Buckhorn Saloon & Opera House — Restaurant in Four Corners States

After our experience at The Buckhorn tonight I wish I could give the establishment zero stars.

Since we moved to Silver City in the fall of last year, we've been to The Buckhorn probably five or six times. We typically enjoy having supper there before seeing a show. And, having worked in restaurants as severs, we consistently tip generously. We've tipped 30–40% on bills large relative to our paychecks. We make very little money and yet we appreciate service of any kind, but especially good service.

That's exactly what we'd received at The Buckhorn until tonight, good service. Tonight. we walked in and asked for a six-top. I know that's a large table when you're not prepared, but the dining room in which we were sat was nearly empty, so I don't quite understand the resistance we were met with after asking for the table. After two of our party were sat, the hostess went into the kitchen and very loudly complained about us to the entire kitchen staff.

After we were sat, the rest of our party arrived but wanted to sit in the main dining room where the bar is located in order to listen to the open mic performers. So we wanted to join them. Granted, it was a little awkward asking to be moved from one table, and dining room, to another. However, having worked as a sever for many years, I asked the hostess what the least troublesome way we could transition was. And she just stared at me. So I asked again. She stared longer. Eventually, we completed our transition to another table. We offered to retrieve our water glasses, menus, and silverware from our original table so that no one would have to do it for us. And we did. While we were grabbing those items, we heard, again, loud complaints from the waitstaff to the kitchen about how we wanted to change tables.

I wanted to get up and leave. Unfortunately, The Buckhorn has a monopoly on restaurants in PA, and I was starving. But I felt incredibly embarrassed in front of our guests.

Though I'll likely still pay to see shows in the opera house, since it's an amazing venue that even terrible service couldn't spoil, I will never pay for food in The Buckhorn restaurant or support its service staff again.

What a joke. Silver City is a small community. PA is even smaller. If you can't recognize your friends and exercise a little patience for their benefit, what kind of local business are you? I'll tell you. You're a chain restaurant in the guise of a local business, with a stale menu that never changes and a waitstaff that doesn't understand the first thing about the service industry.

We treated you right, Buckhorn. The least you couldn't done is pay that back.

Also, for the love of God, get rid of the racist mannequin near the restrooms. Really? A "Native American" sitting at a...

TL;DR: They need someone to answer their phone, food was great, service was horrible.

Reading the other reviews, maybe I just went on the wrong night? But I feel I need to share my experience.

First problem was making a reservation, had to call several times on different days just to get someone to pick up the phone, and yes I called during their business hours. We finally got one, Dec 21 at 6pm.

We were expecting a nice, quiet dining experience, that was not the case. We were sat near a table full of drunken, loud people doing a gift exchange. So loud we couldn't hear each other. We were able to order and get our drinks quite quickly, but that was about the only quick thing that happened. It took about average to get our main dish, and even longer to be offered refills on our drinks.

The portions of our meals after a large order of calamari was a bit too much for us to finish, so we requested to-go boxes. When our waitress delivered our boxes she offered dessert, which we politely declined. But who asks for a to-go box and eats dessert, we're full.

Then our waitress disappeared for quite awhile, then came back with our check, which she just threw on the table and walked off to another table. I looked over the check and got my credit card out so she could come by and pick it up, but she never came back. We ended up having to flag down the host that was sitting another table to take my card to her. She then came back with my card, which she just sat on the table and walked off again. Seems like she was mad at us for being full on the food and not wanting dessert?

The kicker is we went to breakfast at another local restaurant on Sunday morning before heading back home, and there she was. We over heard her saying "I had such a bad night Friday." Guess she's one of those people who takes our her bad mood on her customers.

I grew up in Silver City, but my family could never afford to take us to the Buckhorn. So I wanted to go for my 35th birthday, and she ruined the experience, along with the...

Why would a couple that hardly ever eats meat want to go to a steakhouse? Because of the history of the place.

We went on a dark and rainy Friday evening. It was busy but not packed and a musician was seated near the bar playing acustic classics from mid 20th century American folk and country. Stepping into the place is like stepping into a museum and artifacts from the storied history of the establishment are on some walls.

We were seated near the entrance to the opera house. We ordered green chile cheese fries, a portabella burger ( which has no meat) and the green chile stew ( which has some shredded chicken, but I knew it wasn't going to be vegetarian and wanted to order a signature item). Everything was fantastic. The burger was probably the best portabella burger we've had. It was perfectly marinated and seasoned. We deeply appreciated that the kitchen wanted to offer a top notch item for those who don't eat meat. The gcc fries were the best we've had, with excellent fries and a solid gc sauce. The stew was akin to a gc chicken enchilada stew and was comforting and excellent. The meal came with complementary bread and our waiter was excellent. Note I didn't check if the gc sauce was vegetarian so those who are really concerned should check before ordering the fries.

After dinner we went and looked around the opera house. It's like stepping back into time. It does have a slightly haunted atmosphere but perhaps that's just the uncanny feeling that happens when one is in an empty place that is meant to be full of people. Along the walls are photographs of ghost towns, but not all of them are such! ( Such as Magdalena which definitely has people even if it's quieter than it was in the past.)

Definitely make reservations at dinner. It gets busy and we were glad we did.

Next time we're in the Gila we'll stop by and if given the chance would bring family...