Native Grill & Wings — Restaurant in Marana

Up until they changed it, I always knew em as Native New Yorker...and one of the best places to "wing-it" on the planet! Plus, they were only 10 cents a wing with only 2 rules...order some sort of beverage and not valid for carry-out orders. That was it, nice and simple. The wings were fantastic and always consistently the same size and the sauces were uniform regardless of what location you found yourself at...let's not forget the insane number of televisions and sporting events you could watch on any given day of the week! There's even a screen or two in the restroom for God sales!! It was in Phoenix, Feb of 1985, when I first discovered this magical place, and it was blissful...kind of a "you complete me" sort of relationship to be honest. These days, they have changed their name to Native Grill & Wings and they have changed their menus and of course the prices to reflect the times. The wings are no longer consistent in size, flavor, doneness or the amount of sauce applied to them. Service is slow to slower more often then not, and it's clear something has been lost in transition. Ownership did not change hands as far as I know, same family since they ventured out of New York long ago... just added a couple generations of kids to the mix...and a name change to better reflect the type of food one might expect to be had there...I still go there maybe once or twice a month (Used to be once or twice a week) and take my chances. I wouldn't care about slow service, or over priced wings even, but lately I've had to endure under cooked wings served slowly AND expensively and only once in a while do they hit the same mark they used to. I don't know what has happened in the last few years to cause this once great place to become just another reason to consider eating at home, but omg do I miss the place they used to be. Almost 3 decades of amazingly delectable wings, service and value...down to a shadow of their former glory. I offer 3 stars, two reflect the current state of being...the extra star is for still getting it right now and again...and me wishing for someone in charge to bring back the passion and heart that made them great in New York all those years ago, and also drove them to risk bringing it to others who genuinely love what they did...please don't forget forever, I promise to be patient...

A honey-hot fan for 34 & 1/2...

Experience here was a bit disappointing tonight... Went there with family after daughter's graduation as she asked for wings. We were seated fairly quickly, so that's good.

Our main waitress was just okay, it took a while for her to get back to us after every interaction, and always seemed a bit in a hurry. Even though the place was not full and other waitresses were on duty. They do seem a bit understaffed today and at times we've visited before.

The food was meh I guess. I ordered a ten pack of bone in wings combo, and they gave me all drums. I didn't order all drums, and I don't remember the menu indicating this. No big deal I guess. The chicken itself was smaller dry-ish pieces, but it came out hot at least. Fries were hard and lukewarm. They were probably drying out under a heat lamp I'm thinking.

The low Service rating is because when bringing out my food, the server (not our waitress) almost dumped a cup of ranch all over my lap because of how she just quickly slammed the food down in front of me. I intercepted the ranch just in time before disaster and it spilled all over my hands instead. (Unfortunately I happen to strongly dislike ranch). She's like "oh, sorry about that" a few times. I asked for a lot of napkins to help clean up all this. She gave me like three and quickly walked away.

Native Grill & Wings Servers: slow down and be careful is all that's asked. Just take care of your customers please. That's a pretty basic restaurant service...

So I’m giving 5 stars, because the waitress who looked after us was brilliant. The food we got was absolutely fine if a little overcooked. However, a little message for those who are running the business:-

It took 50 minutes from ordering to receiving our food. Throughout this wait the waitress kept apologizing to us for the wait and did everything she could. Apparently the manager was in the kitchen as the chef had to go to the store. There were no more than 30 customers in the building.

We were on our way to Phoenix for our flight home, and time was tight. The food arrived as we were literally about to get up and go as we had given up. We were late returning our rental car at the airport and that was after rushing eating and then taking a take out box to eat on the road. Had the food arrived in a timeous manner, we would have had no issues.

To the manager on shift. You put your server in an awful position for the shift with your decisions. If you cannot handle covering the kitchen for a quiet afternoon shift to the point it impacts customer service, then either retrain in the kitchen to up your skill level, or ensure other people in your team can pick up the cooking if a situation like this comes up again. I felt so sorry for her having to come over and apologise. She knocked off the cost of the drinks on the bill and for that we are grateful. I’m awarding the 5 stars for her. Good staff in hospitality are so hard to get a hold...