Black Marlin Bayside Grill — Restaurant in Hilton Head Island

Our visit was on 7/28 for dinner. My family and I have been here multiple times for whatever reason. My husband and I arrived this year a bit early for our reservation. We decided to go sit at the outdoor bar and have a few drinks until family arrived. We sat there for a while without being acknowledged. The bar tender cleaned the empty drinks from beside us, but refuse to acknowledge we existed. My parents made the reservation thinking they had enjoyed the place prior. My mother was going to get the fried seafood which my husband and I quickly reminded her she did not enjoy last time. Our service wasn’t bad, but it was great either. I asked for a spicy Bloody Mary, which just tasted like straight tomato juice with no flavor garnished with a lemon, nothing else. Which is crazy for a drink that wasn’t cheap. After adding some hot sauce and salt, it was drinkable. We started off with the shrimp and artichoke dip (which also offered very little flavor) and the calamari. The calamari was okay but nothing to get excited over. I won’t give opinions on how much others at the table enjoyed their food but mine was disappointing. For my entree I got the filet Oscar. It was cool led to the perfect temperature. But then I ate it. The filet itself was fine. But the Oscar topping was not good. The topping was overly fishy, as if it were not fresh or starting to go bad. I scrapped it off my filet and at the steak, still with that overwhelming taste left on it. I didn’t finish my meal, because in all reality it wasn’t great or really great quality. We decided we won’t be coming back. It wasn’t amazing. There are many options for food on the island that are phenomenal, but this...

Went here with 4 other women. Everyone enjoyed our lunch combo meals. The others all shared a large serving of Mussels which they raved about. 03/21/25: We have been here many times before and as my previous post the Food has always been excellent. I'm not sure if the Kitchen was having a bad night but my Husband & I were very disappointed this time. There were 4 of us dining - 1 of the 4 had never eaten here. We were all looking forward to dining with you. My Husband ordered the Fish & Chips. When his meal arrived the Fish was very heavily fried. There were 2 pieces & he ate the larger of the 2. We brought home the smaller piece which I ate today for lunch. It was all breading & a very small piece of Fish inside. I had the Shrimp Platter that was on the March Special Menu. Some of the Shrimp were small & the Breading was a little spicy. I do not recall the menu stating it would be spicy ( which I am not fond of ). My Sister-in-Law ordered the Pecan Butter Cod ( which I have eaten in the past & enjoyed ). The piece of Cod she received was approximately 2 x 2".. She said it was very good but so small. My Brother ordered & greatly enjoyed the Seafood Chowder & the Stuffed Shrimp. So we were only good on 25% of our meals. As I said maybe the Kitchen was having some problems. All of the Wait Staff were excellent. We will not hold this 1 incident against you because all of our previous meals have been great. We just wanted to advise you of...

I want to say that I expected to absolutely LOVE this place. In fact, we cancelled a reservation at one of our favorite restaurants to give this one a try because the menu and reviews looked so good. Unfortunately, things didn't go as well as I had expected.

When we arrived, there was an hour wait to sit outside and immediate availability for the inside. However, we were able to grab a first-come first-served high bar table outside right away. There was live music playing and the weather was beautiful.

Throughout our stay, we had two servers attending to us. Sean (Shawn?) was definitely the stand-out though! He was pleasant and thorough. We started with the mussels appetizer, which was delicious. Partially through we asked for some bread to go with it, which took over 10 minutes because they were baking a fresh batch. We slowed down on our appetizer so that we could finish it with bread.

Our entrees arrived very quickly. However, as seen in the photo, my crab cake was very overcooked on one side. I asked for a new one and Sean quickly brought two more that were cooked much better. I also had to ask for both butter and sour cream for my baked potato. My husband's came with butter on it.

Overall, the food was just lacking though. There was no seasoning on the vegetables. Nothing was horrible but it just wasn't great either. When I spend that much on a meal, I am expecting greatness. Unfortunately, it just missed the...