This cute little tavern definitely has potential. We had family visiting and we decided to bring them to the Botanical Gardens for their Gardens Aglow. We purchased tickets in advance for 6pm. A couple of us had a drive of 1-1.5 hours so we decided we would eat dinner in the area so we would be close to the Gardens. I called ahead to see if I could make a reservation for 9. I wasn't sure if they required it and how busy they would be that early in the day. I tried to schedule a reservation for 4-4:15pm. The hostess was polite, at first she thought she could make it work and tried accommodating but determined that she could only fit us in at 3:30pm or 7pm. I explained to her that I lived in Standish and was an hour and a half away, so 3:30pm would not allow for enough travel time and I had to let the rest of my party know. I almost decided to try a different restaurant since we all had a long drive home. I went ahead and made the 7pm reservation.
We arrived and they were ready for us. We did wait a little bit before our waitress came to take our drink order. The restaurant was busy so it was to be expected. When she did finally take our order she went around the table and did not take my husbands drink order. We dismissed it at first thinking maybe she was overwhelmed. I caught her attention as she walked by to order a beverage for my husband and she apologized. It was pretty cool when one of the brewers themselves delivered the beer.
Several of us also ordered water with lemons, after the drinks were delivered we had to ask for water again. Out of 4 of us who ordered water, only 2 got water with dinner.
Once our drinks finally arrived, she took off for a little while. When she came back we started to place our orders. My nice is a vegetarian, and ordered first. She ordered the veggie burger on the menu and the waitress informed us that they were already out of it. She recommended a salad or a pizza after I let her know that she was a vegetarian. I ordered a salad with steak tips and apparently they were out of steak too. She informed me I could do chicken or haddock on my salad. Neither of which I wanted to eat at the time. I ordered their Committed pig pizza, cute name and it looked like it would be pretty good. We asked if we could get a small side caesar salad. Everyone else ordered burgers and we had to order fries on the side. It seemed like they were out of a lot of items on the menu by the time we arrived.
It was about 8pm by the time our dinners made it to the table. Once our food arrived it didn't all come out at the same time. The Pizza's came out first, my nieces vegetarian pizza had a burnt crust all the way around. My pizza and my nieces pizza was mostly red sauce, mine had chunks of feta and hers had chunks of Buffalo mozzarella. But we both expected there to be more cheese on the pizza since Cheeses was listed on the menu. It was different, but not what we were expecting. The burgers arrived next and as everyone bit into their burgers we realized 2 out of the 4 burgers did not have bacon. We waited for my mother's order, she ordered a beet salad and was the last meal to make it to the table.
The kids decided they wanted desert so we ordered a brownie sundae, beignets, and a couple of mini treats. They ran out of one of the mini treats and brought out an alternative without even asking ahead of time if it was a suitable replacement.
We asked for the bill and she put us all on the same bill. We waited such a long time for everything we decided we would not ask her to split it. After carefully inspecting the bill we were charged for bacon on all 4 of the burgers(even though we only got bacon on 2), we got charged $9 for 2 full sized caesar salads instead of 1/2 that for a smaller side caesar(the salads we received were not $9 worth or a dinner sized salad). It wasn't unexpected to have the tip included in the tab. After receiving a bill for $380 I would expect better service and better food. The service was slow, they were out of a lot of items on their menu, they charge extra for things like french fries with their burgers(and it's $7 as an appetizer, not a side of french fries), they charge you full price for a small side caesar salad. The restaurant was cute, we were impressed with the beer selection. My sister lives in Thomaston so we travel through town, but there are plenty of other places in town to choose from. If you are looking for a place to have a nice brew this is a cool spot to stop at. But if you are looking for reasonable service and a nice meal I would try one of the many other places in town. read more