Old Detroit Burger Bar — Restaurant in Lapeer

Semi regular to this restaurant, my friend's family introduced me years ago and I've been a big fan.

However, on Monday (8-11-25) me and my friend stopped in and I have to say I was extremely disappointed for the first time. Enough so to leave a negative review. A few things bothered me.

First off, the more minor annoyance was when I noticed the menu had changed. It seemed to have been slimmed down, and many of the names changed. My favorite burger, The Warren Ave, was gone, and the name changes were confusing and unnecessary in my opinion. I ended up ordering "The Lightning," which I believe was formally "The Gratiot Ave." Why would you get rid of the name "The Gratiot Ave" when Gratiot is the literal backbone of southern Michigan? Anyways, I asked about the Warren Ave and the waitress didn't know what I was talking about, despite the menu change being recent. So I mentioned that it had green olives on it and asked if I could get that on my burger today, to which she said she could make that happen.

After ordering, we noticed the waitress ended up talking to what seemed like another employee that was off-shift about some personal issues. This wouldn't have been a problem if they could have kept their volume to a respectable level as they were situated at the table directly behind ours. It was a bit annoying, but whatever. However, when our food was ready the waitress was pretty fired up with her personal business and the attitude ended up being carried into our service. We ended up getting some of her residual attitude when we were served, and our burgers were dropped in front of us instead of being set down.

She never introduced herself so I'm not sure of her name, and I regret not asking. The modifications to my burger were forgotten as well and she disappeared for some length of time so I was unable to ask for them on the side.

The biggest annoyance was that the bartender (I think his name is Paul) was vaping inside, behind the bar, while having a conversation with customers. I thought this was utterly disrespectful.

This was a sad experience at one of my favorite...

Alright so normally I’m not one to leave a negative review but after dining here tonight I felt compelled to do so. I decided to take my sons out for a burger and we ordered the appetizer nachos. Maybe 10 chips had toppings on them and the rest of the chips underneath that were all crushed into crumbs. Super disappointed with those. Kaitlyn was our waitress btw. Midway through our appetizer a party of 8 came in. I sat without a drink for over 15 minutes after asking for a refill. Finally I got up and walked up to the bar and asked for the bartender to fill my coke and he jokingly goes “will a gram be enough” haha funny thank god my sons weren’t standing behind me…our food finally came and I had asked for dressing on the side… it was all over my Reuben which I only planned to eat half this is why I ordered it with it on the side so it wouldn’t get soggy on my way home…sooo about 10 mins later she finally brought me a side of 1000 island. Once the party of 8 came in and sat down any type of attentiveness or any attention being paid to my sons and I went out the window. It was self serve at that point. Which I understand you’re assuming you’re going to get a larger tip from a party of 8 vs the single mom who has her sons out to eat. My bill was $75, I had A $100 bill I was going to just leave and give her a nice 25% tip but nah. I’m extremely disappointed in not only the service but the waitress didn’t even offer to get my sandwich made the way I ordered it. I paid 18 for a sandwich I ate a 1/4 of and is now too soggy to even consume. Won’t be returning unfortunately. Really sad lesson I had to teach my...

This location sucks!! Don't waste your time or your money!! Ordered 3 burgers, none of them came out correct. Granted 2 of them were just missing condiments, but the waitress said she would bring out what was missing and that didnt happen. Was literally lettuce and pickles so not sure why that was so hard. She offered to take mine back as it was completey incorrect. I never send my food back so I already felt bad. However once it came back it was still made incorrectly!!!!!! I wish I had just sent it back again as it was disgusting. It had way too much salt and pepper on the patty to the point I had to force myself to eat what I could as I was starving. Also for a burger that is supposed to have onion rings on it, it had the smallest onion ring and I couldn't even bite through it. Waffle fries we got were had to of been the end of the bag because it was literal crumbs on the plate. I was very unhappy and ready to leave. The place wasn't even busy but the waitress was more worried about the 3 people at the bar than anything else. Had been done for over 20 mins before she even came to check back up. The other locations are great and will just have to drive out of my way next time as I'll never go back to this location again. For what I spent there I shouldn't of left still hungry....