Looking through all the 5 star reviews for this place, I've begun to realize that most of these people probably think McDonald's is 5 stars...
I recently moved into the neighborhood and have been anxious about trying this place due to the bi-polar nature of the reviews (either 1-2 star or 5 star) and the fact that, after living in Tempe for over a decade, no one has recommended, let alone even mentioned this place to me.
After visiting yesterday, it has all become clear to me.
This place should change it's name from Pier 54 to Pure Diarrhea.
First of all, let me get the positives out of the way. The spot itself is cool, with a great view of the lake and good sized bar, and since it's outside, it's one of the few bars you can smoke at if you're into that. They also had an ok tap. Not that many selections, but they had church music from the shop, Odell IPA, and some other reasonable mainstream craft... This got them the extra star solely.
The bad:
Someone needs to clean this place. I know it's outside, but once my family and I sat ourselves, I started looking around and the dishevelment became apparent. Fans had think layers of crusted dust on them, sweeping seemed to be an after thought, menus were dirty and water warped, canopy was all out of wack, layers of dust all over anything attached to the metal ceiling part... Just gross. I swear I could hear Gordon Ramsey in my head saying "fucking disgraceful".
The service was spotty. At first, it took 10 minutes to get anyone's attention, and they just dropped off a menu and dipped before I could order a beer. Another 10 minutes and I got my beer order in. Eventually more servers showed up (like 4 more) and things got a little better, but just a little... Don't know if it was right in the middle of a shift change, but even when fully staffed my second beer was forgotten but then remembered after the server brought our food out.
The ugly:
The food.
Terrible is an understatement, and on top of that it's expensive. Everything on the menu is $3-$4 more than it should be:
$12.50 for 8 disgusting wings that made me nearly ruin my pants later on that evening...
Here's some perspective on other places that are actually good:
Four peaks, $12 for 10 and they're amazing
Teakwoods, $12.99 for 12 and they're bomb
$12.50 for a lackluster hummus plate with 1 pita and celery and carrots. The hummus was definitely store bought or purchased premade through their distributor, because of this, this was honestly the best thing we had.
$12.50 for 4 soggy ass chicken strips. This had promise, but the execution was botched completely. Oil must have been under temp because these were floppy and wet. They weren't dredged properly, so the batter just slid off.
We didn't order one, but they want $14.50 for a burger. This has to be one of the most expensive burgers in Tempe, and I would bet money it's also one of the worst.
At the top of every page is their menu they have a message (this is verbatim):
"Great food takes time to prepare, and we are very serious about our food!
Please check with your server prior to ordering, if you have time constraints. Thanks for understanding."
First of all, cough cough bullshit cough cough.
Extra comma and unneeded capital letter aside, poor grammar gives me great pause when on menus, this really just reads to me like, "we know our kitchen sucks, is mad inefficient, and have received a lot of complaints about it as well as our slow service, so instead of fixing the problem, we're just going to put this message on top of every page of the menu".
I could not have been more disappointed with the food here. The absolute worst food experience I have had in 2018, and the worst $60 I've wasted as well.
I still may come by and grab a beer at the bar and stare at the lake ever so often just due to the close proximity of this joint to my house, but that's it.
Bottom line: if you're hungry, run as fast as you can away from this place. read more