Shoeless Joe's Sports Grill — Restaurant in Guelph

My recent visit to Shoeless Joe's was a complete letdown from start to finish. Arriving around 4pm on a not-so-busy Saturday afternoon, I was surprised by the slow service and lack of attention from the staff.

After finally being seated, it took a good ten minutes for our server to even acknowledge our presence. Ordering was another ordeal, as our food took an excruciatingly half hour to arrive. I had ordered a medium rare steak with parmesan fries. What arrived was a slab of leather disguised as a steak—it was so overcooked (well done) that I could barely cut into it, let alone chew it.

To make matters worse, when I finally flagged down our server (after another 5-minute wait), she whisked away my plate of disappointment along with my fries, leaving me staring at an empty table for another half hour. When my meal was returned, the steak was marginally better, but the parmesan fries were inedible. They were overcooked to a brown crisp and drenched in an overwhelming amount of garlic.

Adding insult to injury, I paid over $50 for this subpar experience as the service was equally disappointing. Our server struggled to string together a coherent sentence before rushing off. Despite these glaring issues, I was shocked that no discount or apology was offered at the end of our meal or during it.

As someone who has worked in the restaurant industry, I've never encountered such a combination of poor service and disappointing food. It's safe to say that I won't be returning anytime soon. DO NOT GO TO...

I'm with my family. We had a gift card ordered the steak taco bowl. Never again would I ever. Definitely if I had to compare from Niagara falls to this location. Totally different meat. I actually had steak bites or frites, and they ask you how do you like your meat cook at Niagara falls. But at this location the way they cooked their meat was the same way when you order a Philly cheesesteak. I definitely got the burnt end of all the meat cuz there were so many black burnt pieces in my meal, it was so disgusting that I had to show the waiter but I was so hungry that I did not want to wait another 20 to 25 minutes for my meal. Every time the waiter would walk by she would see me literally taking the burnt pieces out of my mouth and I would show her all the chunk.. and then if she didn't see me take the black pieces out of my mouth, it would be literally on the rim of my plate. I don't understand why it was cook that way when the title of the name of the food is called steak Taco bowl. So I was expecting to have steak and the consistency of all the restaurants to be the same. Clearly I was wrong. Oh and the kicker was they thought that this was acceptable to give to a customer. All the burnt pieces were all over the meat and at the bottom of my plate. What a lovely meal. You either put the actual steak meat or check your meal before you give it out...

Good food, but lack-lustre service.

Went here for dinner with my parents and my roommate, and it was one of the unintentionally-longest dining experiences of my life. We arrived toward the tail-end of the dinner rush on a Wednesday and stood at the front for over 20 minutes before we were seated (shame on us for waiting that long to begin with), all the while watching more and more tables free up and be cleaned.

By the time we sat down at our table, the restaurant was at roughly 50% capacity, yet it was about half an hour until we ordered and almost an hour after that until the food showed up. I give points for the food itself as it was quite good, but we all watched servers and other staff members meandering about the place not seeming to be doing a whole lot of anything while we waited for our food. Needless to say, the wait times and in-house conditions of a restaurant shouldn't cause your customers to be hangry by the time their food finally shows up.

There is perhaps some benefit of the doubt to be given based on the fact that most of the staff appears to be students, but at the same time there are standards to be upheld in food service that simply weren't there on the night...