The Dutchie — Restaurant in Morro Bay

A Disappointing Return to What Was Once a Favorite

It pains me to write this review, as Dutchman's Seafood House had been our cherished destination since July 2020. My wife and I chose this restaurant to celebrate our joint birthdays (that are just couple days apart), based on numerous positive previous experiences. Unfortunately, the establishment has changed dramatically, and not for the better.

The evening began with concerning service issues. Despite informing our waiter about our birthday celebration, we waited over 10 minutes just to place drink orders, followed by another 20-minute wait for cocktails to arrive. The food order timing was equally problematic, with a 40-minute wait for our dishes to come.

The quality of the food, which had previously been excellent, was unfortunately subpar:

The local oysters were poorly shucked, with shell fragments in every single one - a serious safety concern. The way they had been thrown onto the plate showed absolutely no care. The clam chowder, once a highlight, was more reminiscent of mashed potatoes, over-thickened with flour and containing minimal clams. The mixed seafood and chips arrived swimming in butter - the top pieces were dried out while the bottom layer was soggy with garlic-butter-soaked breadcrumbs, masking any seafood flavor. I will not be surprised to guess, frozen seafood is now used for this dish. This is particularly disappointing for a waterfront restaurant in a renowned fishermen's town.

Our dessert experience was equally underwhelming. Having noticed other birthday celebrations in the restaurant during previous visits, we ordered crème brûlée, which was practically thrown onto our table. Even getting our check required an unnecessary wait.

The service seemed to decline noticeably once our waiter realized we weren't locals, which is unacceptable for a restaurant in a tourist destination. This marks our second consecutive disappointing experience at Dutchman's. While one subpar visit could be dismissed as an off day, two suggest a concerning pattern.

Needless to say we had not received any complementary congratulation or special attention from the waitress after spending $100+ per person. The waitress even spoke to us as we were bothering her with placing more orders for cocktails. Very disappointing experience both on the personal level and food-wise.

It seems the marketing strategy is now: 'These are tourists, they are here just once, so who cares. Well, we don't care for sure...'

For a restaurant that was once a highlight of every Central Coast trip, this decline in both food quality and service standards is heartbreaking. Given our history with the establishment, this is especially difficult to write, but we cannot recommend what was once our favorite seafood...

I really, really wanted to enjoy my experience at this place. It has an overall 4.2-star google rating and all of the recent reviews are positive, but there were just too many things that didn’t go right at my visit to Dutchman’s to give it any more than 2 stars. It was plainly clear that the staff at this busy restaurant struggle to keep up with the volume of patrons, and the tiredness shows on their faces and actions. There were 3 staff who were involved in helping me: the hostess, the server, and the busser. I could see the fatigue on the hostess’s face. Our server did check on us once during the meal, but otherwise was too busy to really give us the level of attention that I would expect from the prices on the menu. The busser offered to take our plates, mine not even half-finished, but did not ask if we wanted to take our food to go. My plate was less than half-finished because I could only eat so much before feeling sick. The reason? Both of our dishes had an overwhelming quantity of oil/grease/butter. The overall taste of the food was good, but there was just sooooo much oil. I understand that, in general, great-tasting food has a lot of fat in it, but my dish was drowning in butter, and I couldn’t finish it. Some people may ask: why didn’t you have the server take it back to the kitchen? This was my intention, but I waited and waited for the server to check in on us again towards the end of the meal, but it never happened and then the busser came by for the plates. I really wish I could give Dutchman’s a better rating, but there were just too many instances where the staff dropped the ball and there was no effort to correct the problems. For the prices they charge, I expect the staff to make more of an effort to ensure my meal and my experience were superb. I shouldn’t have to go out seeking an employee or management to let them know there...

Ever since the owners daughter has taken over the atmosphere is absolutely chaotic. She walks around super smug wearing high end clothing and sunglasses at night indoors, constantly critiquing and telling the employees how they are doing everything wrong. We miss Travis and his wife they made the place what it was very happy and friendly. Now you just feel like you’re in an episode of bar rescue except the owners daughter thinks she is the hottest thing to ever happen to the restaurant business. Not a good look! We’ve been coming here for years unfortunately I believe this will be our last visit here. Unless things go back to the way they were.

Response to Owner: Good for you being proud of your daughter no one criticized that at all. To respond to being ashamed; why would I be ashamed of an honest opinion and review? If you would like to watch your business decline and customers disappear then keep doing what you’re doing. Your daughter was smug, and arrogant. She walked around in the dark with sunglasses on harassing the staff about every little thing. When we asked about our 2 favorite servers and bartender she became defensive and extremely unfriendly. Maybe a better example should have been left for her on how you speak to people and customers and she wouldn’t be having these issues. Even your own current servers are very unhappy as they expressed to us during dinner about your daughter! You think the mass exodus you experienced from your previous staff was because of them? No it was because of your daughter poor management practices that made the environment unsuitable to work. You can be defensive and resistant but only you will suffer the effects of that mindset. The u happy customers like myself will continue to spend our money at your...