Virgil's Cafe - bringing something new to Bellevue!

Friday night was a night on the town with Kate, Scott and John. First on tap was the exhibit at the Taft Museum and then we decided on a bite to eat at Virgil's Cafe in Bellevue.

Bellevue, KY has quite a little downtown - with shops and restaurants lining the cutely lit streets!

Virgil's recently opened and has been getting very good reviews. We had the fortune of chatting it up with Chef Matthew Buschle after our meal...he makes every dish from scratch and is very passionate about his restaurant.

But now - the food!

Well - we started out famously - the bread is amazing! It's warm, fresh and just amazingly delicious! And...yes...the butter was soft!

Fresh pasta, wild mushroom, squash, Parmesan, with rich burre blanc.

The pasta was delicious...definitely fresh...I really loved it! The sauce was nice, light and flavorful. The mushrooms - seemed like buttons and not really "wild" - but were fine. I have to say on the squash - I was thinking more like orange squash but it was basically zucchini. A nice light dish and only $8! (You can add chicken or shrimp for more.) The pasta though - A+!

Green cabbage, romaine, bacon, and red onion hot slaw.

John had already eaten dinner so he just had a salad but it looked delicious! He was pleased and only $4!

Thai pepper and nut crusted pork tenderloin, roasted potatoes, vegetable.

This was okay. The pork was dry and for some reason it had marinara poured over the top of it. Not sure how thai and marinara go together. The potatoes and broccoli were fine but nothing too special. $15

Israeli couscous, wild mushrooms,seasonal vegetables, white beans, and cashews.

First problem here - Scott didn't order this. He asked about this but didn't order it. Second - why is there marinara on couscous? Third - I guess I'm used to a tinier couscous - so we were a little surprised - but that's probably just the "Israeli" version. We each tried a bite and it was okay - but nothing too special. $11

Shrimp Creole with cheddar cheese grits,and fried shoestring sweet potato

This is what Scott ordered - he ordered it spicy. It was fairly spicy...the tails were on the shrimp - which is a pet peeve of Scott's. Hard to take them off when they're in the sauce, etc... The grits were good for grits. I didn't try the fried sweet potatoes and Scott didn't eat can't say much there. This was a pretty decent dish. $14

There were a couple of other issues...I had ordered a starter...

Roasted chicken thigh, chorizo, polenta, and garlic cream. $6

Unfortunately - it came after our main dishes! It had great flavors and a nice presentation (of course I forgot to take the picture). My other problem was the chicken thigh - while flavorful had the bone-in. When a dish is covered with cream sauce and on top of polenta - it's not easy to cut the meat off the bone. It's along the same lines as the shrimp tail...pretty but not user-friendly.

So - there were definitely some hiccups in the service - with Scott's wrong dish and my late dish. The staff was excellent and rectified the situations very quickly - so they do get points for that.

The food - I have to say it was good for the price range. Was it Aqua? Was it Nada? had moments...but wasn't quite up to that standard. I guess that's kind of what I was hoping for...

BUT for the price - it's really good. The thing is - this price point is very comparable with "chain-world" (i.e. Fridays, Applebees, etc...) and this food is much better than "chain-world".

So - all in all - if I'm wanting a unique meal for a better than average price - I'd definitely go back to Virgil's. I mean - mine was only $13!!!!

Virgils Cafe

710 Fairfield Ave
Bellevue, KY 41073
(859) 491-3287

Virgil's Cafe on Urbanspoon


  1. did you go to the fashion in film exhibit at the taft?

  2. yup! the costumes were pretty - they wouldn't let me take pictures though - argh! they were a little stuffy for the fact that there was ZERO traffic there!