Samuel Beckett's Irish Gastro Pub — Restaurant in Bailey's Crossroads

If there is to be a more than just great, American Mom & Pop-style Irish Pub… this is it! Close friends and I decided on having our ten-year reunion at Samuel Beckett's Irish Gastro Pub – and oh what a perfect choice we made! It is so, so true that great atmosphere, great food and great friends – is great times. The drinks were superb, the atmosphere superb, the service superb, the food even more superb! This place is larger than expected, ample and spacious, modestly and traditionally appointed, yet splendidly detailed and subtle in design, seating and accoutréments of an old-style public house. This place boasts about it’s personal and professional experience they offer – all well and good. But their food is incredibly marvelous! Which bolsters that combination of both expert customer service enhanced with an incredible array of drinkables and eatables. As a celebratory event, of course we started with libations (hello, it’s a pub). First off, no one at the party had any depredations of any of the drinks we all enjoyed them! Whomever their bartender is, kudos… each of the elixirs we experiences were vivacious, tasty and had the most appropriate amount of alky need, or at least, to the liking of each participant. You know you can’t go wrong with Guiness Draft as a few in the group enjoyed them. But, when it comes to mixed drinks, proper cocktails, it’s a different story. My wife ordered their Moscow Mule which, in her words (as a Moscow Mule lover), was enthralled by how well it was prepared. It must have been the Three Olives Vodka, with just the right amount of lime juice, and using Crabbie’s ginger beer that made it so good! As for me, being the outrageous one, ordered the Pornstar Martini with a decent amount of Vanilla Vodka, Passionfruit, some Lime, just the right amount of Foam and the prefect spritz amount of Prosecco, I had three (no I was not driving)! Outside of my go to Grey Goose, extra dry, two olives, two cocktail onions mainstay Martini – the Pornstar Martini came in a close second as a fave Martini. Now the food, that’s a different story, a very good story, an excellent story actually! The party ran the gamut on selections. Being a hearty group of Irish wannabes and one real Irishman, we went with the appetizers of Calamari with cherry peppers and very interesting and good so called boom boom sauce, and Hummus along with sun-dried tomatoes, pita points, carrots, celery, plus the Spinach & Artichoke Dip with tortilla chips. All I must say was excellent! But going into our mains, the really exceptional entrees were: Corned Beef Sandwich in toasted rye bread, tender and juicy corned beef, a delectable thousand island dressing, crispy and easy on the mayo coleslaw, along with tender aromatic caramelized onions; the Fish & Chips of flaky Cod in a fine beer-batter, some crispy outside, tender inside pub fries, terrific coleslaw, and a nicely prep’d tartar sauce; the Alaskan Salmon offered with jasmine rice fresh brussels sprouts and eased with bacon were terrific; and last, but not least, my Corned beef and cabbage, served with a mouthwatering and buttery mash potato, and ladled over the corned beef was an incredibly prepared parsley sauce that made everything work perfect together! If you’ve read any of my reviews, I don’t give the highest ratings easily – that’s because I like comparing apples to apples and attempt to be as genuine to our subjective taste buds as possible. In my travels through many cities in the U.S., I have seldom come across such an outstanding public house such as this. And, having visited and enjoyed Pubs in Ireland, Samuel Beckett’s Irish Gastro Pub deserves par excellence recognition! Mark Kirwan, a Tipperary native and former Guinness employee and his marvelous staff, from management all the way to wait staff should be commended for giving customers not just a place to eat, but an amazingly fantastic experience – Ireland at home!...

I was pleasantly surprised they were open during all that snow on 1/23/2016. I've eaten here multiple times and always had decent food. I thought it was funny when the waitress apologized for being short-staffed and that they were only running a limited menu. Both of us at the table said it was not a problem at all and we were glad they were open at all. I decided to check in on Facebook at the restaurant and I included a clearly comical and obviously sarcastic comment:

"Waitress: 'I'm so sorry, we are only running a limited menu today. We are a little short-staffed..' How unprofessional; I'd like to speak to your manager."

Again, this was clearly a joke and we both enjoyed ourselves for a bit. Other friends and family on Facebook commented and liked the status, and it was clear that it was sarcasm. Especially seeing as we hadn't complained to the waitress and had told them we didn't have any problem. Nothing else was open in the entire neighborhood, why would anyone sincerely complain? They wouldn't and I wasn't.

A representative for the restaurant didn't seem to think it was very funny. My guest and I were sitting there when I was confronted pretty abruptly mid sentence by a woman asking us about a Facebook post. I assume she may have been the owner or a manager, but she never introduced herself. She was VERY aggressive and went off about "those fers, fing complaining while we are even open..." And went on for quite some time. I explained to her that it was clearly a joke and I intended it to be funny and a testament to the dedication of the restaurant remaining open. I can't tell you how uncomfortable that was. She kept lingering around the table and wouldn't leave trying to further engage both of us at the table with more uncomfortable expletive-laced statements about how, had we actually been complaining, what "f*ers" we would be. No apology at any point for aggressively and rudely interrupting our meal because she misunderstood a benign and harmless Facebook post that was intended to be positive and funny. Eventually, she just stood behind us about 20 ft away for about 10-15 minutes. We were ready to go as soon as she left our table because it was such an odd, unusual and unnecessary confrontation. Up until this point, we had received pretty attentive service, but we got ignored for around 25 minutes until one poor guy came and asked us if we needed anything. We asked for a couple of boxes and left. She made my birthday dinner so extremely uncomfortable for both of us.

She could have come up to the table and said, "excuse me, my name is __ and I am the _ here. Did you post something on Facebook?" But that isn't even close to how it was handled. The woman representing the restaurant chose to try to intimidate two of her patrons and aggressively confront them, effectively chasing business out the door without trying one bit to welcoming, hospitable, understanding or accommodating. I didn't trust that restaurant or their food as I felt it may be as unpredictable as their representative was.

Truly a bizarre, uncomfortable and unfortunate experience. The appetizers were delicious, the beer colder than the weather and the wait staff very accommodating and kind... But it only takes one person to make NONE of...

We came here ok a Tuesday night. Some street parking in Shrilington. No one at the hostess stand and no sign indicating to seat yourself. Finally had a server who sat is with menus who ended up being our server. Took about 10 minutes after we sat down before she came back with water and another 5 minutes or so before she came and took our order. We ordered the Calamari and for drinks, I ordered the What's the Craic'n and my boyfriend ordered the velvet devil. The drinks were delicious and they have a good selection of beers and cocktails.

Calamari had some kind of paprika or Chilli powder seasoning through the middle of the dish but inconsistent otherwise. Calamari was good and so was the sauce it came with.

For dinner, I ordered the Guinness Burger but I substituted the fries instead of the mash. Boyfriend ordered the Beef Wellington. Tough to cut through and somewhat decently cooked. Pastry was still a little doughy and only the Mushroom on the top of the Wellington. Mashed potatoes and brussel sprouts were delicious. Guinness burger was good but there was a portion where I got a very burnt taste.

Took awhile after we ate to get a dessert menu - we ordered the molten chocolate Lava cake. The cake itself was amazing. Ice cream with it was good but it was really frozen and hard to even get a spoon through.

Overall food was ok but the service was slow. I would recommend coming here to get some beers...