We had an OK lunch at Tides Restaurant & Pub. Tides is located on Nahant Beach, about 30 minutes northeast of Boston, on the North Shore. The food was fine, service was good, and the view was nice.
Tides' dedicated parking lot was full so we parked for free on adjacent Wilson Rd.
Tides says "reservations are strongly recommended." Our large group of eight got lucky and was seated almost immediately on a Thursday around 1pm. Seating was tight, however, as eight of us had to squeeze in at a single picnic table. The picnic tables on Tides' porch are better suited for six people each. Not a big deal, but it was a bit uncomfortable. The restaurant was busy on an ordinary Thursday afternoon.
Tides has a sizable freestanding building and outdoor patio (porch). They also have keno. This place has been around for 25+ years. The atmosphere was casual. You do need to put a shirt over your swimsuit if you're coming from the beach. In this sense, it's not a super-casual beach bar.
During our visit, the menu had a fairly extensive selection of drinks (full bar), seafood, salads, sandwiches, burgers, pizza, and desserts. Most of our group got beer and lobster rolls. The lobster rolls were on the specials menu. There were two varieties, Lobster Salad Roll and Just Lobster Roll. They were $28 each. Our group got both. Both came with 5 ounces of claw, knuckle, and tail lobster meat on a toasted hot dog bun with a side. The Lobster Salad Roll came with diced celery and mayo while the Just Lobster Roll came plain with drawn butter (melted butter). I'm allergic to lobster so I didn't try one. The rolls looked fresh, delicious, and filling and everyone who ordered one seemed to enjoy it.
I had some of the Sweet Chili Glazed Fried Calamari ($16), ordered one of the Baked Scallops entrees for myself ($34), and also had a slice of a large Pepperoni Pizza ($16 for large pizza, +$1 for pepperoni) and some Beer Battered Onion Rings ($4). Everything tasted OK/good. The fried calamari wasn't anything out of the ordinary, but one thing that made it different to me was it came with sweet red peppers. I've eaten a lot of fried calamari appetizers and this was the first that had lots of sweet red peppers included. A unique touch.
The Baked Scallops came with my choice of two sides. I chose coleslaw and grilled asparagus. The sides were average. The slaw was mayo-based. The asparagus spears were too chewy, but tasted fine. The Baked Scallops were interesting. It was basically a bowl of scallops, breadcrumbs, and butter. Lots of butter. Simple. Not bad, but not great either. It's not something I'd order again. There were plenty of scallops, so they didn't skimp on the portions. The Pepperoni Pizza was A-OK. Again, nothing out of the ordinary. Just reliable, run-of-the-mill pizza. Like the pizza, the Onion Rings were par for the course. Someone commented that they tasted frozen, not fresh.
Our server was friendly, had a good attitude, and did a nice job handling all of our orders (including more beer) and water refills. read more