The Cove Restaurant & Marina — Restaurant in Fall River

I have worked in the Fall River area for about 8 years, and am very familiar with The Cove Restaurant. Up until recently, it was always very good and one of our family favorites, but something has changed, and not for the better. Going back a couple years ago, we had our Daughter's Sweet 16 Dinner for about 65 people in thier banquet room, and multiple dinners came out wrong or not at all, specifically the children's plates who were specifically requested due to thier younger ages and weren't ready for beef or seafood. Many of the main dishes were not overly warm. But, not being one to complain, I let it go and enjoyed the special day and wonderful views, which is one of the few bright spots for this establishment lately. Over the last couple of years, and being a regular customer, and a frequent lunch and dinner patron, I have noticed the quality of the food has gone down considerably. The staff tries hard and can be very pleasant but the Management seems to care less and less. On this particuliar occassion which was Mother's Day, 5/9/21, I had another and last poor attempt to make our dining experience a pleasurable one. When we originally called to make the reservation in advance, there was very little transparency into the Mother's Day Menu or Pricing; "We are servicing a special menu this day only and it is based on what you order that day". The average Entre' cost was $36., the lowest cost was $32. for a plate of average Chicken Parmesan. I shelled out $60. for the Raw Bar, which is average for a nice place by the water but the only problem is the Oysters and clams had obviously been cut in smaller portions to get more yield, then put back in the shell and were tiny portions of what should have been a wonderful treat. It was the smallest raw bar presentation I've every ordered for the money. The shrimp were decent size, but only came with 3 of them. The crab was decent but once again, very small. But once again, not being one to complain and obviously being Mother's Day, I just wanted to get through the lunch and make it enjoyable without griping and getting upset on a nice day. Then that's when our lunch really went down hill. I was served the beer I ordered but quickly returned it after getting a piece of hard plastic in my mouth that came directly from the glass of beer upon my very first sip. I promptly returned it, and she brought me another one with no issues, other than that beer never came off the bill or a follow up to ensure it was better and ok. Then came the Steak incident. Prior to ordering the Portuguess steak, which used to be my favorite, I let our server know that the last time I had been in, which was 3 weeks prior to this writing, I had a very mediocre experience with my steak. Side note, I was relatively embarrassed that night because I took some work V.I.P.'s to The Cove because they were from Buffalo New York, and had never really had great seafood and/or good portuguess cooking. They still left thier that evening not having what I described was going to be one of the best steaks ever. At any rate, I asked my server to please let the cook know about this sub-par dining experience lately and to ask him or her to please make sure my steak is properly prepared and to please make sure it is a decent cut. In hindsight, I have surmised that one of two things happened. Our server did pass that request on to the Chef, or she didn't. Either way, what I received was what tasted like a pre-cooked, left over steak that went into the cooler the night before, and was thrown into the microwave with a cold side of rice to boot. Maybe it's true, you should never upset the Chef, because this is what can happen. The end result was that my steak was extremely difficult to cut, was gray shoe leather and tepid at best. The Manager abruptly appeared to delvier me a new one 15 minutes later. I let him know it was better but went on to say the first steak they served me was totally unacceptable. He non-chalantly stated "I know, I saw it", then left. He took $10 off the total bill of $345.39 with no...

Tuesday night experience.

I’ve dined at Cove Restaurant many times over the past three years while working in the area, but my recent experience was deeply disappointing. Within the first five minutes, I should have known to try somewhere else. I sat at the patio bar and wasn’t greeted or even acknowledged by the busy bartender for 3-5 minutes. The gentleman next to me, wearing a military cap and shirt, remarked, “They must not like the military,” as he too was ignored. He also pointed out how filthy the bar top was, smeared from a sloppy rag wipe-down. I didn’t think much of it initially, but the night only got worse. The service was glaringly poor, primarily due to kitchen delays. I had to inquire about my garden salad with scallops, which was significantly delayed, and later about three shrimp cocktails ordered 20 minutes earlier. The lack of attention was frustrating and unacceptable. I don’t usually complain or write reviews, but I felt compelled to speak with the manager when I saw him delivering food on the patio. Unfortunately, his lack of customer service skills only worsened the experience. I suspect his attitude contributes to the poor service throughout the establishment—something I’ve never encountered in my 15-20 previous visits here. My goal was to inform him of the delays, hoping for a sincere apology and perhaps a comped beer. Instead, he offered excuses, blaming the heat and a busy night, saying, “That’s just how it is.” His dismissive response was utterly disappointing. The bar servers eventually offered me a complimentary beer, which I appreciated, but the manager’s behavior was unacceptable. Please invest in training for him and the staff to prevent other customers from having such a frustrating experience.

Another couple adding about their food as this...

My daughters and I decided to try the Cove today for lunch. It’s been on my list of restaurants to try for a quite a while. Perfect day to sit outside and enjoy the beautiful view. What a disappointment!

The hostess was extremely polite and pleasant. We requested a shady spot and she was more than happy to accommodate our request. We got seated immediately. The restaurant didn’t seem extremely busy.

Our waitress was pleasant. She waited on us fairly quickly. We placed our entire order at once to include drinks, an appetizer and our entrees. It was down hill from here.

Our waitress brought our drinks fairly quickly and we did not see her again for a ridiculously long time. I know this because we eventually interrupted and asked another server for another round of drinks. She was happy to get us drinks. Our waitress was no where to be seen.

We finally got our appetizer one half hour later. I know this because our waitress later apologized for the delay and quoted the time. Our meals came right after our appetizer. I ordered a Connecticut?? lobster roll which was described as served warm with butter. It came cold with the wrong side and no butter.

Our waitress finally arrived after the food was on the table. We asked for butter, ketchup and honey mustard. She came back with honey mustard and ketchup and said she would be back with the butter. It was quite a while before she came back with butter. At that point I had lost my appetite. I told her I was no longer interested in the disappointing lobster roll.

The waitress was apologetic and comped part of the bill and acknowledged the ridiculous wait. However, I didn’t address the fact that she was MIA for most of our visit. I didn’t want to embarrass her and I certainly appreciated her apologies.

An overall...