Meding's Seafood — Restaurant in Frederica

Poor Service, Public Disrespect, and No Accountability

I had a very bad experience at Meding’s Seafood in Delaware — one that reflects a broader pattern of poor customer service echoed in reviews across TripAdvisor, Google, and Restaurantji.

I had phoned in an order for 1.5 dozen jumbo crabs and 1.5 dozen large/extra-large crabs. When I arrived, I introduced myself to a young man at the register. He said he couldn’t find my order. There was an order for someone named “Mike,” but it was for a dozen jumbo crabs and some shrimp — not what I had placed.

A middle-aged man took over (who I believe was the manager or owner). I told him what I had ordered. He said they didn’t have that order and that they only had a dozen jumbo crabs available — not 1.5 dozen. I explained again what I had ordered and how the woman who took my call had gone to the back to check inventory before confirming it. He responded bluntly: “You didn’t order them from here.”

As a couple of female staff members tried to identify who may have taken the order (possibly the hostess), I replied, “I hear you” to the man. At that point, the he snapped: “You obviously don’t, because you keep cutting me off.”

I responded that I did understand what he was saying, but that he was also cutting me off.

That’s when he escalated and said, “That’s enough, cowboy. I don’t need your business. You can leave now — and don’t let the door hit you in the ass as you get out.”

I told him, “No problem,” and left.

Consistent Patterns Across Review Platforms

After this experience, I looked up reviews — and unfortunately, my situation isn’t unique. Across TripAdvisor (3.6★), Google/Restaurantji (3.1★), and others, customers frequently report:

Rude or dismissive treatment Confrontations with management A lack of accountability when orders are wrong or delayed

There are multiple reviews describing the same tone of open hostility and defensiveness from management, often during situations that could have been easily resolved with professionalism and courtesy.

My Take

Mistakes happen — especially during busy hours or seafood season. But what matters is how those situations are handled. This business chose to insult and eject a paying customer who was simply trying to resolve an error — and they’ve done the same to others.

I won’t be returning. And if respectful service matters to you, I suggest you look elsewhere.

Update since owner response. I called, waited for the person who answered to check"the count," placed my order as described above, and gave her my full name.

When I entered the restaurant I was smiling and happy. Engaged with the young man and the register, and was never disrespectful. You, the owner, escalated the situation.

Your response is a fine illustration of how you probably approach many things - aggressively, defensively, and disrespectful.

I encourage everyone to check out the all 1 and 2 start reviews. You'll see a bit...

We were seated at a corner table that had multiple leaks coming the the ceiling. We disregarded the leaks as there were paper towels. We just moved around to ensure the water wouldn’t drop into our food/drinks.

Madalyn approached our table and asked what we’d like to drink… no introduction or anything even remotely friendly (I only know her name from the receipt). The 5 of us (and our 1 year old daughter) ordered 5 waters to start as we had never been here before and didn’t have time to review the menu. Her demeanor automatically shifted to us being an inconvenience and she stormed off.

She brought our waters and asked for our order. We weren’t told if they had any sort of specials, to which we found out about 15 minutes after we placed our order. A member of our group asked if she could do something other than coleslaw and was told there are no substitutions under any circumstance. We then were asked if our daughter wanted anything. We stated no thank you, because obviously a tiny human won’t eat a whole meal… we asked for a separate plate so we could give her little pieces of what we had.

35 minutes went by and two young men brought our food to the table. We had to flag down our server for a plate for our daughter… which we never received. We also never received the option to order different drinks or even get our waters refilled. Our drinks were empty 10 minutes into our visit and were never refilled. The fact she disappeared for so long didn’t even offer us the opportunity to ask for refills.

She finally brought our check that we had waited for 20 minutes to receive…to which we were charged an 18% gratuity for having 6 people at our table. Only 5 meals, our child didn’t even need her own seat. We quickly realized she dismissed us because she knew she’d get her tip no matter what, so why bother working for it. When confronted about it she said the system does that automatically, turned her back, and walked away. It’s hard to have a conversation or ask for a manager when you purposely ignore your guests.

My husband and I both spent a decade each in the service industry prior to joining the military so we understand when people are needy and when servers just do not care. Madalyn was the worst server I have ever had and she truly didn’t try to hide it or care about her job. We will not return and will share our experience with anyone who asks for our opinion. I recommend if anyone visits here you review the menu and ask about specials. The food was mediocre and the service...

Posting this in repsonse to the photos:

I’m aware I wasn’t around for the entire altercation, it’s still not a good look for the restaurant and that’s the first interaction you see. Not only is account of the review wrong, it’s absolutely childish. I’m aware restaurant life is very tiresome and stressful, I’ve worked in restaurants before and the goal is always the same: appease the customer.

First of all when we arrived we noticed it was busy and the bar was full (initially where we wanted to sit) so we take a trip over to the host stand. We did not stand off to the far left, we walked in and took 1-2 steps over to the left to get out from in front of the door cause there was proper asking in and out. Your hostess watched us walked before the other group and did not greet us, she didn’t say a word to us. No one did, front of house is supposed to greet new customers as they walk in. The party after us had to ask us if we were in front of them, I pointed out that the hostess had watched us walk in the restaurant and stare at them helplessly. We did not refuse to be put on the list because we did put our names on the list, we actually stood outside and the hostess came to get us to take us to our table at the patio. We then noticed the bar was mostly empty so we told the hostess that we’d actually prefer to sit at the bar so she gave us the menus and told us to take a seat. We sat down with our menus in hand and the word you said to us were “we have drinks specials in here” and pointed at your little basket and walked away without giving us a chance to ask if we’d like anything to drink: heck even a water would’ve satisfied me enough to stay, you didn’t even do that. Me and my friend sat at the bar and watched you take a man’s order (sat down after us) get his drink, ring in his food, and then got a different person a second drink when we had received no service. We were not standing around, we were sitting at the end of your bar waiting for service. You don’t have to be a mind reader to ask a person who’s literally sitting at your bar if they want a drink. Like I said not only is your account of the day WRONG it’s extremely CHILDISH. We were patient during the entire encounter, it was your lack of effort that ultimately drove us away. I definitely won’t be back after this childish response. Maybe that day just wasn’t your day or you’re hard to please but you need to be better and more understanding. I can’t believe you sat there and typed out that response as if you were doing yourself any...