Twisted Monkey Bar & Grill — Restaurant in Lacey

Reviewing anything is extremely rare for me but this was too unique of an outing to not say something. Coworker asked me to check this place out with him. We're trying to find a good bar for pool and watching football this season. The location is ideal, right between our houses so we went in optimistic. We had a blast, not for the typical reasons but for roasting this place for what it is. I will say, before I go any further in review, this place could easily be an awesome bar. If some easy changes were made, I could see this bar popping off in no time. I get the feeling that the owner is probably less than pleased with earnings but very happy with the senior vibe as I have to assume she is also on the older side. Definitely looks like they intended to have a 55+ crowd which is a great path to going out of business. I'll start with the pros: The side room with the pool tables is fantastic, separate from the main room it's a controlled environment with exactly enough space between and around the tables. Easy spot to do tournaments, would help if there wasn't speakers in that room, but instead a few TVs with sports, with the volume adjustable by the pool players. Could be great revenue for the bar if it wasn't for the deal breaking caveats I'll mention at the end. The vibe: place has absolutely no soul, no identity. The first few steps inside will have you super confused, you've never entered a bar like this in your life. It's a huge empty space with awkward seeting, obnoxiously expensive and overly quirky menu. The owner obviously loves monkeys, bananas, plantains, and mango. The food: when you go to a place with this low of a rating it's best to stick to just fried food, hard for the cooks to mess that up. I ended up being right on the nose with this one. Warned one of my buddies to not order anything that isn't deep fried, he got a burger and by the second bite very much regretted not listening. Raved about the onion rings and the ranch he said tastes exactly like hidden valley ranch, which to him is a good thing lol. But once those were gone and he went for the burger regret was immediate. The quirkyness and fine dining price of the menu had no chance whatsoever to meet expectations. You can't charge $2+ per chicken wing, $9 for French fries or $20+ for a burger without delivering on the quality, quick way to rack up bad reviews. I feel bad for the cook, probably gets ignored on suggestions, limited on budget, probably has to work alone so larger tables end up with long service times. It's a bad spot to be in for a line cook. Bar: alcohol is reasonably priced, I had no idea what I was going to pay for my drinks, but after looking at the menu I thought I was in for quite the bill, but no, the booze was priced perfectly within reason. Live music/events: was "Ladies night" tonight and there was I believe 5 women, all 5 over 65yrs old. The live band, even older. It was rough, we so badly wanted this to be our bar, the pool table room has so much potential, the bar itself has massive potential as a physical space, but under its current direction, no chance it survives to 2027. We actually took bets on how long till it goes out of business, my wager was 5 months. Felt myself badly wanting to talk to the owner and have a heartfelt conversation about what could be for this place but I can imagine it got this way because they're too stubborn. I'll check in again in about 5 months to see if they corrected course but not...

Update: First of all, 5 stars for making a go of it and opening a local bar in my neighborhood. Shout out to twisted monkey for the effort. I would like to thank the staff for making us feel welcome when we went in for the first time last night. There are some pros, consider and suggestions I would like to share with the establishment. First, we found the staff to be warm and friendly. The beer was cold, my wife's vodka tonic was descent and we really enjoyed the pool room. The cons include that there clearly is not enough staff to service clientele without a wait. That includes the bar and when ordering food. Although the prices are generally what one would expect to pay, perhaps slightly higher than expected, there were items missing in inventory that just can't be missing when running a business. They ran out of tonic water so we were only able to order 1 drink. The first order of food which were wings was not completed because they ran out of wings. Settled on garlic fries which to be honest, were underwhelming. We expected fresh minced garlic on the fries, it was instead garlic seasoning. The portion was quite small for the price paid, about $11.50. The wait for the fries was incredibly long, although staff did apologize for the delay. Apparently a snafu with the ordering process. For those that smoke, there is no outside area to do so. That's fine as we will find a way, lol. But, an ashtray or smokers outpost outside the door where the proposed patio area would be would be appreciated so we dont end up throwing butts in the rocks outside. I would also suggest some sort of happy hour drink and food specials to drive interest into the place. Promos tied to sporting events, etc. Twisted Monkey has alot of potential. But, until staffing and stick of products is addressed, its going to be a struggle. The music was good, great playlist, but the volume also fluctuates wildly, some songs you could hardly hear. Addressing the above should help. Yes, you will have to pour more capital in to address these items, but if twisted monkey wants to stay open, they will listen and address these items in a hurry. Thank you again for having us, we will be back, assuming you are able...

We were so excited to try this place based on the menu. However, the food you get looks nothing like the menu. It is very misleading. The bottoms up pour system is cool but right now there are only 2 beers on tap (Coors light, Blue Moon) and a cider. The system uses plastic solo cups with a magnet at the bottom of the cup. I would rather have a beer in a pint glass to be honest. The well drink glasses are also smaller than average. The flavor of the food was not as described on the menu either. The calamari was supposed to be peanut crusted and there was no such crust. The chicken skewers were supposed to be grilled and have a coconut peanut sauce but looked like microwaved chunks of chicken and the sauce was spicy with little coconut flavor. Hopefully things will get sorted out and this place will be more accurate with the food and beverage options as they fully open in mid August. Sadly, I dont think we'll be back as the menu can't be trusted. Several people have mentioned the menu is AI created. Our server was friendly, though. Its a pretty wide open space with little to no decor. Several tvs for sports but they are mounted pretty high up in the building. We were hoping for a carribean type vibe based on the food options, but it feels like a wide open cheaply done sports bar. See below pics for what the menu shows vs...