Sky Bistro - Banff

Delicious food with an amazing view. Secure a reservation early as tables are somewhat difficult to come by lots of folks standing outside waiting for a table without a reservation. Don't forget to book your gondola ticket as well. 3 hours was plenty of time to explore the observation deck and have a meal.

Probably my favourite restaurant in Banff, an absolutely must try. The food is farm to table and it shows in the quality of ingredients. Everything tasted so fresh and delicious. The cocktails are also really cool and they have a pretty neat selection of wine. Dress in something you're ready to take photos in, because the view is spectacular!

My experience here was pretty good honestly, the lead chef came to my table and asked for improvement and that's super great to hear! The food was good but for a fine dining like this I would expect to see more in their menu. It was limited its like either salmon pork or beef dish with salad and limited soup option. I would recommend to either switch your menu or add more options since this location is located at a beautiful top mountain and scenery.

Sky Bistro exceeded my expectations as my first meal in Banff. I planned my first day with a ride up Banff Gondola with dinner added to my ticket. I figured 2 hours of walking around and then eating dinner would be sufficient. One thing to note though is that depending on what you order here, the Gondola+Sky Bistro dinner ticket may end up costing you more if you were to do it separately. With the combo ticket, you get one free appetizer and one free entree. I did the math and I made sure to order the almost the expensive thing on both ends, so I saved some money. I will say they didn 't, for some reason, have my ticket reservation in the system, so I had to wait a little bit for a table. Make sure you make a reservation in some form, otherwise you 'll be waiting a while for a table. For starters, I ordered the Duck Wings. I never actually had duck before and I was interested in trying it, after all American Thanksgiving was a few days away at the time and I needed poultry to simulate Thanksgiving. The Duck Wings were magnificent. Expertly fried to the perfect crispness with a rich, intense flavor. It was tender, and I enjoyed how much fattier it was compared to chicken. The Berry Reduction that was dolloped on my plate was delicious as well and although the 3 dollops were for 3 of my duck wings, there wasn 't enough. Still though, I truly enjoyed the duck even by itself. For my main course, I ordered the Beef Short Ribs. It was a hard toss-up between that and the Bison, but I knew I was going to have steak later in the week. The Beef Short Rib sat on top of pile of potato puree, which in the simplest description is smoother mashed potatoes. On top of the rib were a good portion of chanterelle mushrooms and an ample covering of red wine demi-glace. Next to it was a side of creamed spinach. The beef short rib was hands down, the BEST short rib I 've ever eaten. Between the plump mushrooms, tender beef, savory demi-glace, and luxurious-creamy potatoes, each bite was heavenly. My mouth is watering just thinking about it. It was so good; I was very careful to restrain myself from licking the plate when I was done. The creamed spinach was OK, it seemed more of a puree as well, but I nearly forgot about it because of the short rib itself. For dessert, I selected the apple tart with cinnamon gelato. I 've never had cinnamon ice cream before and it went perfectly with the apple tart. The tart was crispy with slivers of slightly dried, tart apples layered on top. The tart was a little small and I wish it was bigger. The dessert was amazing nevertheless. Last but not least, the atmosphere was amazing. I didn 't sit next to the window, but I sat really close to it. If you can dine here while the Sun is still illuminating the mountains, the view is breathtaking and very romantic.

First of all: rating the restaurant only is hard as it is not accessible without using the gondola which you have to pay extra one way or the other. The restaurant itself is not cheap, the food is good even though the serving size is on the smaller end, but getting there for eating at the Sky Bistro only is ridiculously expensive as the gondola ride alone is around $65 already. The service was very friendly but slow, considering the restaurant wasn 't even 50% booked when I was there. I had to wait more than 15min after I finished my main for a server to show up, clean my table and ask for deserts. On one hand I don 't like the overly fast North American style where you take the last bite and the server is already waiting to take your plate and present you the bill in case you don 't order a desert, but this wait was definitely too much. My table was at one of the windows but as it was dark already, it didn 't make much of a difference: however, the restaurant itself is not too big and feels good. Summary: comp the gondola for people with a reservation who make a minimum order of an entree for example and the value would be more fitting. At the end of the day you end up paying over $150 per person for a gondola, an appetizer, a main and one drink.