Neptune's — Restaurant in Alameda

We were very excited as Neptune's prepared to open. Sadly, it did not live up to our hopes. We went first during the initial couple weeks of the soft opening. Service was slow but we chalked it up to the crowd and staff being new. Sadly, things slid downhill from there. They forgot my coffee order. We ordered the shrimp and grits and attempted to order the chicken and waffles. We were told they were out of fried chicken, so I ordered the salad. The table next to us ordered the fried chicken minutes after us and no one told them that they were out. Then our order came. The shrimp and grits were made with chewy, overcooked baby shrimp, with improperly cooked grits and no flavor. The salad was very good, if expensive for what it was. Then the table next to us got their fried chicken, even though we'd been told they were out. An offhand comment was made about that to the chef, and they were nice enough to comp us a half portion, which we enjoyed. By that time, we'd not really enjoyed ourselves, but were hoping they'd pull their act together after a few weeks and we'd give them a second try.

We tried again today. It wasn't crowded, as most people were at the parade. Hopeful, given the quality of the chicken and waffles last time, we ordered that and the chicken silog style. Things started feeling off when our order came out after just a couple minutes. The egg on the silog style rice came out raw, with a large section of the white still runny. They were happy to fix that for us. When that came back, everything on it was tasty, if not very interesting. The chicken was good but the rice wasn't really fried and the pickles were only ok. But the chicken and waffles plate was incredibly disappointing. The chicken tasted fine, but if the chicken and the waffle had been made in the past 2 hours I'd be surprised. The waffle was bone dry, obviously cooked hours ago and left to sit. The 'salad' on the side was a few pieces of mixed greens with an incredibly salty dressing. Of everything we ordered, the only thing we thought was made to order was the egg. Everything else seemed like it had been sitting. On top of the food being disappointing, somehow the staff added a $4.75 coffee drink to our bill that we'd neither ordered nor received. That needed to be fixed as well. While that was being taken care of, the table right next to us was told there was no cold brew coffee available and the waitress suggested an iced Americano as a substitute. The customer agreed, only to be told 2 minutes later that more cold brew was just brought in from "our coffee shop" so he asked to have the cold brew instead of the Americano. Guess who got an iced Americano five minutes later.

At the end of everything, we tried to give Neptune's a fair chance. But if you can't keep your food consistent, if you charge $16 for chicken that isn't fresh and waffles and rice that were precooked hours ago, if the staff after more than 2 months can't communicate with each other, the kitchen, or coffee station, then you've...

Great food, disappointed in the service. The staff was friendly and polite but I felt they may have been understaffed, less organized or a combination of both. Dining out for breakfast by myself, took approximately an hour from walking into the restaurant to paying my bill and exiting. When I am usually handed the bill, I have my credit card in hand to not waste their time or mine and they can get another customer in; I did this without knowing they gave me a bill for the table of four sitting next to me. I noticed it when I went to sign off and tip them. They were able to correct it as soon as I showed them without any fuss. Water service could have been a bit more frequent.

A tip to the staff, I think when a waiter/waitress comes to the table a greeting like "Hi I'm blahblah, I'll be your server this morning, what can I [something here]?" This adds to their already friendly environment and making the experience more personable. The staff is already friendly but could also use a more sense of urgency to the customers. I observed most of the outside tables were waiting to have their orders taken and then waiting on their food for what I would consider an uncomfortable amount of waiting around. When a waiter/waitress expresses urgency to the customer, it at least presents to me that they are busy and are going to take care of me but if they are a little more relaxed, I would start to question if they need more staff for their culture they developed or reorganization to be more efficient or training their staff to be more effective.

Food was good. Cold brew coffee, not as potent/strong as other coffee shops as I would like, tasted a little watery but smooth. Had the biscuit benedict. Hashbrowns, not your normally presented hashbrowns from a breakfast diner. They made it into a patty! I had to take a picture of the beautifully and tasty dish. Eggs were well seasoned with the yolk...

Delicious food, perfect food presentation, great menu as well. The hostess is very friendly and helpful. The female server I had on Saturday was a bit rude when the first thing she said when approaching the table was “next time use the side door when with the dog” - information that I had no clue about, was not informed by the hostess, didn’t even knew there was a side door as it was my first time at the restaurant. During our brunch she didn’t came to the table very often, and we had to wave and call her when we needed service. The food was so good that we decided to give it another try for a better service on a week day, bringing a larger group of friends. The male server on Wednesday was nice and friendly. Unfortunately it seems that he and the hostess were the only front of the house employees working today, so they were super busy. Food was as great as it was before (it is a big thumbs up for the kitchen staff, honestly), although mimosa was a bit meh. Champagne was flat and they used a weird glass. Freshly squeezed OJ was delicious, and the cappuccino and hot chocolate were also very well made. Unfortunately we didn’t got that much service again due to the lack of staff, and I had to walk to the front of the saloon to request sides and the check - as the dirty plates were piling up on our table without being bussed. I felt bad for the employees today because this really feels like a mismanagement issue, since the house clearly needs more staff for server/busser. Highly recommend the food and appreciate the staff efforts, but would really like to experience a better service in order to become a regular/someone who recommend...