Sand and Pearl Oyster Bar — Restaurant in Ontario

"We were a family of 14, there to celebrate my mother-in-law's 70th birthday. Let's start with the positives: Cute look to the resto, lovely backyard area with well-distanced picnic tables and lots of land for the kids to run around. I'm afraid that's where the positives stop.As soon as we arrive, we are brought to our picnic tables (which were not as described on the phone to us as "picnic tables together by the fire pit) but as far from the fire pit as tables could be placed. The manager comes outside to move the tables together. Instead of asking his staff to help, he asks "the strong men of the family" to help him, which is "fine". We sit down, look over at the menus and no less than 5 minutes later, the same manager comes over and explains that there is some rule he just remembered about, that we cannot be seated together and must return the tables as they originally were and not even side by side, but front to back apart. That was frustrating, because he should know the rules ahead of time. It's very weird, but we can get over that. We order our food, it takes over 30 minutes to receive our appetizers and we were NOT IMPRESSED with them. The "Caldosa" is ceviche and doritos. It arrives in a small bag of Doritos with the top cut off, the fish and tomatoes swishing around in the bag, we get our hands wet trying to scoop out the fish at the bottom of the bag and the only thing we taste is DORITOS. Not great. Then we wait and wait and wait and wait. No one comes to pick up our finished appetizers for another 45 minutes. Nobody comes to see us. Finally, the manager shows up and we have to ASK him where our food is. He THEN explains that there was a "computer malfunction" when the waitress put in our big order. In the meantime, we have three kids under the age of 5 who are restless, crying and hungry. It doesn't help that while we were waiting, we see EVERY OTHER table that arrived AFTER us being served their food. Why were the kids' meals not served first? I have been a waitress for 10 years of my life, if anyone is sympathetic to wait staff, it's me, HOWEVER, if there is a malfunction or a delay, SOMEONE has to go to the table and INFORM the clients that there is a delay. You don't leave people waiting 1.5 hours after ordering their meal to just sit there, ignored and not serviced at all. The manager profusely apologized, then said the words "I will take care of the bills and I will make sure the kids are served right away". While we wait for our meals, we are then given a few small bags of chips and not one per person either and we had to ask for bread to have SOMETHING to nibble on. The meals come, finally and my $38 lobster roll came with one piece of lettuce and lobster on top on a hot dog bun, the lobster tasted fine, but the sides were a small bag of Miss Vickie's, five little round slices of homemade pickles and coleslaw in a little paper container. My roll just tasted dry and just not "wow". I mean, for $38, I'm expecting just a lot better presentation and content than that. I tasted my husband's fish and chips and the fish was fine, but not a very big piece and the best thing was his french fries.Fries should not be what I remember from an expensive meal. So, while we eat, the manager comes over a few times to "smooth" things over and apologizes, unfortunately, the damage is done. We simply didn't want to be disrespected and ignored. He hears us say we are here for a birthday, so he returns with two shots of premium tequila. Who got to take the shots? THE MANAGER himself and my mother-in-law. I mean, if you want to repair the damage, you bring ALL OF US a shot of tequila. Then, he returns with champagne glasses, because he "made a MISTAKE and opened the wrong bottle". Oh and NOT everyone got a glass of champagne either. "ONLY THE LADIES". I mean, what the hell is that??!! Then he offered three pieces of pie "on the house" . Making people share a pie in covid times is not cool either.  We cannot sit together, but we can share a pie. SMART! Overall just a...

An anti-climactic experience at an establishment that could hold so much promise. We were promptly seated on the front verandah. It is a quaint and comfortable screened in area with a small-town feel. Unfortunately the hot sun was blazing through and had my wife and I soaked in sweat within minutes. A grand on some ceiling fans and bamboo blinds would go a long way to mitigating this seeing as this would be a regular occurrence through the high season. I politely asked for a more shaded spot or something out of the direct sun, however was told they were rammed with reservations and could not accomodate. Interestingly, three of the tables in the shaded part of the verandah sat unoccupied our entire stay. So minus one star for putting zero effort into mitigating the evening sun that is very clearly there throughout the season. We had planned on having a meal but scrapped that due to the sweltering conditions at our table and instead opted for a salad and some oysters. The food was of good quality - the salad was a little light on quantity for the price, but the greens were fresh and the dressing was great. The oysters were reasonably presented and garnished with what counts, however a couple of the had a little more crunch than I'd like and were priced slightly over market. Overall the food seemed good if not a little expensive - too bad it was too hot to enjoy anything more off the menu. It is a popular spot - we watched plenty of people being turned away for having no reservation. Until Richie Rich and his botox/silicone filled wife pulled up in their Range Rover and sweet talked their way into a table without having a reservation (while their poor nanny paced the parking area with their child). Even more disgraceful was that when they complained about the heat in the sunny spot of the verandah, they were promptly reseated out back in the shade - where we were just told there was absolutely no room when we (customers with an actual reservation) were denied the same. So minus another star for that. The third star is for the 4% surcharge for using my credit card instead of cash/debit - sure it is nominal for most that can afford to eat at a place like this, it's that it isn't the norm and wasn't disclosed until we were ready to cash out, and to be honest it felt like a bit of a cash grab during a time in which most businesses won't accept cash and people likely don't have much of it on them. Finally, it seemed we had about seven different servers tending to us at varying times - I'm not going to take a star for that as it simply a preference that I have one person serving me throughout my meal. A great dining experience includes the development of some rapport and/or a relationship between customer and server and that was missing here. The place has potential - I haven't written it off yet. But it needs some polishing to demand the prices they ask. On any other night it might have been a different experience. Tonight, unfortunately for all of us, was a...

We live in the area and had been waiting for an occasion to visit the restaurant with family visiting from overseas. Upon arriving on time for our reconfirmed reservation we were told that no table was available for us and that we could either wait an undefined period or “go someplace else”. When asked if our table had been given to a walk-in customer, the manager (I’m increasingly of the opinion it may have been an owner which makes our experience even more shocking - had she been a member of my staff I would have dismissed her on the spot!) replied “probably” and shrugged. When then asked if she thought that was acceptable she grew irate, gestured to our conversation with her hands and replied “do you want to know what I find unacceptable, this”. We were all taken aback by her rudeness and hostility and sadly, a situation that a competent restaurant manager could have dealt with, escalated into unpleasantness the likes of which none of us has ever experienced before. It’s one thing to be stressed during a busy service period but it is quite another to take that out on customers that are not responsible for that stress. No form of apology was ever offered, no explanation ever attempted. Whilst we are pleased that the restaurant is doing well there is absolutely no excuse to treat potential paying customers in the way we were treated. Their “go someplace else” / couldn’t give a damn attitude might be something they can get away with when riding a wave of popularity in a large city ( they run a restaurant in Toronto so are cashing in on the boom being experienced here in the County ) but I suspect it won’t ultimately serve them well here. Finally, the restaurant chose to mark our reservation on OpenTable as a ‘No show’ - no doubt to ensure our inability to review our experience on that platform....it makes me wonder if there might not be a pattern here...take piles of bookings you cannot fulfil knowing that on a busy weekend you’re options are limited so you’ll “just have to wait”. As it happens, we were able to secure a table at The Agrarian in Bloomfield ( quickly followed by at least three other parties we had seen waiting at Sand and Pearl! ) where we had a great meal in a friendly environment...