A Fabulous Late Lunch on the Patio at Siren Song Wines

I was so delighted to be able to return to Siren Song Wines this week, now that Chelan is carefully opening back up under Phase 1.5!

After doing a couple of wine tastings earlier in the afternoon yesterday, my friend Dawn and I were famished and looking forward to a late lunch outdoors at Siren Song. It started to rain, but being an experienced Chelan vacationer, I knew the rain would pass.

We killed time picking up supplies at Wal-Mart (cheese and crackers for midnight snacks after drinking wine in the evening; plus sunscreen for the bright sunny hot days coming up this weekend) In the fifteen or twenty minutes it took us to shop at Wal-Mart, the rain went away and we knew we could enjoy sitting on an outdoor restaurant patio for lunch.

Siren Song came up with this ingenious system to help with sanitation and social distancing at the restaurant. When you walk up, you wait in line, six feet or more apart from the party in front of you, of course.

You can admire the beautiful gardens and yellow roses while you wait to order.

You’re handed a laminated sanitized wine menu and food menu to peruse while the people in front of you order. (Take a look at Siren Song Wines’ current menu here).

You place your order with a friendly staff member at the front, and pay for it right there. You’re given a side plate and silverware set, and you carry your own water carafe and water glasses out to the table. You’ll be given a table number flag so the food server can drop the food on the correct table.

I don’t remember seeing so many gorgeous yellow roses at Siren Song. Are they new or did I just not pay attention last summer when I was here, because I was distracted by the beautiful views of Lake Chelan?

I was slightly worried that we wouldn’t be able to find a table on the front patio overlooking the water, although the patios in the front gardens are lovely too. Luckily we were invited to go out to the main front patio and select our table.

As you can see, there’s plenty of room between the patio tables – and plenty of tables! I’d been worried we would need a reservation (Siren Song is so popular!), but we didn’t.

There was plenty of open seating near the wood fired pizza oven, too, but naturally most people chose to sit closer to the view of the lake.

We felt bad sitting at a table for five with just two of us, but we knew we’d ordered several different dishes and would need room on the table for all of them. And there were plenty of open tables when we arrived near 4 pm.

Our meal came with delicious fresh baked bread with butter.

Dawn ordered a three glass tasting flight, which began with Siren Song’s excellent Sauvignon Blanc. We enjoyed reading each wine glass’s info card tucked around the stem.

For her starter, Dawn ordered the Bacon Wrapped Dates, and pronounced them the best she’s ever eaten. She was so impressed with this place!

You know how some wedge salads can be just drowned in far too much gooey blue cheese dressing? Not this one! I was impressed by the high quality lettuce, the amount of bleu cheese chunks and cranberries, and generous sprinkling of glazed pecans. (I ordered the salad without bacon since I’m a vegetarian). This salad really is a good deal for the $.

We were excited to try the Greek Olive and Walnut Tapenade on Manchego Crostini and found it delicious – so tasty! It was a little strange that it came, generously and surprisingly, with bacon wrapped dates on the platter – that wasn’t mentioned on the menu description of this starter. I’m a vegetarian and would have preferred to not have that touching my food. Luckily my friend Dawn was there to eat the bacon so it wasn’t wasted – but she’d also ordered a plate of bacon wrapped dates for herself already.

The roasted artichoke was cooked perfectly, and we nearly fought over the delectable aioli you can dip the leaves into.

Dawn enjoyed her Homestyle Mac and Cheese with Chorizo thoroughly. We thought she might take some home as leftovers, but it was just too good. She didn’t have room to share a dessert with me – I was hoping to try the cherry cordial trio!

We took a lingering look at the gardens and patio on our way out to the car. I’m so glad there’s such a fabulous place to take our out-of-town guests and really “wow” them!