1st & Main — Restaurant in Dubuque

Came to Dubuque for a weekend getaway. 1st and main was recommended to us so we thought we would give it a try being it’s down the street from the hotel we are staying at. Went on Saturday around 1. Was greeted by saying “you’ll have to wait until there’s a clean table”. Once seated the waitress did not acknowledge us along with other tables. Finally the bar tender told the waitress and then the bartender came to take our orders. She wasn’t very friendly or polite herself. We have never been there before so had questions about things on the menu and she just acted like she said we annoyed with that. It took forever to get the drinks and then the food. Everyone who was working was running around like they didn’t know what they were doing or that they didn’t want to be there. The food was good so I suppose that’s why people go here. Sunday morning we thought we would give it a shot thinking maybe different servers would be working. Walked in and seated ourselves. Didn’t take as long to get waited on however it was the same guy and another girl from the day before. The older gentlemen who works here was very rude. My wife ordered a Bloody Mary and I ordered a virgin one. We asked if it would be the same price he said yes. When they were brought out the virgin one didn’t have any of the toppings. Told him if we are paying the same price why wouldn’t it and he said a virgin didn’t come with it and that he was charging $2 less when I had asked he said same price. He then snatched the drink off the table and said he was going to charge full price and that he was putting the alcohol in it. I’m pregnant so that’s why I ordered a virgin. Needless to say we got up and left and being of the horrible service.

Also notice that the owner never responds to any of the bad reviews they receive. So does the owner condone...

My wife and I stopped in for dinner on a road trip recently. The first impression was negative because of their 'seat yourself' policy. I've never been to a restaurant where this actually works well, if the restaurant is full, which this one was. It's no fun standing around, hoping to grab a table before someone else.

Also, the entire bar side of the restaurant was too cold, due to a single front door letting in cold air constantly. We were sitting in the farthest end of the bar, away from the door, and it still felt drafty. I didn't envy anyone sitting closer to the door.

The menu had lots of appealing sounding items and I'd bet most people would find something appealing. Note: Food prep was a bit off because my wife received her salad about 5 minutes before my food arrived. This made her feel uncomfortable even though, not minding, I encouraged her to start eating. She did enjoy her steak salad, but had to ask for the egg that was supposed to be on it. I ordered the 1st & Main burger. It was OK. It was lacking an ingredient to offset the dryness of the peanut butter. Maybe more jelly? Something! I got it with onion rings instead of fries and they were WAY too salty. I couldn't eat more than 1 or 2 of them. This could have been due to fryer oil that needed changing but, not great.

We ordered a peanut butter chocolat mousse cake for dessert... But it turned out they don't actually have that anymore and the menus weren't yet updated. The peanut butter pie we ordered instead was fine, not great.

Our server, however, WAS great! She was attentive and very pleasant.

If we lived in Debuque, we'd probably come back, hoping for a better overall experience. But, based on this one visit, I can't really...

Had lunch here with wife and kids, was sat at one of the high tables in front of the bar. Guess someone reserved the entire other half of the restaurant. The good: we ordered the appetizer platter. The platter was excellent. I ordered the mango habanero chicken flat bread. That was excellent as well, it was the perfect combo of sweet and hot.

The bad: my wife ordered the Cesar salad, the lettuce had lots brown edges, and some black at the end of the leaves. Not the most appealing thing to see while eating, she ended up leaving several pieces of salad. I ordered the chicken tenders for my son and 1 (of 3) tenders was translucent (didn't look cooked) the other 2 tenders looked fine. When I told the server about it he didn't even say anything just looked at the tender and took it away. Most places will say something like "sorry about that let me get you another one" our server ended up bringing us a whole second order, which we were thankful for but the second order looked like it was cooked just as long as the first one which didn't inspire confidence. (Looked like it was exactly the same shade of light gold breading, which means their cook was told the last one looked underdone and still cooked it exactly like the last order, or they are microwaving them) If you are going to sell food for kids you gotta make sure it's well done. The only reason I even caught the underdone tender was because I cut the tender for my son, if I just let him eat it on his own there's a chance he could've gotten sick. All in all I feel like consistency...