The Pour House at Machinery Hall — Restaurant in Chillicothe

This is gonna be somewhat negative but I’d still recommend you still give it a shot. I may have just been unlucky.

The good: amazing croquettes as an appetizer, and we got a nice bottle of wine for cheap that we drank on the terrace while we waited to be seated.

The bad: we were told a 15-20 minute wait, no big deal but after 30 minutes we checked in with the hostess who was mixed up and said she thought she already sat us - joking that someone must have stolen our identity?? Lol. We were probably more annoyed because we had an event to be at at a particular time. Anyways, we’re ready to order once seated and the server was kind enough to take our app and entree orders at once. We got the pub chips and croquettes for apps, for entrees I got the steak, and my wife got the chicken tacos. If I had to score, I’d probably give the chips a solid 6.8/10. The croquettes were the highlight - 9.2/10. Sadly, the apps took 20 minutes to come out, and the entrees (which clearly were done at the same time as the apps) came only 5 minutes after. I know the food had been sitting there a while because my steak was lukewarm, and the gravy was starting to clump. Couple major issues with the steak: I ordered it medium rare and received a steak that was close to well-done, and as I said…only lukewarm. The steak had already been sliced as well by the kitchen, therefore it was very dry by the time I received it. Also I was annoyed that despite being sliced by the kitchen it was still not cooked properly. The gravy looked like it was slipped on top to hide the fact that it wasn’t cooked to order, and sadly it just didn’t add much as a sauce. The steak on its own was not well seasoned either. Normally I would have sent this back but as I said we were in a bit of a rush at this point. I’d recommend you order something else… 1.5/10. My wife’s chicken tacos can only be described as boring. The chicken was just a regular fried tender stuffed in a corn tortilla with your regular taco toppings, however I will say they did a nice job on the corn tortilla, very nice added texture and taste. I would have loved to see some kind of Mexican seasoning or sauce on the fried chicken to spice it up a bit. Her tortilla chips seemed homemade perhaps, and regardless we’re quite good. As a whole dish, 5.1/10.

Overall if I would do it again, I’d probably just go with a beer and a cheap burger or wings as those would probably be better executed. The ambiance of the restaurant suggests you’d get some kind amplified culinary experience but for me that was not the case - so I’d recommend just sticking to mostly just bar food. You have to get the croquettes though if you go…unique and very...

WE had read a number of good reviews for this place, so we decided to check it out.

We wanted to glance and a menu when we first went in, but was ignored and was quickly seated. Our server came to the table to take our drink order wile carrying food, which we thought was odd. About 5 minutes later another server, will far less tattoo's, came to take our drink order. We surprised her by telling her we already ordered drinks. It was obvious to us the first server swiped a table from another server. We finally ordered food, waited too long to get our food, during our wait we had to go up to the bar and ask for refills on our drinks. When our food arrived everything looked good and we were ready to dig in. BUT, the pasta my daughter ordered had a musty smell to it. We both tried it and found the taste equally bad. Our wait person was no where to be seen, her area seemed to be in the back of the restaurant and we were in the middle. We ask another wait person to fetch her. We explained our issue with the pasta. She explained to us that we were accustomed to eating sauce out of a can, and that they make their sauce fresh for every order. Let me translate, she said "this aint Chef Boyardee, like you hill billies eat at home". Very condescending. The issue was, I believe, the sauce was made days before and had simply set around too long. We did order a burger for my daughter and that was finally delivered. The Burgers were very good and the side of fries, was, well, just because you cut a potato and throw it in oil does not make it a good fry. The place was nice, the remodel of a older place went well. Plenty of large TV, but none of them had the local football game on, strange. After lunch we went to another local shop and told the ladys who were working there where we had been. One of them ask me if we had burgers, we had, she ask me if the buns were grilled untill they were ( her words ) burnt. I had to agree the were very well grilled, but over all the burgers were good. This place could be a gem, looks like they put too much time and money into building a restaurant and a brand and very little time into the wait staff or the food they serve. It reminds me of some brew pubs I've been to, lets make great beer and people will eat any food we throw out. FYI restaurants...

New in the area and we’re looking for a nice spot for an anniversary dinner. The parking was difficult; obviously we arrived during the evening time when most restaurants are busy but It was a Tuesday after 7:30 so we didn’t expect it to be extremely difficult. We circled the block several times and finally found a spot a block away. Luckily during evening hours, parking is free.

We were greeted and seated immediately in a mostly empty down stairs dining area. We did learn that there was a party of 50 up stairs.

We asked for water while looking over the cocktail menu. I ordered a dirty martini with blue cheese stuffed olives…and was told they didn’t have those. So regular olives it was. He ordered the cowboy killer. It took an extremely long time to get the cocktails. There were 3 people behind the bar and I noticed guests coming down stairs to get their drinks. I’m guessing there was no bartender designated for their large private party.

We ordered the deviled eggs for an appetizer; delish! And about half way through enjoying those, our cocktails were delivered. Not the best martini I’ve ever had but not the worst. His cocktail was nice.

I looked on Google reviews and checked out the menu before we decided. I was disappointed (100% my fault for not looking on their website) that the menu options were different. Only NY Strip steak option. Not his preference and at $36 I felt was overpriced. The chicken dish I had was tasty. I felt the sweet potatoes were lack luster and the broccoli was over cooked/fired and crunch. Not in a good way.

I tried to order an after dinner cocktail. But was told they didn’t have espresso martinis, I asked about a chocolate martini and was told they didn’t do those either. The server didn’t offer any other suggestion or a look at the cocktail menu again, So I didn’t order anything.

We settled in the chocolate mousse for dessert. It was just ok and very small. Very straight forward with no yum factor.

Overall, the atmosphere was pleasant, the service was mostly attentive but you could tell she distracted. The food was “ok”. Our bill was $107 2 meals, deviled egg app, 2 cocktails and tiny bit quite large enough to share dessert.

Not sure I would make another 40 minute drive for a meal there but if in the area, I’m sure we give them...