Fort Ben Pub — Restaurant in Lawrence

The way we were treated at this pub really had a profound effect on my emotions. I not saying that they don't appreciate people of color in their establishment, but that is the way I felt while I was there. I have never in my life experienced such blatant disrespect!! Being a woman of color, certain treatment and looks come with the territory when you’re out in certain areas of Indiana, but this place took it to a whole other level. We have been living close to this restaurant for about 2 years and decided to try some of the local fair in our area. We love to try new places, and this restaurant’s menu online had a lot of great items that we felt we would like to try. We called in an order for pick up, the person who took the order advised us that the order would be ready in 30 minutes. When we arrived, the place was packed with our local "men in uniform", we believe for the city of Lawrence (not a person of color among them) From the second we entered the door all eyes were on my fiancé and me. We approached the bar area where you would pick up a phone in orders, the staff definitely made it obvious that they did not want to serve us bypassing us more than several times to assist other non-melanin customers. Mind you we sat on the bar stools smack dab in the middle of the bar. The server would work both ends of the bar and never interact with my fiancé and me. They would walk by as if we weren't even sitting there and refused to make eye contact with us. At this point, it was oblivious that this was a thing that was really happening. And when you looked at the fellow costumers and staff if became alarmingly clear why. We were the only people of color in the whole place (except for the Hispanic gentlemen working in the kitchen)

The only staff that was helpful were the Hispanic gentleman working in the kitchen. After waiting for about 20 minutes, just to get the attention of a server, I was able to catch the attention of one of the men working in the kitchen. He let us know that our order had never even been placed in the kitchen. My fiancé was furious, and I was so hurt by the way were treated I just cried in the car. I have never felt so uncomfortable in my entire life! To the owner of this establishment. This is 2018 and people of color spend money just like everyone else. The only reason I am giving this place 1 star is that you must for your...

Terrible service last night, on my friends birthday no less. The long haired brunette server was rude to me seconds after walking in regarding where I wanted to sit... really? She made a comment to my friend about how old he looked for his age and then asked his wife how old she was, mind u it was his birthday. It took me 5 minutes to get my first bottle of beer. Later in the evening I requested a beer as she walked past and she said nothing, I then said 'miss' and then she looked back at me. I was seriously in shock at the unprofessionalism, my hearst started to race like it does before you get into a fight but u can't hit a woman and I didn't want to make a scene on my friends birthday. Finally, I saw her sit next to another customer and take a 'shot' with them... drinking on the job? That's a nice touch, is there a back room for private dances too? My friend is too laid back to say anything so I felt compelled to speak on his behalf, my behalf and the other couple she was rude to. *Fair warning to the owner, who I have seen at the bar watching football on Sunday, I will be back in there and if the experience is 1% similar to last night I will be contacting the BBB...

The good: steak quesadillas were really good. The ok: burger was thoroughly mediocre and overcooked by two levels of doneness. Hot wings were ok, and not at all spicy. Fried mushrooms were average. Shrimp app was meh. The bad: shrimp tacos were not good. My fries were cold. The terrible: The service was a complete disaster. Don’t get me wrong, the servers were friendly, but the service as a whole was completely incompetent. Our entrees came out over the span of over an hour. A couple were wrong. Some things never came out. And this was after a long wait for our food to begin with. Then, it took an egregiously long time to get our bill and settle up. So basically, after a needlessly long and not that good meal we couldn’t even leave bc they couldn’t bother to get us a check.

They were dealing with a large party, but that’s not an excuse for this level of poor service, and their half throated apologies that were basically just excuses didn’t help.

So, in short, come here if you want good bar quesadillas....