I've been to The House at Secret Garden a few times for private events. The area is absolutely gorgeous but their food & service is just mediocre. \n\nOne event I went to was in the patio & sun room, and the other was in the urban barn. The patio was very nice but the room is a standard plain white room.  The urban barn is cute from the outside but the inside is a little janky. The ceiling and beams are unfinished ugly wood with the manufacturer stamps still visible and spray painting...they could have at least stained them a neutral brown. There are faux wooden beams painting on the wall. Not that impressive, but the area outside (we had cocktails under the carob tree) is beautiful.\n\nThe food and service is a different story. One of the meals was catered by Santa Barabara catering and it was fantastic. If you're hosting an event here, I recommend going with a buffet from the catering company. The other meal was a sit down, pre-selected 3 course dinner. The kitchen/servers had zero coordination. One person out of the table would get their hot entree a good 10 minutes before anyone else got theirs. It was near impossible to get beers and was impossible to get a refill of water. I thought the food was disappointing. I had:\n\n- Goat Cheese & Beet Salad: By far the best thing I had. Great dressing, yummy goat cheese, fresh greens. \n- Vegetarian Trio: So small and just okay. The grilled eggplant was very soggy and the tomato jam it was topped with was far too sweet for an entree. The arancini ball was delicious but I only got one...for my entree. If there had been 3 then it would have been a meal.\n- Chocolate Cake with Fudge, Fleur De Sel Caramel, & Buttercream Frosting: Amazing sounding description but one of the worst desserts I've ever had. The cake was so dry and barely had a chocolate flavor. There was about a tablespoon's worth of frosting and not even a teaspoon of caramel. So so dry and lacking the richness or flavor of a chocolate dessert.\n- Bread Pudding: Much better than the chocolate cake but still average.\n\nIf you're planning on hosting an event at The House at Secret Garden, I recommend trying to make it as outdoors as possible (prettiest) and not using their in house catering.