Irma's Kitchen — Restaurant in East Gull Lake

Moved up here and new to the area, menu looked great so decided to go for dinner. Got in and was asked if we had a reservation, we did not, there was 10 people in the restaurant, and we went to the bar area to eat. Sat down and wasn't acknowledged for over 45 minutes, saw people getting seated and their drink orders placed, more people came came got their food orders placed. Watched 2 or 3 servers walk right by but never stopped to say hello, etc. Finally went up to the bar and asked the bartender for a couple drinks, first thing he asked is if we had a reservation? Why would that matter? There was no one at his bar and he wasn't doing anything. Told him we were seated by the hostess and we had been waiting for 45 minutes with no service, he said he would get someone over, poor girl looked stressed out, took our order but didn't ask how we wanted our steaks cooked. Food came out with another staff member, she dropped it off and left, didn't ask us if we needed anything, which we did since there were a few things lacking. Got done eating what we had and an hour went by after our food was delivered to us before the server came back so we gave her our card since we didn't know if she was coming back, she said they had her running other errands in the restaurant the whole time, we don't blame her, we blame the service and staff. For the price of 2 steaks which was $120 total, it wasn't worth it. I'm very understanding with servers when they're busy, but this place wasn't 10% busy, so I don't get it. But then when we were leaving we walked past another hostess and she didn't acknowledge us, thank us for coming anything, so I'm sure it's like that across the board. Food was eh, one of our steaks had pot roast sauce on it which kind of killed that one, and not being asked how we wanted our steaks was very poor service. Nice place, food and service...

Work in-progress... Over the last few years since they renamed and remodeled the place some things have improved. It's a super nice restaurant, excelent location on the lake with public docking, inside and outside seating, etc. However, this place is empty even during peak lunch/dinner hours and there are reasons why.

Service is lacking, especially in speed of anything. It took the bartender, I am not joking, over 30 minutes to make two cocktails and find a can of beer. Apparently it was his first time making both of the cocktails my brother-in-law ordered, that was on their cocktail menu, and then asked us if it looked right LOL. It's not his fault though, he should have been trained properly, but it was obvious that they didn't.

We stopped in for dinner as well. Again, the service was very slow, but we were prepared for that. Our waitress disappeared for about 20 minutes and we had to go up to the bar to ask for some silverware. There were a couple bigger groups there, but otherwise very empty. The food came out quicker than we anticipated, but still much slower than most other residents. The food was actually really good, huge improvement over previous years, a step in the right direction.

You can no longer use the excuse that you can't find staff when every other place on the lake, like Bar Harbor, Zorbaz, Earnies, all the restaurants at Grandview Lodge, etc. have great knowledgeable/friendly staff and service. It all starts with the right management and training of the staff. It could be such...

Irma's... You've lived up to your billing. You are the worst. We stopped coming to you about 4 years ago after a few years of poor meals and awful service. We decided that making meals in our cabin at Craguns was always better than patronizing your restaurant. We decided to give you another shot after hearing some people say that the restaurant has improved. Nope. Still awful. We were seated and drink orders were taken. After at least 25 minutes of no drinks and no waiter or waitress we asked what was happening. We watched at least 17 wait staff walk by us without as much as a nod in our direction. We finally became impatient enough to talk to the head waitress who had no explanation as to why we didn't have drinks or were asked to place any order for appetizers or meals. If I could do zero stars, I would. Horribly disappointing, yet again.

Edit to respond..your manager offered to comp us for our drinks. Yes, the drinks that never came after 25 minutes. We were served two sodas, that is all. When we asked about our drinks that we had ordered, they had not even been started. We sat down at our table at 7:35 and walked out of your restaurant at 8:12. We were never even asked for an appetizer order, much less anything else. That is pathetic. Sorry to be so blunt, but I'm not sure why I would give you...