The Snake Pit — Restaurant in Kellogg

We've been using the Snake Pit as a destination bike ride from Harrison for 5ish years now with our boys, riding 32 miles each way on the trail of the CDAs.

It's never been about the food, and when asked, I would tell people the food is mediocre. it was always about the experience, and a fun historical location.

However, The Snake Pit is under new ownership and it really shows.

Atmosphere: Both the outside and inside have been spruced up. The inside is noticeably cleaner, with better table spacing. The outside has flowers and plants adorning the 2nd level, making it far more attractive now. They've added to signage, redone the menus, and it's all a nice upgrade. It's a work in progress, and I hope to see continued improvements... the men's bathroom definitely needs some work. Also, fly traps outside would be nice, though we really enjoyed eating outside in the full shade thanks to their large shade cover on the deck.

Food: The food was greatly improved as well. There are more menu options, and the food is just tastier. Pictured here are the steak sandwich with chimichurri, and the brisket cheese sandwich (order this!). I ordered jalapeno jam as a 1.50 add on and it was disappointing. It came out in a small cup and looked nothing like jam, in fact it looked just like sliced jalapenos. Upon tasting it was... sliced jalapenos, sweetened. I asked for a replacement as I thought it was a mistake, but received the same thing again. Also, I pictured a nice pile of chimichurri on my steak sandwich, but it was scarce. Oh well. The steak was tender and flavorful, the tots had a fantastic crunch, the brisket had a great smoke flavor and tenderness to it. Overall the food is a big improvement, tastier, more options, and I can now say it's GOOD!

Service: This blew our socks off. The service wasn't bad before, but we arrived hot sweaty and thirsty, ordering Arnold palmers all around. I think I drank 5-6 of them, the refills just kept coming, and swiftly. This was one of the best restaurant services I've ever experienced, and one of the rare times I fell a great tip was very justified. Great work!

Judging from the standpoint of eating here once annually for 5 years, The Snake Pit is the best it's ever been in our experience, and I can finally recommend it as a solid restaurant stop for anyone.

Congratulations on revitalizing this historic restaurant new owners! I wish you many great years loving on this...

I hate to do this to a local place and I will still go there but I won’t eat the food it’s terrible. We are locals and many of our friends warned us how bad it would be and it was. Last night I had the steamed mussels...Because we are mussel connoisseurs... Oh my gosh it was terrible about a 1/8 of them...were not open that’s not a good sign. Not everybody is honest when they talk to the owner Tom because they don’t want to hurt his feelings but I think it’s better to tell the truth so they can do better this is a great location and could become a destination spot. The other thing we had which was a chicken sandwich was dry and lacked flavor it is rather expensive dining for very bad food it’s better to do fried barfood and stick with that then try to make your restaurant upscale if you don’t know what you’re doing. I highly recommend reviewing your kitchen procedures you need a system and you guys don’t have one the thing is we want you to succeed. People will come there from all over to hang out and to be in the beautiful state of Idaho fix this thing… I’m not kidding it was terrible can you go there and have a drink and a beer and survive... yes you can but they need to do something seriously about the kitchen it’s a new business trying to get off the ground we understand but you need to invest in the food if you’re going to sell it. The lore of the area is great and you can be very successful if you just follow some steps. The locals are not telling the truth except amongst themselves. The mussels weren’t just bad they were horribly bad... the broth was too salty and the bread which is supposed to be toasted crisp was stuck in the bottoms so it was just a soggy mess... it’s really hard to screw up this type of dish you have to really work at it. We fed a lot of it to the dogs that were on the deck that is the cool part you can bring your dog. This is a fast dish that you do in the whole butter and white wine with garlic and seasoning maybe a little oregano. If you had a good seafood gumbo which would involve cooking but also letting it mellow it might be a better choice but somebody at that place needs to learn how to be a chef or even a cook. It’s not a joke. Take the one star listen to what we’re saying because we want you to succeed. Thanks for listening Sunny. PS the wait...

READ TILL THE END! YOU'LL BE GLAD YOU DID. the place looks cool enough but I had a bad experience so thats why the poor review. I was able to sit at the bar because I was solo but they had a 40 min wait on Sat lunchtime and that's not crazy to believe but it took the 1 bartender the place will hire 25 mins before she even acknowledged my presence. I asked for a sprite and a menu and she gave me the menu and I took 2 mins to figure out what I wanted but it took her another 15 mins to take my order. It was very hot outside and I was on my motorcycle and very thirsty and I was still waiting for my sprite and politely trying to get her attention.( never yell for things from your waitstaff especially the bartender) but I think she realized that I must be staring at her because I need something and my food wasn't out yet so what could it be? DING I then got my sprite finally and to her credit she didn't charge me for it and therefore not the reason for the poor review. I really needed to make a call and i had no service and i asked her if i could get the wifi password and she said no sorry. Thats sucks now im stuck waiting here on a day i dont have spare time and I can't do anything until i get my food and go and since im on my bike i cant just get it to go. So i did the next logical step and i tried to bribe her for it! I told her i would tip her very well for it and get off of it as soon as my business was taken care of and not share it with a soul. Im not saying that was cool or should be done but i really needed this wifi so i could make these calls i had to make. Still no! Ok i didnt keep trying after that . I finally got my food a moment later, (approx 35 mins in all.) Ate it fast asked for my bill. Still tipped her better than I should have somewhere just under 50% ($7 on $15 tab) and I left. Now here's the real reason for the bad review. 7 hours later on my long road trip home I get food poisoning and am imprisoned in every nasty smelly rest area and gas station bathroom between cor d' leane Idaho and Seattle Washington. I didn't eat anything else today just them. It's going to be a long 330 miles home. Effin snake pit. Should've known by a name like that. What was I thinking. If I can save even 1 person from the living hell I'm in right now then sharing this humiliation will...