The Cove Restaurant & Oyster Bar — Restaurant in City of Glen Cove

The four of us needed a pleasant night out to catch up, unwind, and talk about better things than work. A nice meal is a form of stress relief, yes?

We went to the Cove in Glen Cove, knowing the location and reading the generally good reviews. The menu had a decent variety so we ordered Ceviche Tacos to start, with our wives ordering Tuna and a different fish and the two boys ordering the Seafood Pasta as the menu photo looked like it would be a really nice dish.

Ceviche Tacos came and were very good. The first indication of our bad experience to come came when the plate with the lemons was taken away before we finished the Tacos. What's the rush?

A Village Greek Salad was next. It looked just OK (for $18, not OK at all). The feta was good quality but the tomatoes were pale and tasteless. A good restaurant offers presentation and flavor. You'd think the house would try to provide the best tomatoes on the market but these were no better than a commercial Key Food grocery offering. It was an embarrassment, and I just don't understand that this would be acceptable to serve in an upscale place.

Not wanting to kill the vibe we so wanted, I kept my mouth shut and just ate the cheese.

The mains came and the Tuna looked fine, my wife's fish looked fine, but my Pasta was pathetic. First of all, it looked NOTHING like the menu photo, with several shrimp, octopus, and little neck clams nestled in their shells, with a swirl of Squid ink pasta set in the middle with two nice red peppers topping it. What was set in front of me was a tangle of pasta with empty, small Manila clam shells and just one shrimp. I don't remember the red pepper but maybe it was there. Not one clam in its shell, just mixed into the sauce and basically invisible. Sloppy preparation. How do you serve empty shells? Why did the waiter let that hit the table? I ate the bread to make up for the main course.

Here's the thing.... We went out to have a good time. We expected a good meal, given the price and appearance of a quality restaurant. I spent the night trying not to get into an argument with the waiter, the manager, or any of the bus staff who, by the way tried to remove my half consumed drink from the table without asking.

My wife and friends liked most of what they ate, we enjoyed each other's company but It was the worst meal I've had in a long time.

Wait! There's more! I called the restaurant the Monday after we attended the previous Friday. I explained the issue to the Manager on that day and she attempted to put it on me to make things right. "Why didn't you send it back to the kitchen?" and so on. She totally missed the point that it shouldn't have left the kitchen in the first place. In a good restaurant, you've got one change to get it right because once someone sends something back, the flow of the service is done, the good vibe is gone, and the trust is over. A good meal isn't a salvage operation. Get it right, end of story.

She said that the Manager on duty that night had gone on vacation but there would be a discussion about this the following Tuesday. Three Tuesdays later, nothing. No phone call, no text. Called this morning, a Monday before yet another Tuesday and was told the Manager would call me back. Of course, that didn't happen. Surprise!

The take away? Don't waste your time. The Cove is overpriced and mediocre, with a management that has no pride in their business, nor concern or remedy that a customer was very unhappy.

But, they'll happily take your money and then blow you off.

Run. Plenty of other...

UPDATE: THEY REMOVED MY REVIEW SO HERE IT IS FOR A SECOND TIME BUT NOW HERES YOUR 1 STAR. Keep deleting and I’ll keep reposting it. This is my second time visiting the cove and I have to say it was a huge disappointment. When we first walked in the ‘manager’, if you want to call him that was sitting at the front table enjoying a glass of wine and sitting on his phone. - very professional. Our server was very nice and quick to bring our drinks and appetizers. Calamari was good, the shishito peppers were good, the cove salad was good, the raw clams were good and the halloumi, although it was the cold, had very good flavor. After getting our main course, only 2 out of the 5 meals were edible because they were LOADED with salt. We didn’t even make a dent in our plates because it was unbearable, after bringing it to the servers attention he went up to the ‘manager’ who clearly couldn’t care less. Being in the food business myself I know how a manager should act when a customer has a complaint and this guy had NO idea what he was doing. After about 15 - 20 minutes the server came and took our plates saying nothing, which you could see he was uncomfortable because he had ZERO assistance from this so called manager to make it better. So we asked for our check just to get out of there as quickly as we could. After ANOTHER 20 minutes, the server and one other employee comes out with a dessert plate for my mother in laws birthday - that we didn’t ask for, to basically shut us up about the fact that our entrees were inedible. Then we got the bill and everything was still on it except for the dessert plate we DIDNT ask or really care for. So we complained again and the server came back apologetically and clearly embarrassed about the whole situation saying the ‘manager’ is offering us 10% off our bill. We paid our bill and left — THATS when the manager came out of hiding from in the kitchen. PATHETIC. I am still giving this review 2 stars because This review is not for the establishment itself, not even for the bad entrees, the gentleman who served us was great also. — It’s for the poor management skills by the guy in the glasses upfront. 17 years in the restaurant business - i know that when a customer has an issue with anything they order - they want a manager to handle it not hide in the back leaving the server helpless. This place has SO much potential, but clearly needs to teach their staff how to handle situations, and also to act a little more professional. I feel like a bill that was almost $500 during a pandemic deserves a visit from the manager if were unhappy with something- it all could have been settled if he would have atleast come up to us and ask us if we wanted something else instead. Considering we were the ONLY ONES IN THERE. but no, drinking wine and sitting on your phone was definitely the better thing to do. you should be embarrassed, the poor service by management representing your establishment might be the reason it was empty on a Sunday night. It’s employees like that, and the little respect that they have that scare away...

i quite litterally never leave reviews but I had to for this atrocious dining experience… I came here for my brothers 26th birthday. I was sketchy to come due to reading many reviews on how poor the service is here and I should have listened to them. I mainly came cause apparently the food made up for the poor performance of service and that couldn’t have been more wrong. I order the cove burger cooked medium, it came out extremely well done. The burger was so cooked all I could taste was burnt grill. When I ordered, I also asked for extra lemon aioli sauce (3 to be exact) since I am a burger & sauce enthusiast. Not only did they forget about my request, I asked our server again to bring it he forgot too again. 20 mins later I had to ask a third person, a food runner to bring it and then he finally brought it to our table. The portioning of fries was so depressing on the plate, the only thing that made this experience enjoyable was the peach smash drink I ordered. The drink is made with peach Burbon & was phenomenal but the food & service was extremely poor. The server never even introduced himself to us so i didn’t even know how to call for either server when me or my family needed something (we started with one server then ended up with another???). Moreover, no one ever even checked up on us to see if everything was fine when the food was at our table, we had to constantly call on any worker we saw for their attention just to help us. The “cherry on top” for us was how we made reservations, specifically stated the occasion was for a birthday and wanted a celebration after our meal, nothing. Absolutely nothing happened after 30-45 mins sitting down at the table when our meals were finished. We even brought it up to the servers attention when my father got up to go to the bathroom prior to sing happy birthday with a cake to my brother (we stated it in the reservation & also to our server while we were there). I don’t know if they’re understaffed here but I do not see myself coming back to this restaurant, ever. The worst part is we even brought all this up to the manager on shift & he offered us no type of compensation for the piss poor night we had. No comps, no discounts, no free drinks/ food, nothing. I’ve worked in the restaurant industry myself for almost a decade so I would say I’m more understanding than most when it comes to issues in a restaurant. However this place is Very unprofessional, provides Poor Service, has Bland Flavor, Very Minimal Seasoning, & the portion sizes are Cheap for the price tag. Do Not Waste Your Money Here!!! Definitely not worth the price & Most Definitely the worst experience I’ve ever had in...