My Favorite Critic

There's a ton of miscommunication and entitlement in this industry. Some guests will walk through the door and expect to be treated as if they just got crowned the Queen of England but you as a simple server has to understand the guest is always right. In the case of this negative google review that is exactly what we had to do.

Rating : 2 Stars

a year ago From the outside this place looks nice and seemingly small. Inside it is dark and very big ..and BUSY! For me, being busy usually means great food, great service, and something that indicates it is different from the rest. This was not the case here. Accessibility is awful. As a low vision person, bathrooms were hard to find and there were obstacles in hallways (chairs) and such close tables it is hard to maneuver. Besides this fact, the restaurant was LOUD. It was loud due to all the talking and people eating and cavorting. This is definitely not the place for a quiet sit down meal. At least not today. This was a blessing in disguise for us as we have 5 kids that we were traveling with, and our twin 2 yr old boys were being less than cooperative. On to the food...The food is on a smaller selection menu. Lots of fish and pasta. The cost was in the higher mid range. I ordered a capital city salad along with a bowl of soup and my kids had things like buttered noodles, grilled cheese, hamburger/fries, etc. The hubby had BBQ Pork tacos. The quality of the food and our service is where the 2 star rating comes from. The soup had a rather large bay leaf in it. In all my cooking experience this is NOT an acceptable practice as this poses a serious choking hazard and should always be removed before serving. As a person of low vision this was dangerous! Additionally, my husbands tacos were completely dry and did not come with BBQ sauce although that is what the menu indicated. He literally had to ask for BBQ sauce. Not to mention they were lukewarm at best which is not how pork should be served as this can also become a dangerous situation, serving food that is not warmed thoroughly or kept to temp to remove or deter bacteria. My salad was warm and the lettuce seemingly lifeless with no crunch. Not very appetizing, which was sad because it sounded so good on the menu. Our server was slow, and also did not know the menu very well. She had to ask management if drinks were included with the children’s meals. Overall, I would never recommend this restaurant or visit it again. It was a very bad experience for us as this was our first meal visiting Petoskey. *We did inform management of the tacos, salad, and soup and were given an apology and taco and salad was refunded.

This review punched me in the gut . I was one of the two managers on to begin with, not the one this family had talked to but I do remember them very clear. This family was a family of five with three kids that would not stop running around our back dining room. Our servers were dodging them and one even ended up in our kitchen running from the mom; ironically the one who left this review. She seemed to have forgotten that we were very patient with them. I analyzed this review so many times to get to the bottom of what might have been avoided during their stay and this is what I concluded. Karen started out by stating that this restaurant was nice but seemed small from the outside. Yes it looked like a basic building from the outside, once you walked in there was a hallway that took you back to the 400's; our back dining room. This is where they were sat and yes the lights may have been dimmed down but not to the point of no visibility, when creating a safe services scape for both our guests and staff. She then continues on to talk about our food. She ordered the Capital City Salad; we do not have that. Her husband ordered the BBQ Pulled Pork Tacos; we do not have that either. The salad she is referring to is the City Park Salad which she could not stop talking fondly about! And believe it or not, if you looked at the previous menu, the "BBQ Pulled Pork Tacos" were an app special and we not in fact BBQ Pulled Pork Tacos, they were our Pulled Pork Tacos with a cold salad on top and served with a lime wedge. She once again was incorrect and made us out to be the bad guys. This is a prime example of the saying A guest is ALWAYS correct.

Though we did refund her for the made up items, we are a fine dining establishment; we set our expectations high for our service, food, and venue and we follow through with that within our training. The building has a lot of fun history to be known. It was in fact a hot spot during the prohibition era, there are tunnels downstairs that had been filled in by city ordinance. The doors are flipped upside down but all original and there is a guard that stands there waiting for the password without missing a beat. I will go into greater detail about this restaurant on a later date but for now guests just have to understand that they can ruin some establishments because of what they post. It is the internet and nothing is gone forever.