2009 Open Table Diner’s Choice Award
“Congratulations! As a tribute to the excellent experience your restaurant provides, OpenTable.com diners voted your restaurant onto the OpenTable Diners’ Choice lists for May 2009. The OpenTable Diners’ Choice lists are designed to give your restaurant additional visibility on OpenTable.com and to inspire new diners to visit your restaurant. The lists are prominently featured on the OpenTable website and are regularly profiled in our Insider email newsletters to local diners.” —Randall Reeves, Senior Director, Client Relations, OpenTable, Inc., May 15, 2009. Read diner reviews for Alex Madonna’s Gold Rush Steak House.
2007 California Beef Backer Award
“The California Beef Council (CBC) announced today that Alex Madonna’s Gold Rush Steak House located at the Madonna Inn in San Luis Obispo has been recognized as the recipient of the 2007 California Beef Backer Award. Established in 2000, the California Beef Backer Award recognizes restaurants that promote beef and the beef industry through innovative menuing, promotions, and delicious beef entrées that draw consumers back time after time. “The Madonna family has created a unique tradition on the central coast that deserves recognition,” said Brad Scott, 2007 Chairman of the California Beef Council. “Alex Madonna was a self-made man with interests in the construction, lumber and cattle industries. He was committed to selling great beef and his family has continued that tradition.” —HF, CBC Press Release, October 2, 2007
1st Place, “Best Dessert” 2008
"Chocolate curls the size of your hands adorn the Madonna Inn’s most famous of desserts. These memorable cakes are layered with whipped cream and Bavarian cream, piled high with frosting, and topped with white-, pink-, or milk-chocolate shavings. The Inn’s dessert menu also boasts cream pies, fruit pies, cookies, French pastries, hot fudge sundaes, and Madonna’s Delight—a local twist on a traditional banana split. But let’s get back to the cakes: black forest, banana nut, pink Champagne, lemon coconut, and apple spice. Plus toffee crunch cake—a gold mine of toffee nuggets clinging to a cliff of cream. And at the Copper Café, you can get just desserts until 10 p.m. or take home endless deliciousness any time of the day." —AR, New Times SLO
1st Place, “Best Meal Where Someone Else Pays” 2008
"If a truly fine dining experience is pleasing to all your senses, then Alex Madonna’s Gold Rush Steak House offers a Fine dining experience (note the capital “F”). First, the eyes are treated to lavish decor. While the nose and ears take in the aromas of grilled filet mignon and the sounds of clinking china, the body is treated to plush upholstery. The mouth has the pleasure of tasting the Stilton cheese endive spears and prime rib it relished ordering. Finally, your sixth sense (about allowing Mr. Big to pay) will be richly rewarded. As one might expect, a Fine dining experience involves more than a few cents. The Madonna Inn’s meals—$33.95 for the French filet mignon, $29.95 for the prime rib, $82.95 for the filet mignon and Australian lobster, $31.95 for the spring lamb chops—are worth every penny. More so if those pennies belong to someone else." —AR, New Times SLO