Duffer's Pub — Restaurant in Lake Forest

One price fits all apparently. It seems as if everything on the menu is $15.95. So odd that you can get 7 boneless/bone in wings or a variety of buyers with fries or a salad at the same price point. Not a lot of thought goes into the menu.

The draft menu is good. Like their sister restaurants, they do a good job with their draft choices. Nice to see the number of craft option they have.

The gem is the golf simulators. $65 for an hour and would be a great option for business meetings during winter months. They open early which is great if a deal need to be closed, you’ve got golf, food, a full bar and ice cold drafts.

What’s really fun is you can walk around the corner by the bathrooms and get frozen yogurt from Suzy Swirl.

A bonus will be the two double sized garage doors windows they have. When the weather permits it’ll be amazing when these can be opened and get more of an indoor/outdoor experience.

All the TVs are awesome. Hosting a viewing party or a big game would be great here.

My recommendations; offer varied prices menu that makes more sense and not what appear to be a flat rate for varying food categories. Increase the amount of wings or really improve the quality of wing you offer. Compete with what your Chief’s partner offers, great wings but go from a count of 7 to 12 for the price you have. Add vegetarian options. Add garbanzo or black beans as an alternative to meat. Have a garden burger in place of meat patties. Add a kids menu. Maybe it’s a secret menu but what I looked at there wasn’t anything.

It’s a nice addition to the community. The service is great. For new staff they are hustling to cover the bar and tables as well as getting people seated.

It’s worth a visit and...

Our lunch at Duffer's was not a good experience, sadly. The restaurant atmosphere was heavy on the golf simulation they offer but no other unique or distinguishing qualities. The ambiance was loud and echoing. The sound of golf balls slamming against the golf simulation backdrops was jarring and very unpleasant (unless you like that sort of thing). Service was abominable. After waiting for over 15 mins, someone finally came around to greet us and take drink and appetizer orders. Asked the server what was good or what came recommended and they shrugged and appeared miffed by my inquiry. Fourty mins later we got our appetizers. Decent food, happy with it, but nothing spectacular. Draft beer selection is pretty good. We ordered the main course which never came. No offers to refill drinks or asking how things were going. Another 40 mins pass. Our server, we were told, left for the day and our table was forgotten about. I saw a few people at other nearby tables peer around the restaurant in search for a server or perhaps a lifeboat to another restaurant. Apparently we were not the only ones abandoned! After some polite apologies from a staff member, we asked for the bill then promptly departed. Over $50 for two appetizers and three beers which seemed pretty steep. Very sorry but we will not be back. I wish I could say we had a...

This was not our original destination for the night but the atmosphere looked awesome so we changed out plans and stopped in. Seat your self, so we sat at the bar so we'd get good/fast service. Bartender came, got our order and we never saw her again. Our food came out and boy was this the biggest disappointment. Sliders were raw. Not undercooked, raw. The meat fell apart. Our fries were so hard from sitting under the heat lamp for so long. And we never received our jalapeño bites. We flagged down another bartender to get this addressed. He came back and said they took if our bill. 3 out of 3 food items that were wrong. So we left there with no food in our tummies. No manager ever came out and apologized for serving literal RAW meat and fries that you could use as a boomerang. Didn't expect much but some acknowledgment would be nice. We were still customers and still paid for our drinks.

Long story short: stick to your original plan. The nice atmosphere is what pulled us in. But once you walk through the doors, it all...