Jefferson House — Restaurant in Jefferson Township

Someone needs to call Gordon Ramsey ASAP...

My experience here was like an episode straight out of Kitchen Nightmares. Starting from the confusing entrance through a dingy dusty hallway. My mom and I were sat down by the water towards the back of the restaurant at a table with chairs that were covered in spider webs. Service was slow to begin with, taking 10-15 minutes to even receive water.

We ordered the Seafood Crabcakes, which aren't fresh to begin with and also cheapened by adding shrimp to the crabcakes – can't even afford to serve 100% crab for 19? and then both ordered bacon cheeseburgers. I ordered it without cheese and tomato, and requested the onions to be caramelized. My mom ordered it with cheddar cheese, as well as caramelized onions too.

When the burgers arrive, her burger has AMERICAN cheese on it. We send it back to the kitchen to have the burger replaced with cheddar cheese and it comes back within 5 minutes–the fastest anything at this restaurant has happened so far. The waiter comes back to clarify that the cheddar cheese is shredded versus a slice – and as she takes a bite, it is clear the shredded cheddar cheese has just been sprinkled on top of the American cheese. The fact that it came out within 5 minutes shows that not only that they didn't even bother to cook a whole new burger which is standard practice at any restaurant, but they couldn't even SCRAPE off the American cheese on the burger in the first place.

My mom continued to eat her burger due to her hunger, and when the waiter came back to clear our table, he made an indication to take my mom's plate–still half full and mid-eaten–because of her complaints of the food without taking into consideration the fact that she was literally still eating?

After we receive the check, we got up and went inside to pay ASAP instead of having to wait yet another 20minutes for the check to be picked up. We wait about 5 minutes for the waiter to come inside to swipe our card. Afterwards we noticed that we were overcharged on the burgers for $1 each without an itemized receipt explaining why. We bring it up to the waiter who says that the "upgrade" to caramelized onions cost a $1 each... which he never mentioned to us at the table when we first brought it up as common curtesy.

A woman, potentially a manager? (although I hope it isn't...) came up to us asking what was going on. The waiter used this as his chance to run and hide in the kitchen. My mom begins to explain what has happened throughout our time at the restaurant – which has been nothing short of unpleasant – and this woman does everything BUT pay attention. She begins cutting my mom off by repeatedly interjecting with "Ok, ok, ok." My mom asks if she will let her finish talking. When my mom mentions the onion overcharge, the woman immediately grabs a menu to double check if that information was on the menu (it wasn't.) This woman then asks us how much the overcharge was and then walks away in the middle of my mom complaining to grab $2 from the petty cash drawer. She essentially shoves the cash at my mom. As we sign the check, my mom says we'll never be coming back and we'll be leaving bad reviews... A man working at the restaurant laughs as he passes by the situation–a customer explaining how terrible her experience at this place was...

Unfortunately, it is clear that this family run restaurant has a lot of dysfunction–similar to the places you'd see on Kitchen Nightmares. I imagine they're only still in business because of the lake view (which even that is mediocre) and being the only option available when the Windlass and Alice is closed, because their lack of customer service is disgusting, the restaurant itself is dusty and dirty, their food is lackluster and overpriced. I am suspicious at the amount and rate of the 5 star reviews about this place when they are the epitome of a NO...

This is the worse restaurant in all of Lake Hopatcong & Sussex county. It was our first time eating here and certainly will be our last. We decided to eat here because The Windlass was closed. What a huge mistake it turned out to be. Slow service, overpriced low quality food and incredibly poor customer service. We ordered 2 bacon cheeseburgers, one with cheese and one without. I asked for cheddar and received American. When I complained to the waiter, he took the burger back to the kitchen, only to come back with shredded cheddar cheese slapped on top of the American. My burger was also cold by that time. I'm used to being serviced at restaurants that will remake the entire meal if they screw up or at the very least willing to do away with the wrong item on the order. Despite expressing my grave disappointment to the waiter, he did nothing to try and make up for it. There was no offer to get a manager, to discount the food or comp it, no offer of complimentary food/beverage of any kind, absolutely nothing.

As we left and went to pay the bill, we noticed we had been overcharged. When brought to the waiter's attention he claimed the sauteed onions we asked for were additional, yet he never made us aware there would be an extra charge for requesting that the onions the burger already came dressed with, be carmelized. And just when I thought things couldn't get any worse, he turns the issue over to a hostile woman who demanded to know what happened but then decides to cut me off as I start to explain. I had to assert myself so she could let me finish. She then rudely hands me $2 in cash for the overcharge, no apologies no concern for our awful experience whatsoever. At this point already feeling incredibly sour, there was just no way I could leave a tip.

This has got to be one of the worse if not worst dining experiences we have ever had. I mentioned I was going to leave a bad Google review and an old man who could have been the owner just laughed. Like seriously? Stay away from this place if you value quality food and polite hospitality. Never again! They reek of racism in this place as I also noticed the segregration that another reviewer...

We arrived with no reservation but the waitress quickly prepared a table for us, party of 13. The atmosphere was casual, with a separate bar area, and seating tables over looking the water. The waitress, Jane Marie was hospitable took our orders. We were a large group so I’m sure we were overwhelming for her since we ordered the kids food 1st, then drinks, then our apps and food. We sat down at 2pm . We received our food ONLY AFTER, someone in our party asked one of the waitress’ why we had not gotten our food since tables around us got their orders first. A different waitress responded “because you are a big party, the kitchen was short staff and because the kids went back to college”. -When our waitress returned she realized she never placed the order in digitally. Then began to ask again what we ordered because she needed to see if food was ready in the kitchen and didn’t want to place all the orders again a second time. At 4PM—Then all the food came out rushed, cold, and the anticipated hunger and wait was truly disappointing! Although we paid the $400 bill- this is just a sample of what We ordered and based on the speed of when we got our food only after we inquired about our order- I’m going to assume our food was just sitting in the kitchen: (we don’t like to return food) -Beef empanadas (which were like knishes) not latin styled empanadas. -Meat lovers pizza was hard -Nachos were soggy and burnt placed on a metal tray with no real meat -the meat tasted like canned meat. -Chicken sandwiches were cold -Bruschetta was bland and just sitting in a watery mix -Penne vodka bland and sauce was also watery **Ropa Vieja(waitress did mention it new item) was the worst- looked like soup. IYKYK: looked more like “asopao”. We did credit for that meal! Only good thing was the chicken tacos. Kitchen needs a revamp of the head chef and menu! Come for the view and drinks. Apparently the locals enjoy the bar cuz as we were leaving that area was packed. Sadly I would NOT recommend this place although the...