good but this meal has kicked it up a notch. Someone in the kitchen has been paying attention and it shows. Thanks all, and thanks to Bridget for great service!

We heard amazing things about the Merchant Tavern. My partner has celiacs disease and we contacted the restaurant prior to visiting to confirm if they could accommodate. They mentioned that most items on the menu could be made gluten free. I ordered the Ragu Rigatoni (which was delicious), however way overpriced at $28. My partner had a hard time finding a good option. The fryer is not dedicated and has cross contamination so fries weren’t an option. The sandwich bread replacement was the sad grocery store Gf option, which is not worth paying $18+ for a sandwich. So he was left with salad or expensive pasta (they do make GF pasta, but it’s all $29 at lunch). He opted for a salad, got the Caesar, which looked and tasted fantastic. However, the $14 salad was TINY, just a wedge of lettuce, and they had no safe GF protein options to make it into a meal. Quite disappointed they couldn’t better accommodate GF and the prices for lunch were too expensive. Service however was fantastic. Our server was so friendly and attentive.

Made a reservation two months in advance but given a high table next to the bar backs area that made us feel as if we were on show…. Not a great first impression but remedied very quickly.
Our server Bridget was amazing and made us feel very comfortable.
Food was outstanding!
The beer selection was good example of local microbrew offerings… which we’re not fussy on but, not your fault.
Thanks for a great evening.

It was good

Beautiful restaurant. Food was amazing. We’ll be back

The meal was delicious and the service was wonderful. I will be back again.. hopefully soon!

Consistently great every time I visit! I look forward to my next meal at Merchant.

Everything was delicious,as usual! The oysters were so fresh I swear they were right from the sea. We had the cod as our main. It was an innovative take on traditional fish and potato. The gnocchi and pork lardons were the perfect accompaniment to a perfectly cooked and generously sized portion of cod. The pesto just put the flavour over the top! Love the whole environment here. Never disappoints.

The usual A level service dropped to a B last night. We had a reservation and were asked to leave so the next reservation could have the table, we were never given a time limit. Service staff were not of the usual standard. Please remember this was good just not their good. Food was their good and I will recommend you try The Merchant Tavern.

The food was bland and the service was the worst I've had in recent years at any restaurant. Turns out it was a pop-up taco night which was nice, but maybe that means "take the night off" for Merchant? All of the food was cold, the lamb taco was bland with no seasoning, tasted like cardboard and we could have got a better one from a frozen costco pack (the complimentary tortilla chips were from there I believe).

The server didn't bring sharing plates when the food was coupled onto plates together, brought one drink and another arrived later, and they forgot the order of one person and the drink of another. Extra food also arrived which we didn't order.

The server was not around for the majority of the meal, and the bills were also wrong. I don't blame the server since it all starts at the top, but from start to finish, the worst meal I've had and won't be going back any time soon.

Family outing.

Amazing food for a special occasion. A bit expensive but worth it!

Would have been nice to have salad options or soup as it was 1:00

Great brunch! Eggs Benedict were delicious, service was great. Price point was on the high side but worthwhile for the level of quality.

Went there for my 60TH birthday. Had a fabulous dinner.
Great server, great cocktails, great ambience and great food.
A perfect special dinner, to end a wonderful day.
Tuna Tartare, steak frites and creme brûlée were excellent.

Great food and service. A varied menu with lots of choice. The chicken liver appetizer is outstanding, and I really enjoyed the steak frites.

Fantastic meal as always. Enormous amount of food!

The cod was AMAZING