That being said--The service this time was absolutely ATROCIOUS. Shockingly so. We had made a reservation, and when we showed up, the restaurant was about half full, and we sat right down. From there, we sat at our table for about 20 minutes without one single staff member saying a word to us--or making eye contact at all, for that matter. Which was annoying to us, but more of a disservice to them, because we could have (and would have) consumed about 15 drinks together in the time we were waiting for anyone to come take our order. After a little bit, we decided to just get up ourselves and get our own drinks at the bar. (The bartender, it should be said, was very accommodating and ended up hustling a lot to make up for the understaffed service team.)
Finally, our waiter came over. (Who, it should also be said, was incredibly nice...I certainly won't attack his personal character. He was totally overwhelmed and the service issues weren't entirely his fault. These seemed intrinsic to the actual management of the restaurant.) We ordered some more drinks (1/2 of which didn't come, 1/2 of which were incorrect), and we decided to order our food right away, since we knew it was bound to take forever.
The burger selection is al la carte for the most part, and when the basic burger starts at $10 and the toppings are $.50-$1 each, it's easy to spend some loot. They do have interesting ingredients (fried egg, local goat cheese, pepperoni, various sauces) and you can choose fries or onion rings included in that price. We ordered.
Then, we waited.
And waited.
And waited.
We were out for burgers and beers. And we were there for just shy of 3 hours.
By the time the food came, I personally didn't even care if it was a burger from McDonald's. We were starving. (Although they did bring us bread, which was kind.) For me, the food was o.k. The onion rings were floppy and tasteless, the burger was (for all it's impressive toppings) not that interesting and messy. For others, the food was real good. The meat was cooked well for most of us, the sauces (which you pay for separately) were really delicious, the krinkle-cut fries were a "pleasant surprise" and the homemade pickles were incredible. In fact, it was said that they were "the highlight of the whole place which was a bit of a disappointment."
And then, the bill. Our waiter (who, may I say again, was a very nice person), seemed to not be paying attention to anything that had happened all night. The drinks were incorrect, we were charged for some that were "given" to us because they were poured wrong for other tables, we were overcharged for some of the food; he ended up printing 4 "drafts" of our bill before we finally just signed and left, wanting to go home and go to bed. The poor guy. He was trying, he really was. And if it were just this one time that the service team had an "off night", I could have gotten over it easier. But this is the 4th (and last) time I'd given it a shot, and each time I'd gotten apologies from the staff about how "slammed" they were...even though some of the tables were empty.
So, unless you have a LOT of catching up to do with an old friend...or a really good date you just want to drag out...or just a whole lot of time to kill before you catch a plane...there are just too many good restaurants in this state to bother with this one.
Scores out of 100
Taste: 74
Atmosphere: 54
Overall Experience: 54
