We've been here twice; both times in the summer for the early bird menu. My scallops were delectable - the pie was awesome (blueberry-raspberry). The drinks were generous with the liquor and you can't beat eating outside among the flowers. Excellent place and would highly recommend! And thank you to the motel owner at the Northwoods in Beulah who told us about it! read more

Sorry people, having grown up here I couldn't wait to have my honeymoon meal at the Manitou. The server, when I saw her, was friendly. The food was a big disappointment. Starting with the brown salad with slimy spinach and ended with finding moldy raspberries in my drink at the very last sip. My husband had the lamb chops, they seemed a little underdone but were tasty. My trout was good so I'll give them that. No water refills and no ask for any other drink orders throughout the entire meal. When I asked for salt and pepper I was waved at but nothing came. If that made me tacky whatever: I likes me salt and pepper. I promptly left instead of asking for the manager because I was too disappointed to talk or argue with anyone. I called today once I calmed down only to be met with excuses for service and an apology. They did tell me to look them up and have dinner on them should I be in the area again and be willing to give it another try. I'll stop in when I'm back at the end of August or September and see if they honor this offer. If so, and its good, I will happily review this establishment again and I hope I can say something nice... read more

Really, really a let down after being so jazzed up after the other reviews. Maybe its because I don't own a house in the area and therefor don't dine at Manitou weekly but I found the entire experience to be rushed, unfriendly and a rip off. Now that being said, the food was great, the whitefish was cooked perfectly (though not swimming in anything as Ben K said). It was good but debatable if its worth $22. The dried out veggies served with a plastic cup filled with dressing before hand hardly said fine dining to me and the same goes for the bread with land o' lakes butter. The wait staff and hostesses were young, confused. and it was really, really obvious. I should have known when we waited 20 minutes after our reservation and then got seated next to the restroom door. They ran out of anchovies for the ceasar salad and asked us if we wanted dessert before we had even finished dinner, clearly turning tables is very important to them. Now maybe its because my husband and I don't scream "we have money" like some of the other patrons did but it was a big expensive bummer. I'd maybe consider giving them 3 stars because clearly the bar tender does know his stuff, great martini however that alone was hardly enough to recommend Manitou to friend or fellow yelper. read more

CHECK THE ADDRESS! Do Not use Yelp for directions! When entering the address into your devise be sure to add North... as in 4349 N. Scenic Highway ... might be a good idea to add "Honor, Michigan" as well. It's north of Long Lake (which is north of Crystal Lake). Yelp takes you south of Crystal Lake, between Upper and Lower Herring Lake. Nice area ... no restaurant. So you're driving from either direction along M22 ... mile after forested mile ... singing the banjo part to Deliverance ... when you think you've come upon a big traffic accident. There are cars everywhere. Parked both directions on the side of the road. There's no question where you need to go ... it's the only building. And boy is it worth the drive. Especially if you are lucky enough to have Carrie as your server. This young lady fires it back faster than the speed of love. With a wink and a nod, I told her I was the food editor for a fancy downstate newspaper. She didn't miss a beat and told me that I'd better have the Nutty Trout. Shut Up! That wasn't dinner, it was a candy bar! And it was seriously good. The house speciality for desert was the blueberry/raspberry pie. That too was quite yummy. The Manitou is a charming little out-of-the-way find with four small dining rooms and even some outdoor seating. If you're off the beaten path, be sure to stop in and say "Hi!" to Carrie. read more

Excellent food, service good. Unfortunately, google & apple maps are both wrong. Manitou is 9 miles north of Frankfort. Visited 9/1/13

The atmosphere is relaxing and fun. The staff was awesome and the food even better. I would drive past a lot of restaurants to get to the Manitou. I'll be back as soon as possible. I had the perch dinner with sweet potato fries. It was hard to pick a meal, everything on the menu sounded and looked good. read more

Kitchen was very fast. One meal came out cold. We had a great waitress. She got every order correct and on time. There were seven of us so that was quit an order. Drinks were good . Very good wine choices . read more

The service was friendly and the atmosphere nice, but the food was only okay. Both the whitefish and nutty trout were plain, not much flavor. The sweet potato fries were the only thing we really liked. The food is definitely over priced though. read more

Dinner started out great with the clam strips. The perch was salty and when we told the waitress she denied it and didn't even act contrite. The atmosphere is fun and the food was pretty good. Might return . read more

The Manitou was by far our best dining experience in Northern Michigan. Our waiter, Brandon, was excellent and dining on the enclosed patio was a nice touch with the woods surrounding us. The bread was delicious as was the house salad with cherry vinaigrette. The perch was fine. The "nutty" trout was indeed that. I would have liked to try their famous blueberry raspberry pie. The table behind us reserved 3 whole pies! read more

After years of driving by this restaurant on my way to visit my Grandparents who lived in nearby Michabou Shores, it is appalling to me why anyone in their right mind would visit such a disgusting, ridiculously overpriced restaurant. The disappointment was immediate. They served some carrots and celery sticks with a gross bleu cheese dressing to begin. Then came the deep fried frog legs as an appetizer, a rubber toy frog would have tasted better as far as I'm concerned. The fish special, which was deep fried perch, whitefish, and walleye was terrible. There was more breading on the perch than there was perch, all of the fish looked and tasted like it had been sitting in the freezer since last year. It seems like the theme here is just deep frying everything. I am shocked with all the positive comments, I can't stress enough how bad this food was. read more

The food was good, but so over-priced it ruined the meal. The beer alone was $6.00. Really?

I have been vacationing and dining in this part of northern Michigan for many years and I have never been more disappointed than this in a Michigan restaurant. Long waits for every stage of our dining experience, poor quality food and service and prices way too high for this level of dining are the reasons I would have rated it zero stars if possible. My husband, teen daughter and I decided to try this on a Saturday night. I called in the afternoon to try for a reservation and was told that the inside was booked until 9, but that outdoor seating was available on a first come, first served basis. Since it was a nice night, we decided to try our luck and made the long drive, arriving by 7:00. All of the outdoor seating, which is between the front door and the parking lot, was open, but we were greeted by a Hostess with a terrible attitude who made us feel like we should be punished for not making a reservation. She actually made us wait about 10 minutes to be seated, even though every outdoor table was available. We had another long wait before a waitress finally arrived to give us menus, then another wait until she took our drink order. Meanwhile, the Hostess, who was stationed about 5' from our table and who had enough free time to check her phone every few minutes and talk to waiters who came out to check the reservation book, never made any attempt to interact with us, take a drink order, or help in any way. Our waitress did not appear often, but when she did, she did a good job of trying to conceal her stress level, and she apologized for everything being backed up. She said there were a couple of large parties inside and that was holding up the kitchen. We never entered the restaurant during the 2.5 hours we were there so I have no idea how busy it actually was inside, but I worked in fine dining for over 20 years and this excuse did not explain why our drinks took a very long time to appear and why our soup and salad course arrived over an hour after we ordered. When I politely pointed out to the waitress that my daughter's chocolate milk had curds floating in it when she arrived with our cold soup and wilted salad, she said she was sorry, but did not attempt to replace the milk or follow up in any way other than to bring a couple of warm rolls out at 1.5 hours after being seated. Our main course arrived over 2 hours after we did. Because we realized early on that this dining experience was going to drag out, we made a point of ordering things which should have been easy on the kitchen. We ordered the following items... 2 draft beers, 1 chocolate milk, 1 soup, 1 Prime Rib Dinner with potato and salad (runs as a highlighted special every Saturday), 1 coconut shrimp appetizer (as my dinner), and one hot fudge sundae (as my daughter's dinner). That's all we had and it should not have been difficult, yet the milk was bad, the soup was cold, the salad was wilted, the prime rib was extremely fatty and overcooked, and the sundae was very small with cold fudge, plus everything was very late. Our check was $70 before tip, which I don't mind paying for a good meal with good service, but not only were we disappointed in everything, but after calmly and politely explaining our disappointment to the waitress, we were not offered any sort of compensation. Taking the sour milk off the check would have been a nice start. Never going back! read more