Blockhouse Restaurant and Oyster Bar — Restaurant in Greenville

We are new to the Greenville SC area. We have experienced very fine dining in Cleveland, Ohio, Northern California, SW Florida. We are chagrined at the reviews of this restaurant because in our opinion, the place is a dive. It is old, dirty, has horrible floors with sudden hills and valleys making it very difficult to walk. My husband is 91. I am 67. Both of us have balance issues and I nearly fell just coming down the “hill” from one side of the restaurant to another. The carpeting was very dirty, with food crumbs all over. Our friends arrived first and were seated in a booth waiting for us. They had ordered some Shrimp two different ways. One was shrimp cocktail and one was hot with garlic butter. The shrimp with garlic butter were absolutely delicious. I enjoyed having some of those! The waitress disappeared and we had to wait a very long time to order. She explained that she was the ONLY wait person there for the entire restaurant including the back patio. My husband ordered chicken salad sandwich with Mac n cheese. I ordered Grilled oysters Rockefeller and a small side salad. Our friends ordered baby back ribs and seafood cakes. The sandwich was ok, the Mac n cheese was pretty good. My side salad was just average, although large. Ribs were adequate. Seafood cakes were overcooked. I had stressed the importance of my oysters being grilled rather than lightly steamed. They arrived steamed which I did not want, but I did not want to send them back. I questioned the waitress thoroughly about the preparation of my oysters so mine were a disappointment. The texture was not what I ordered. I won’t return to this place. Like a lot of restaurants in this upstate area,...

We enjoyed our meal at the Blockhouse. My brother-in-law ordered two orders of Buffalo wings. Cuz that's how he rolls. I had the grilled salmon, which is basically the gateway drug of all seafood dinner menus. My sister ordered a filet, cooked medium.

All our food was generally well prepared. The portions were at least generous if not almost excessive. I was full after I finished my salad and half of my salmon and baked potato; I had enough leftovers for dinner the next two nights. My brother-in-law finished his wings and said they were really good. My sister's filet was ordered medium. It was much closer to rare. She called it raw. I encouraged her to send it back but she demurred. She doesn't like to make a fuss. My salmon was basically perfectly prepared.

The Blockhouse reminded us very much of the 99 restaurant chain in New England (those are our roots). And I mean that as a compliment. It was good, clean, simple food, straightforward preparations, well executed. Very similar vibe or ambiance.

We dined in the bar area. I have one suggestion to ownership. It was early evening, before the dinner rush would have started. One of the bar staff was shucking oysters at the bar. Kudos for keeping the oysters on ice both before and after shucking. Please teach your staff how to use an oyster knife to shuck oysters properly. Wiggling the oyster knife into the oyster's hinge and then bashing it on the bar is not recognized as a best practice. All the delicious oyster liquor was lost and I'm sure shards of shell were introduced into the oyster body.

I'm sure we'll be back in the future. And I may try the...

I WFH for a busy food chain as a HR manager so my days are normally glued to my seat but today, I noticed a 2-hour calendar gap, so my fiancé and I decided a lunch date was in order. I have always heard that their food was great so Blockhouse it was. When we entered (like many other reviews below), we were told by the bar associate to seat ourselves in the dining area. "No problem" We sat down, and a waitress dropped off menus to no return. "10 minutes" I finally flagged down another waitress and asked could she assist so she took our drink and food order. Later to find out there were out of straws. "No biggie" Again, I work in the food industry, so I know things happen. With covid and honestly pre-covid I've never been a fan of drinking out of cups/glasses so, I asked for styrofoam cups. I watched this young lady for 4/5 minutes go from table to table collecting tabs, refilling drinks, and overall checking on the guest without not once coming back to our table to check on us or bring us the previously requested styrofoam cups. After flagging her down a 2nd time we finally received our cups. Another gentleman seated beside us asked his waitress (another young lady) to bring him a straw. This waitress proceeded to walk behind the bar and bring this gentleman a straw "The straws we were told they were out of." Let's just say I won't be back. My fiance and I offered to pay for our drinks, I nicely cancelled my order with the non-attentive waitress and proceeded to a drive thru to conclude our...