St Dave's Diner — Restaurant in Kawartha Lakes

Extremely slow, RUDE service! I had been going to st Dave’s since before he burned down his second location. Servers were usually not very friendly, but I usually ignored it. The last time I was there the service was atrocious! The waitress, before saying ‘good morning’ or ‘hello’, pointed at our table from the door and barked “at the back against the wall!”! We sat down where we were directed and then the waitress came over and asked us what we wanted to drink…I’ve never felt more unwelcome at a restaurant. It was like I was at her door in the middle of the night begging for a drink after waking her up. We watched as 2 people who came in AFTER us got their food, finished eating and LEFT before we were asked if we wanted a refill on our dry, empty coffee cups. When our food finally came, my son asked for an orange juice, to which the waitress rolled her eyes (she thought nobody saw, but I did), then asked if anyone wanted anything else. My son who was right beside her said “an orange juice please “. She then bent down and made rude googly eyes and said (like my son was stupid) “ONE ORANGE JUICE….does…anybody….ELSE …need …anything…?” as she moved her Karen face back and forth right in the 2 peoples faces that were closest to her. As I was paying I told the waitress that I’ve been coming to the restaurant for over 12 years and the food is always good, but the service was bad, today was worse than any other day, and it was bad enough for them to lose a 12+ years customer. She literally told me that nobody cares, then she said that I was the only person who complained “one of a million”! I stated, firmly but professionally, the issues I had. The waitress that rolled her eyes at my son, then stuck her face in ours, came over to try and get up in my face and started explaining WHY she rolled her eyes, while raising her voice…Like there was a good enough reason for treating a customer like that 🤷‍♂️. I paid, left no tip, went to my truck and made a phone call. While I was sitting there the owner came out and was rubbing his eyes like a baby asking if someone was crying! I told him if this is how he deals with customer complaints that he was an idiot. He then called me an idiot, accused me of throwing food on the floor, told me to “FUCK OFF” and gave me the middle finger. I’m 50 years old, I’m not some kid. My complaints were legitimate and that is how they treated me and my family....

My family and I went on a day trip to Lindsay on Monday April 22nd and after looking up restaurant reviews here on Trip Advisor I decided to take my family here for brunch. As soon as I stepped through the door, I should have trusted my gut and just turned around and left. No warm greetings here, the older waitress looked at me with a scorned look on her face and asked how many people then showed us our table, which was on the right side of when you walk into the bigger room. She then asked us what we wanted to drink while we sat down. She brought us our drinks then asked if we were ready to order, I told her not yet and again she gave me her scorned look and rolled her eyes. Thankfully the younger, happier and much much friendlier waitress came back to our table and took our orders. She was very nice & accommodating. Then the older waitress came with our food orders. The supposed eggs benny with black forest ham had some weird sauce on it, which I would not consider to be hollandaise sauce. It was kind of watery, and plasticky tasting...it must have been made with margarine and not butter. The orange juice tasted chemically. The coffee was disgusting and so was the green tea, suffice it to say, we never got refills on any of our drinks. The food was ok at best. The place was filthy. The window where the waitresses were picking up their orders from was disgustingly dirty, looks like they don't really clean anything in there, except kind of the top of the tables when a customer has left. Looks like there might even be black mold where the floor meets the walls all around. We've never been there before, nor will we ever return. I think next time I will also check Google reviews more than Trip Advisor, as my family showed me afterwards that the Google reviews are more recent and also some of those customers seemed to have the same issues as us. They also had very rude service from a particular older waitress. I guess this place is loved by older locals who go here as regulars, and they must be the ones who are giving rave reviews about this place as well as family and friends. In my opinion, this place should not be definitely rated number 2 out of all the restaurants in Lindsay...should be more towards the bottom of the list until they fix their...

Had brunch at St. Dave's with my family this morning and it was not a great experience. When the food arrived I wanted to order a second drink as I had just finished my first one, and the waiter very quickly asked if others at the table needed anything and left in a huge hurry after only 2 people had placed an order, leaving me no chance for mine. Upon returning to the table, someone else wanted another drink and just as I was about to request the same thing, he zipped away again. When he came back, I was finally able to ask for my drink... and he very "politely" patted me on the back and said "It's gonna be a while". (Politely is in italics as I could very much tell he was annoyed at my request, despite it being his own fault I could not get my order in the last 2 times he was at the table). And then, just to top it all off, my drink was never delivered. We sat there for 30 minutes and nothing came. I had to get a water bottle out of my car just to wash down my meal. Heck, a waitress who wasn't even looking after us had to come over to see if we wanted the bill. Like, I get it, it's a busy place, the wait would have been totally understandable, but maybe make sure everyone at the table is taken care of before rushing away, and if someone happens to get missed for whatever reason, the least you can do is be pleasant with them. Really not a great experience. The food was...