19 replies to this topic

[4thgenFolsomite]

Oh, and I was with a party of 6 in the dining area & we could easily hear each other without shooting.

I'm glad to hear you didn't have to shoot!

[Thinkingoutloud]

Can you describe your experience? Was the so-so review because of food (what did you have?), service or both?

I loved the feeling of it, the place was packed and it was a great vibe. My hubby loved the beer selection. There were 2 critical misses:
The Food
I ordered ginger ale because I am not doing caffeine for health reasons. They brought me my drink, which I drank but thought it tasted funny. So I asked about the brand. Turns out it was a 'homemade' ginger ale which is nothing more than sprite with a shot of coke. So, not a caffeine-free drink. What if I had allergies? That could have been a serious problem.
We ordered the appetizer of Irish nachos. They were very good. Good thing we got it, because we didn't see our main entrees for 40-50 minutes. My bangers/mash was delicious, but arrived cold. My Father in law ordered stew which in his word was nothing more than 'hamburger soup'. He never got his Irish soda bread that was supposed to come with it, and when asked, the server simply said, "We're out" and didn't offer a alternative. To our surprise a fresh baked order of it arrived 20 minutes later, which the server never let us know it was coming. My M-i-L ordered the shepherds pie, which was mostly mashed potato. My hubby ordered the fish sandwich. He said the fish was delicious, but served on a barely toasted sliced sourdough bread, which did not suit the heftiness of the fish at all, and it totally fell apart. He said it felt like they had run out of the real bread for the sandwich and had just run across the street to the grocery store and grabbed some sliced sourdough.

The Service
The servers are all very nice and cheery, but *very* inexperienced. They looked and acted completely out of their element and not one experienced wait staff to be found to help coach them through a very busy night. The mgmt didn't seem to be on the floor all that much helping out. When we were seated we were given one menu because they had run out. Not a big deal, we expected them to bring more. The waitress arrived 30 seconds later to take our order and when we told her we were sharing one menu and hadn't made our choices, and hoped for more menus she cheerfully said, "ok!" and we didn't see her (or more menus) for 20 minutes.
All in all our meal took 2.5 hours...way too long.

I think a lot of this will be worked out with some runtime under their belt. I think the bones are there - they just need more refining time.

Also, I did fill out a comment card so the manager was aware of all our thoughts. He comped our dessert as a nod to the difficult experience. Nice touch.

[caligirlz]

I'm glad to hear you didn't have to shoot!

LOL, me too! me too!!! Thanks for the chuckle, I needed that!

[4thgenFolsomite]

LOL, me too! me too!!! Thanks for the chuckle, I needed that!

it made me think of a western when I read it! lol.

[caligirlz]

do they have music? its a wantabe bar unless they have authentic irish songs you can sing to the the one about the Irish Rover

I don't recall any irish-sounding music. We got there at 5, and as the evening wore on, all I could hear was the buzz of conversation around me. Plus, I was with my good buddies so I wasn't really paying attention for musicl

I loved the feeling of it, the place was packed and it was a great vibe.
There were 2 critical misses.

I agree.

The misses I noted were:

• The inexperinced waiters. It was actually funny because ours was totally clueless. When someone asked about a specific item (& I don't remember what), he said that he didn't recommend that c***...or something along those lines. We literally had to coach him on how to talk to the customers, he was so green to waiting. We did have a manager show up, who was very grandiose, but his service was nearly as bad as the waiter. Service was very slow (2.5 hours for a party of 6), but it I don't think our group even noticed because we were enjoying each other's company so much. It was no big deal, then. Now if I had to be back at work by a certain time, then yes, I'd be upset.
• The appetizers. They were all very bland. We had the onion rings, deep fried asparagus & roated veggie platter.

I heard nothing but rave reviews about the dinners ordered: CORNED BEEF AND CABBAGE, MULLIGAN STEW, FISH & CHIPS, PUB BURGER, SLOPPY LAD and CORNED BEEF REUBEN.

And I thought the prices were reasonable, though, now I can't remember. I was happily stuffed when I left. And I'm looking forward to the next time.