The Restaurant
Typically I am willing to spend a little more on Dinner than I am on lunch and breakfast, but as always my goal is to try to keep my prices low without sacrificing quality. In researching places to eat for dinner in Boise several restaurants kept popping up repeatedly on every single list, but the one that stuck out to me the most was Fork. Fork is a restaurant that is built into an Idaho Historic Site, The old Boise City Bank Building, and serves farm to table food that features seasonal ingredients that are local to Idaho.
Fork’s motto is “Loyal to Local” and they take that motto to heart and apply it to more than just their food. Not only is their food made completely from locally sourced ingredients, 75% of the drinks that they serve are local to Idaho.
Set in a renovated historic main street bank, the restaurant felt like an upscale version of your neighborhood pub which gives Fork a sense of class.
The Food
The food at Fork is what you would typically see at most modern american gastropubs. This ranges from the Grown-Up Grilled Cheese featuring local cheeses, ham, and house made heirloom tomato jam for 8.95, to fresh caught Idaho Rainbow Trout 18.95, and their prime rib for $32.95 at the high end. I chose the Urban Burger which is their Waygu & ground chuck blend, fork’s special sauce, and Ballard Family Farms White Cheddar Cheese. This burger comes with a side of fries.
All in all this was my least favorite meal that I had while I was in Boise. The burger itself while cooked medium still tasted extremely dry. My guess at this dryness is that Fork may use a mix of ground beef that is leaner than what I typically eat in a burger which caused it to be drier than usual. I also wasn’t a huge fan of the fries. While cooked well, the fries were just seasoned with a sprinkling of Parmesan cheese and were desperately needing copious amount of salt and pepper to give them decent flavor.
It is very possible that it is just their burger that isn’t very great, but the rest of their food is fantastic. I was seated at the bar and everyone around me was raving about the food they were eating. The person next to me ordered the Voodoo chicken and it looked really good.
In total my Cheeseburger ran me $12.95 before tip, but most of their main dishes looked to be around $20-30 and their salads around $13.
Location