Town's End Bar and Grill — Restaurant in Apple Valley

Edit; I returned to the Still House and have had two lovely experiences. Service does not change, they have wonderful wait staff. I definitely prefer sitting inside.

The chili was wonderful, I’ll order this over the onion soup (which is normally my fav). I did give the onion soup another try but still found too many bay leaves and that texture in my soup is less than desirable. If there were no bayleaves and it would be a hit!

I LOVED the Brussels sprouts. They are out of this world. The burgers are wonderful here. The French fries are delicious. I think the best items on the menu are found on the apps or burgers list. I have not tried the wings but maybe next visit. The menu is broken down into a better flow and everything is easy to find. Steak is still on the high price side but there is something for everyone. They have made wonderful changes in this last year and it’s nice to see the place improve all around.

The drink menu is wonderful. They have a very diverse drink menu and I love enjoyed my different margaritas I have tried over the last couple visits.

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I was a little let down with our first trip after making a reservation for a large party containing 8 adults and multiple children. As this is a new venue I hope to see improvements and constructive criticism being welcomed.

I did not want sit outside during this heat wave (as the party had two pregnant women) but on arrival we went with the outside because that’s what they said was available or there would be a longer wait time. We waited about a half hour over the reservation time. I would have preferred if they sat our table guests as they arrived rather than wait for everyone. The table was already open and would have been nice to sit at instead of inside at the hostess counter. The reservation was also difficult to make itself. I know they haven’t worked out the kinks yet so hopefully that works it self out quickly.

The second questionable moment was not long after getting to our seats. The menus had no steaks on them. Yeah, we came for steak so where are they? We then discovered, thanks to the internet, that there are inside AND outdoor menus. One other restaurant style I know like this is the McMenamins up in Oregon and Washington state (Must visit if traveling, bookmark now). The aged steaks and fancier items are on on the inside menu. The outdoor menu is mostly burgers and pub style food is I would call it.

Four steaks were ordered, one surf and turf, two burgers, two salads, onion soup, clam chowder and an ahi poke tower appetizer. The rest were kid meals.

MP (market price) steaks are at least $50 each. Non aged Ribeye was $52. I think that was the cheapest steak our table purchased. And honestly, you could not tell the difference in taste to the aged version.

The ahi poke tower was a highlight. The ahi tuna was fresh and tender and the mango and cucumbers were a perfect compliment. Ask for extra wonton chips though, I needed an extra serving to finish.

The Cesar and wedge salads had good reviews, nothing extravagant to write home about but a good light and decent portioned meal.

Burgers were cooked as requested on medium and one medium well. Burgers are a hit here and would be my next item to try for myself. Those French fries though. Wow. Good stuff.

The onion soup had too many bayleaves left in it. And for $9 I do not want to choke on those stems. Bleh. I’m a huge onion soup fan but won’t order it here again unless that changes.

Kids meals were good portion for the $9 price tag. Grilled cheeses look good, the chicken tenders were large and the sliders were good for a light eater. My 9 year old could have eat the adult burger without blinking.

I hope to come back for a more settled and relaxed dinner for our next trip. The atmosphere and ambiance is much needed in our high desert. It will be exciting to see how this place grows and improves this year. Looking forward to trying everything...

Alright, I am going to provide a preliminary review as we have spent a surmountable amount of time and money to support a new restaurant that touts luxury food with luxury pricing, maybe we can use premium/ prime instead of luxury.

The ambiance and decoration is stunning, reminds us of our time in metro cities at night on the beach with a breeze on the patio; family founded our desire to relocate to a place I was highly unfamiliar with. Yet, quality and pricing will not escape me, nor deter me if it is merited.

Unfortunately, the patio boast a separate menu and is only open after 6pm. That's ok, weather up here is uncomfortable before that time and is a risk to the business; the largest dining area has a restricted menu. If you go for a 400$ ticket with dry aged steaks and oysters (cooked) you must dine inside the quaint and stuffy side. Assuming the air is not running due to distillery work and concerns over hexavalent chromium contamination, it's quite warm, no music, and stale.

We have dined at each bar and both tables; to give credit to a startup, it has wrinkles to iron out. The staff are friendly; do not seem to make things right; each table offering that has been wrong was not made right, unless you were with seasoned bar staff. I cannot confirm but the waitresses/ waiters seems to run 2-3 tables, there are 3 bartenders per bar that has ~8 seats, and chaos and delay occurs. The bar is responsible for 17 wonderfully crafted cocktails, they are still learning but have some very formidable bar tenders that do it right, but that is small.

Our most recent dining experience was simple, my wife and I had the Avo Burger with Onion Rings. The Onion Rings had no flavor and the batter did not stick to the rings. There was an up charge for them and there were 5. The Avo Burger is supposed to come with thick bacon slices, but they forgot and the beef has no flavor (adequate spicing). We couldn't fix it in time because the waitress never came back around. Our daughters meal was an over salted slider for kids that she couldn't eat because it was over salted and burned all of our mouths; it went in the trash.

Oysters seem ordered frozen and cooked; the sauce is delightful, but as the steaks is charged at MP (Market Price); it can change at any time and they were very gamy. The steaks are similar at MP and aged to 21 or 28 days; the fat is not rendered down and for a steak that cost comparable to a real prime/premium place is unacceptable. Even more so over salted or under seasoned and then you have an up charge for infused butter. A pork chop runs 40$; would run 4$ at home if you can run your own kitchen.

The best thing we have tried was the chicharrones that are made on-site. The Crème brûlée was soupy, but crusted beautifully. Also to note, the Ahi Poke "Tower" at 20$ is good but smaller than the size of small tuna can. These are not sustainable portions and prices. Perhaps they last for a moment because sticker price seems to drive perceived value/ quality up here, regardless of value or quality.

I could go on; my intent is not deter you. I intend to provide feedback to make this place a high desert destination!

They also aren't monitoring their...

Edit: New ownership has changed my mind! (Old review from 2 years ago see below for reference of the improvement). Noticed they reopened this place after they closed down and decided to give it a try. I was skeptical, and I was a bit sad there was only 1 vegan option I could find, I’m vegetarian so I loved the chicken patty sandwich from before which was the one thing that kept me coming back. Anyway, let me tell you the vegan burger is delicious, I guess the cook makes them in house, give it a try it’s delicious! I came with my partner and he loved the towns end burger that he recommends. The first visit we had here and it was the fastest we ever had, our waiter was Riss. We actually got refills, we were greeted within 5 minutes, visited multiple times, and was treated really well by the staff overall. My partner hated coming here and was excited to say he’d like to actually come back! Great job. I hope they consider and add more vegan options! Got our food in like under 30 minutes, if I had to guess. The cook came out to clarify things even! In and out of there under 1 hour whereas before it’d be 2 to 3 hours of just being in there waiting for our food.

Old review: I really wanted this place to be good. I think my entire party wanted it to be good. Now, don't get me wrong, the place is gorgeous and looks nice, rocking, but the service is incredibly lacking. Probably our worst restaurant service experience. A member of our party who was once a hostess even stated "I waited all night for our server to redeem herself." First, she forgot half our drinks. Had to ask 3x just to receive a coke. We were given a can of beer with no glass and ice to at least pour the beer into ourselves. The menu did not differentiate what was on tap and what wasn't. for a place that is supposed to be on tap and all about their alcoholic beverages; we were shocked. We had an oopsie and tipped over our water and the server just bailed - didn't help clean up at all. Her disappearing was the common factor of the entire night. It took over an hour and a half to receive our food and when we did the wings were brought in cold and not cooked, the pulled pork came in with pickles when we asked not to put any in it. Had to ask every time for refills. Had to ask for additional napkins since we had to use the ones we had wrapped in our utensils to clean up the water. Had to state multiple times to our server what we needed or repeat when asked something. Servers name is Neveah. Additionally, none of the stakes, cocktails, whiskey, or beers even have a price listed. Lastly, there was puke in the urinal. We stated at the beginning to the hostess that we were there for a birthday and she stated she'd tell the server so she'd bring our birthday girl a slice a cake - that we never got. The main problem was she was not...