The Wreck at Colchester Harbour — Restaurant in Town of Essex

Went here as a party of 4 on Sat evening, March 24, 2024. Initial arrival was good. Got a table by the window but had very limited room to sit down. People at the tables on each side of us were encroaching in our space making things very uncomfortable. Once they left, we rearranged the tables to allow us to have more room to sit. We got our drink order fairly efficiently and ordered our food. My friend and I both got the same meal, the Wrecked Nashville (spicy chicken sandwich with fries), my wife got the pizza burger and my friends wife got the Reuben. They were busy and after our drinks were finished, we were told that our food order would still be a bit longer so the ladies ordered another round of drinks. Apparently the normal cooks that work there didn't come into work, making the owners have to do chef duties. Fair warning, there's a reason that owners HIRE chefs and don't cook themselves. Our food finally began showing up about 30 min after we ordered it. My wife got her pizza burger (didn't have mushrooms or peppers on it like it should, but instead had lettuce and tomato), my friends wife got her Reuben on completely burnt rye toast, and my friend got his wrecked Nashville chicken sandwich and fries. Our server informed me that despite her writing down on the ticket "Wrecked Nashville X 2", the cooks didn't make 2 of them, they only made one. My server brought me an empty plate and steak knife and said I could cut my friends chicken sandwich in half and eat half his fries until my meal came. That's what we did. My meal finally came and I cut my chicken sandwich in half while I hit started eating my fries. After I cut it, I happened to look at the inside of the chicken breast and it was completely raw. I told my friend not to eat his half and kept eating my fries. The server got flagged down and we showed her the chicken and she was horrified. Kept my fries and she took the sandwich back to the kitchen. A bit later, a new sandwich came and we cut into it right away to make sure it was cooked. The breast this time was a mini sized piece but at least it was fully cooked. Hard to undercook a chicken breast that is less than 1/8" thick including the breading and sauce. We then showed the server my friends wife's burnt toast which she couldn't eat and my wife explained her pizza burgers missing mushrooms and peppers. My friend said humorously that the restaurant truly lived up to its name. It was funny to hear because we had the Murphys Law of meals last night. Our server removed my meal and my friends wife's meal from the bill as compensation for all the problems we had. Needless to say, this was our friend's first time there and they won't be coming back anytime soon. My friend wasn't thrilled that the owner was trying kill him. I know, that's harsh but really, having contingency plans for situations like this would be beneficial, especially if it means keeping the owners out of the kitchen. They have no idea what they're doing. I tipped our server well because the stupidity of the owners was no reflection on our servers abilities, which was admirable. I'll go back again but not if the owners are in the kitchen..........period. To summarize, service was good, food was agonizingly slow to come out and when it finally did, mistake after mistake was part of the meal. Comping the meals was a good resolution but serving raw chicken is unforgivable. This place is better than this. I'd love to talk to the owner about this experience. UPDATE A month later and still haven't heard a peep from the owners. Won't go back simply because the owners obviously don't give a crap about their customers or our experience. Why would anyone...

Buckle up for a detailed review: My wife had heard about this place through a Facebook food page saying it was good, so I went on google reviews and decided to see what the hype was about. Some of these reviews are not great and the responses from the owner were very unprofessional ( Looks like some got edited since). This concerned us and we were hesitant to go on a Friday evening in case it was as bad as people say it was. We felt like going for a drive on Sunday the 21st of July and had never been to Colchester so it was a date. It took us 35 min from Windsor and we arrived at 5:15 and were promptly seated indoors in their sunroom area as we had requested. Both patio's were pretty much full so we were ok with indoors as it was quite warm out. We were greeted right away by our waitress Steph who promptly took our drink order and went to go fill it, she came back and asked if we were ready to order. We told her it was our first time and we would need a few minutes, we had a few questions about the menu and when she returned she answered everything perfectly making our decision easy. I have food concerns so I told Steph and she made sure to take extra care to note it on the order which was awesome. Steph had mentioned an issue her mom was having with food allergies and it was something to look into , we appreciated the info. My wife ordered the haddock with waffle fries and slaw and I had the Philly with fresh cut fries and a side gravy with no garlic aioli ( food concern). We were very happy with the side selections as my wife loves waffle fries and I love fresh cut. The order was placed and we had our usual conversation until a group of 6 old people showed up and decided to talk over everyone while getting intoxicated, we couldn't hear ourselves think. If you enjoy a more quiet setting sit on the patio, the sound bounced off the walls in there making it impossible to hear across the table. We over heard a waitress tell patrons that it would be an hour for food as they were swamped with orders, we were ok with this as we had nothing pressing to do afterwards and we are used to an hour wait for food at other places. It would have been nice if the hostess would have told us this before we sat just in case we were in fact in a hurry . Steph kept checking in with us letting us know where our order was in the line even though we were not concerned. The order finally arrived and everything looked very good, the fish was fresh and the waffle fries were crispy and my Philly was one of the best I have ever had , the meat had a really good taste to it so you didn't need the garlic aioli for flavor. The fresh cut fries were also very good, they didn't need the gravy but I really enjoyed that as well. We ate our food and finished our drinks and paid the bill which was about the going rate as most restaurants these days, some things were a bit higher than I though they should be for what it was but that's my opinion. We left at 6:27 with full bellies and a new restaurant to add to the list of places to dine at again. I would like to try the steak sandwich next time we visit, hopefully it's as good as the Philly. Over all a good experience, the only negatives would be the hostess not telling us the wait times and the noisy people behind us, both issues are easily fixed with a heads up from the hostess and a roll of duct tape for the...

Stopped in @ 4:30 for drink special and dinner. No changes inside, friendly staff, they had no red wine left for the $5 special. I got the last half glass for free, how to do you post $5 specials and run out of wine at 4:30 on an Easter Sunday? Asked for an on tap Corona- nope ran out of that also, so had a Rickards Red. Not impressed an ordering and stock intake issue here.

Now the meal: I ordered chicken tacos, they were cold the wraps were cold the meat only room temp toppings cold, so sent them back, came back at almost the same temp, I didn’t say anything because by this time hubby had finished his meal and I just wanted to eat. I don’t know about you, but I like my food hot, the taco shells should have been warmed up before meat was put into them, they were not, which was a shame as the meat was really nicely seasoned, the fresh tomatoes and diced green onions on top were fresh, they didn’t give me my nacho chips back when they redid my plate, which I don’t really care about as I didn’t need them, but detail people and there were no other toppings, no Mexican creama, avocado or guacamole. Hubbys Swineburger- was more like a frozen patty but he said it was good, not great but ok. I hope that before the season really gets underway that they can iron out some of the issues they appear to be having. Would we go back yes, I’m all for trying a place again to see if they have improved. If not then we will just come for a drink on a nice patio Prices were good and as I said staff...