Lazy Dog Restaurant & Bar — Restaurant in Montclair

Update 6/23/22

Tonight we stopped in for dinner and everything was ok until the check came. Our server (see the pic for name) brought our check on a digital device, but would not let go of it. I asked her about how I leave a tip and she told me it was included. I asked is that the way they do it now, they figure the tip? She said yes. The only options on the screen were “print or email the receipt.” I couldn’t even see the total because I was on the far side of the table. So I pushed print receipt to see what I paid. We did some math and saw that the tip added was 22%. I thought that was kind of strange that a business would assume a 22% tip when the average is 20%. It was only about $3 more, but it felt shady. On my way out I asked the manager about it and she said there are options to choose your tip amount, but I explained to her that I was never given those options. She looked at the servers name and apologized. She said she could redo the transaction, but I told her not to bother. I explained how the situation felt uncomfortable and that I think I am just done with the uncertainty of our experiences every time we come and that we would just go elsewhere from now on. It may sound petty to some, but the dishonesty of this waitress really bothered us.

Update 4/3022

My whole family loves Lazy Dog. Great fusion menu and the Huckleberry IPA is amazing. We ordered the Huckleberry Apple Pie for dessert and it is my new favorite. The patio space is great for those who want to social distance as well.

Update 3/9/22 Sadly, something has gone really wrong for this restaurant. My wife and I went last Sunday night and had an experience so bad it was comedic. My wife ordered the pot pie and the waiter tells her they may be out and asked what her second choice might be. She said the broccoli and ham Mac n cheese would be fine. I ordered the fish tacos. 30 minutes later the waiter comes back and informs me that they are out of the fish for the tacos and wanted me to pick something else. At this point my wife asks if she is getting the pot pie or not. He informs her that there is no pot pie. I asked my wife if maybe we should just go, but she assured me the Mac n cheese would be fine. So I ordered the salmon. The waiter returns and tells me they are out of salmon too. I say I will just have my drink then and skip ordering dinner. He literally walks 5 feet from me and turns around to tell me that they do, in fact have the salmon. I ask him what is going on, how could he suddenly know this? A few minutes later the manager comes out and says our dinner would be free. I assured him that we did not need free food, still he insisted. The waiter also gave us a gift card, but I am not sure if I will be back, because when our food came, it was made with weird substitutions. My wife’s Mac and cheese was made with fettuccine noodles and sliced broccoli stems. The veggies with my salmon also had broccoli stems. (See pics) We are very sad because this was our...

Started with the Brussel Sprouts, solid 4 of 10, cooked at a high heat for a short time so the were burnt on the outside and super tough and bitter on the inside, I'm not sure if there was garlic with the lemon as all I tasted was lemon juice and tough burnt bitterness.

Got the Black and Blue Burger (medium rare) with Umami fries with the Sun Spanked Red Ale. The Burger was a 7 of 10, cooked proper, but the patty was lacking in seasoning and the sauce they put on was lacking in flavor, fell apart in my hands. Umami fries were great with a 9 of 10 for me. Crispy and creamy with an amazing sort of drizzle over top that tasted a little fishy, almost like tartar sauce with seaweed flakes. The Beer was a 5 of 10, for it being a house brew I expected better, but it was lacking in flavor and substance, all it had was a slight bitterness of the ale in the back of the palette with ot much of an orange note to it.

Gf got the flat iron steak (medium rare) wich came with sautéed spinach and mashed potatoes w/ gravy, with their top priced Mojito. The steak was a 7 of 10, wasn't seasoned at all, was cooked well, but overall lacked any redeeming flavor, the butter on top saved the day. Sautéed spinach was a 4 of 10, just tasted like it was boiled/blanched with water. The mashed potatoes were a 5 of 10. Had a good classic potatoe flavor, but again no herbs or seasonings of any kind, the gravy was vrey basic to so it didnt do much to enhance the flavor. The Mojito was an 8.5, was lacking alcohol but overall tasted great, nice adition of pineapple on the toothpick, "wasn't the best monitor I've had but it was good" -gf, I would agree.

"Bonus" point for not being given any silverware minus the knife with the steak and the spoon for the Brussel Sprouts, so my gf had to eat her steak with a spoon. The servers were busy catering to others so couldn't flag her down amd ask. The patron sitting behind us was so dissatisfied with his meal he had it sent back and ordered something else in its place. What he recieved after wasn't to good either but he decided to settle with it saying "It's not very good, but I don't wanna wait for anything else, I'll just eat this".

We give it a 5 of 10 as it wasn't BAD but it also wasn't good at all. A very flavorless meal. If you're a foodie, try somewhere else. We forgot why we haven't gone here in so long and now we remembered why. Because $90 for that meal hardly seemed worth it. Won't...

Overall a very disappointing experience and probably will never go back. Sat in the bar area Party of Three and the night was a medium paste for the restaurant took about 15 minutes for someone to even acknowledge us. After we finally ordered drinks we can see them sitting at the bar well and servers just standing around talking to each other not running cocktails to the tables. After about five minutes of seeing our drinks we decided to sit at the bar top thinking we would get better service from the bartender Marissa but that didn't happen as well. Marissa is definitely a bartender that just phones it in. Very obvious by her mannerisms and facial expressions how much she does not want to be doing what she's doing. When she was greeting us she doesn't even look at you and make eye contact. she's just throwing napkins down and walking away I just couldn't believe how much she does not care about giving you a good experience at making you feel like you actually matter very dry and a very non welcoming experience with her. The only time you could see any life in her like she was happy doing what she was doing was when the co-workers would come up and she would start talking and getting excited about where they were going to drink after work so there was definitely a switch and excitement for that but not for doing her job. My friend ordered a cocktail and notice the man sitting next to us had the same cocktail. his drink was filled to the very top of the glass and guess what my friends was maybe half way filled so noticeably different pores he literally wanted to say something but didn't want to be a pain. Then it just made sense as the man sitting with the same cocktail with his laptop had different employees come up and talked with him on a personal level so I'm sure he either works there or is a regular but everyone should be getting the same amount of alcohol that they are paying for. So after waiting around for cocktails and servers and a very dry attitude from the bartender who can't even look at her customers when she's talking to them acting like she cares we're just not ever...