Published by Jeremy. Last Updated on March 12, 2020.
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If there is any staple restaurant for higher-end seafood in the Strip District, it is most certainly Luke Wholey's Alaskan Grille. While this one is known for its entree-style seafood dishes, the menu is also complete with sushi, sandwiches, and more which gives a number of options for any guest.
Naturally, we tried a bit of them all when visiting.
Sandwiches and Sushi are Decent Options at Luke Wholey's
To get a mix of the menu, we opted for one order of sushi, a sandwich, and a more traditional seafood entree.
As a starter, we ordered a basic sushi roll, the Sake Salmon, which came with six pieces of salmon and rice. We'll be the first to note that this one is not a specialty roll (the restaurant does have a large menu for these), and were simply bites that really highlighted the flavor of the salmon over anything else.
From there, we moved on to the Steel City Lobster Roll. This one was a loaded lobster roll topped with ample garlic butter, lobster bisque, creme fraiche, and in true Pittsburgh fashion, fries (which made the fries also served on the side a bit unneeded).
The first thing that jumped out at us, other than the fries part, is that this one is loaded with lobster. We'd almost go as far as saying even more so than other restaurants in the city. But, since this is lobster, it is also a bit expensive for what you get (as is also the case just about anywhere). The lobster bisque added a nice contrast onto the sandwich overall, but I would say that I would opt for the more traditional lobster roll on the menu next time as the fries on top were unneeded and added little to the dish.
While I would say that these two dishes were generally good, the real winner of this outing was our entree- the Crab-Stuffed Salmon.
Go for the Seafood Entrees Here
We had heard about the glories of Luke Wholey's Crab-Stuffed Salmon for a long time, and comments our waitress made about it after we ordered confirmed our suspicious- this one is a crowd favorite.
This one is a generously sized piece of salmon, stuffed and topped with a mound of crab, covered with a soy ginger and honey glaze, and served with fingerling potatoes and kale. That ingredient list alone was enough of a sell for us, and it ended up being a rather delicious dish as most all of the flavors melded together with the perfectly cooked salmon.
The word most is a keyword here, as our only complaint with this one was that the glaze was seemingly poured on top of everything at the end and overpowered the crab flavor a bit too much for our liking. We would've much preferred the glaze was added only to the salmon before plating to allow the crab flavor to shine, but otherwise this was a fairly solid dish all around.
Overall, we walked away from Luke Wholey's pretty happy with our meal, but not too blown away on any one item at the same time. I have to admit that if we were looking for fast and reasonably priced seafood in the Strip, we may go to other spots. But for higher-end plated dishes in the neighborhood, we'd definitely return here.
Luke Wholey's Alaskan Grille is located at 2106 Penn Avenue in the Strip District.
For more restaurants in the Strip District, check out our neighborhood guide at the previous link!
