Pines Public House & Eatery — Restaurant in Maryland

This is NOT a five star restaurant. I was happy to see a different kind of restaurant open in the Pines - looked like an exciting menu but a dismal truly a dismal failure. I went opening weekend and you expect a little chaos. We were told a 20 to 30 minute wait - we went to the bar, the young lady gave us drink menus and then disappeared. She was busy talking to the wait staff hanging around the kitchen door. She never came back and 20 minutes later we were seated not a glass of wine in sight - then wait staff came to the table asked for drink order we order a glass of wine and a glass of water - 20 minutes later the water showed up but no wine. Finally, I got up from the table asked for someone to have our waiter please check in with the table. He shows up and we remind him of the drink order and would he please take our food order. He does so but its 10 minutes more for the wine to show up and 40 minutes more for food. By this time its a lost cause we eat and leave to the tune of $75 a head. Thinking I would give this place 6 months to work out the kinks I vowed not to return. My sister insisted we go there this evening because her son was in town and we wanted to show him this new place with the terrific looking menu. We were seated promptly, a waitress shows up and takes our drink order - mind you it's not busy - 10 minutes later I walk up to the front and ask for 3 glasses of water (there were at least 5 wait staff standing around chatting) A young man says " right away" and the water shows up. 5 minutes later the waitress shows up with water and the drink order. The waitress notices the water is already on the table and immediately gets an attitude. We tell her we are placing the food order because one of our party was returning to NY tonight and we would appreciate not waiting 45 minutes for food again - she politely agrees to move the food to us as quickly as possible. Appetizers arrive - the bus boy shows up asks if he can remove a dish and leaves all the other dishes - he takes only one dish and all the others are clearly finished. We stack up the remaining dishes and the young man delivering the dinner plates removes all the other appetizer plates. Dinner follows we asked for the sauce on the side - it came without - the hostess comes around asks how things are - we ask her for the side that was missing she promptly sends it over. I had salmon - nothing to brag about, my sister loved the short ribs and my nephew had the duck - he said it was alright. We then ordered coffee and desert. They loved the creme boule but my coffee was a half a mug with 2 little side creamers and no sugar on the table. I asked for more creamers but they did not come until after my nephew went up and got some sugar from the front. This is a management problem not the staff - its obvious. Simple things like getting water, drinks and God forbid bread to a table are basic items needed to keep people satisfied while they are waiting for food. Stop having your staff congregate around the front door - if its not busy teach them circulate and make sure everyone has what they need. This place is not cheap and the menu looks great but the food disappoints. I had salmon it was dry, the rice was the same rice my nephew had with the duck and the broccoli wasn't fresh and didn't come with the dressing identified in the menu. I was hoping for a restaurant that had something new and exciting but it's not there yet - I'll try again in 6 months, if they are still in business, but for now I'll spend my...

I was really hoping to like this new restaurant because the atmosphere is nice and the menu looked great. Well, I was very disappointed to say the least. First of all, we could barely hear the server because of the noise level, and it was difficult to carry on a conversation at the table. The food was just alright and very overcooked. We ordered the calamari appetizer and the menu said “lightly battered”. It was nothing of the sort. The batter was so heavy and crunchy, I had a hard time even tasting the calamari. We also had the grilled romaine salad which was pretty good. I decided to get the stuffed shrimp with crab. The shrimp were good but the tiny piece of crab on top was quite skimpy (could hardly taste anything) and for the price, I was expecting a better portion. My daughter has the expensive rack of lamb. It came totally burnt to a crisp and quite well done in the center. She did say it was tender but would have preferred it not so over cooked. My husband had the steak, which he thought was good and cooked to his liking. His mashed potatoes and my daughters also were tasteless and very lumpy. All in all we were not raving about our meals...they were heavy, and not delicately flavored or just totally flavorless. I don’t normally like to give negative reviews and maybe this place needs to settle out a bit, but when you are spending $150 on a meal, you want it to be fantastic. I might go back for a less expensive burger and give them another shot, but the noise level might...

Terrible experience. Our waitress’ name was Tara. We showed up for Sunday brunch around 10am. There was hardly anyone in the restaurant when we arrived. But it took 10 minutes for the waitress to show up to introduce herself and take drink orders. Then, it was more waiting for her to come back to take orders - 20 minutes from the time of being seated.

Food took a long time to arrive. It was at least 45 minutes to get our food. And when it arrived, it was cold. Everything. Everyone’s. Grilled cheese sandwich was 30 seconds short of burnt. French toast was soggy. Eggs tasted & smelt strange. All the food was flavorless (the salt shaker was very popular at the table this morning). And the 10 oz breakfast steaks were maybe only 3 oz and already cut up for us like a kid’s meal.

Service was terrible. One of the little ones sat there and watched everyone else eat for almost 10 minutes before his burnt breakfast arrived. Another person in our party waited 10 minutes just for water, after everyone else already had their drinks.

Our waitress Tara only showed up to take the order and give us the bill. And delivering the check was the only thing she did quickly. The teenage boys did all the rest of the work for her. Those boys should have receive the tip instead of her since she hardly did any of the...