Blue Bird of Leland — Restaurant in Leland Township

Unfortunately a very poor experience when visiting here in earlier September and I would not recommend going. There was very little and poor communication with the waiter (I think they said his name was Forest?).

Before we even had time to look at the menu the waiter came up and asked what we'd like to drink as they always do. When we just asked for water, he proceeded to give us two bottles of water (which he would later charge us $2 for without any explanation). Then when we ordered a burger, he asked, "would you like the fries with that?" On the menu, it said that it included "chips" which is what we figured it meant by fries (like fish and chips - meaning fries) because he asked it like it was a natural part of the order (like asking if you want toast with your eggs). I thought my thought process was confirmed when the burger came with only fries and no potato chips.

When we got to the end of our order, he proceeded to charge us $2 for the waters (since when do restaurants charge for water esp without telling you there is a charge?) and then charged us $4 extra for fries, which he had volunteered for again without telling us there was an up charge to that. When I told him that we were both under the impression that is what the menu meant by chips he responded very disrespectfully making us feel like idiots for thinking that chips could under any circumstances mean fries (despite being reminded that fish and chips means fish and fries). I then asked why we never got the chips if they came included and he said it was because we ordered the fries. How do we pay more for fries and not get what was already included in the price of the burger?

I will say that I appreciated that he took the bill back and took off the fries, which was nice, but then upon coming back was again quite incredulous and disrespectful adding a dig in his comment back to us about somehow not knowing that what he offered with the burger was an up charge and how much of idiots we were for thinking that chips could ever mean fries.

Anyway, at the end of the day, it was only a few dollars, but in principle it felt very scammy and dishonest to charge for things like water and adding extra fries without communicating that clearer to customers. It feels like you get hit with a bill that you didn't ever even agree to pay because you didn't know you were ordering those things as "extras" (I mean you're really charging $2 for water????). Better communication and then less disrespectful communication about an honest misunderstanding would have gone a long way...

Restaurants in small towns are always interesting as they don't have much competition. Upon arriving, the dining room wasn't open just the bar area so we grabbed a recessed booth to contain the three hungry kids under five better. After around a 5 minute wait without acknowledgement I approached the gentleman at the bar and asked if there was table service or were we to order with him. He said it was table service and that he'd send someone over. Another 5+ minutes goes by and we're finally greeted to count the number of people at the table and then she quickly disappeared to grab menus. By this time, we'd already decided on what we were eating from the small flip menu on the table, keeping it quick and easy with pizza. When she returned, we let her know we were ready to order but she said she'd be right back. A couple minutes later, she returns and we order. There were a few communication issues and with clarification we were good as English was not her first language - this seemed to be a shared fact with most of the waitstaff we came into contact with. The only other oddity with this restaurant is that we never received our drinks until we received our food, not sure if they were forgotten or that's standard to just bring them with the food though not common with most other restaurants.

The pizza was excellent, well cooked, great homemade crust, nothing bad to say about it. Prices were fair for the area and quality. Getting the check and paying took a few to work out as there were additional communication issues but it was worked out in time without any kids melting down on the overall time spent at the restaurant. Generally we don't hang out for a long time at a restaurant and determine meals as soon as possible to keep the flow moving forward, this took longer...

We were visiting Leland and were starving, after surveying the restaurant situation, we chose The Bluebird. We sat outside under a large event tent. There were kids riding Elecrtic scooters right next to our table in their “waiting area”. There were dogs at the table next to ours, which I didn’t particularly like. Also, people tripped on the dogs water bowl 2-3 times, knocking it completely over and almost taking out a small child. Our server seemed disinterested as I did not see her much at all. She was nice, but could have been more present (and she wasn’t hustling around other tables, which I would have understood if they were understaffed). They served pop in cans, and water in bottles. I felt like I was at a graduation party, not spending $100 (for a family of six) to eat dinner. Covid restrictions are lifting. Everywhere we went to eat on our vacation served beverages in glasses. Seemed like a complete rip off. The food was good. I got a cherry chicken salad sandwich on the croissant, which was delightful. My kids got a pizza, which looked good. My husband got a burger and we had a couple appetizers. No complaints there. But seems with Covid restrictions lifting, some of these tacky procedures could...