Buckets Sports Bar & Grill — Restaurant in Mountain Home

TL;DR: The Reuben Smash Burger is delicious.

We stopped for lunch while visiting family and the food was good but the service was excellent.

We started off with a few appetizer: The Fried Bottlecaps (fried sliced pickled jalapenos) were delicious. Possibly the only tasty way to prepare a pickled jalapeño. The Bucket of Cheese Sticks were somewhat of a letdown. They are good, but the bucket is more like 6 sticks on a platter. The Onion Rings are delicious as well. Nothing fancy. Just tasty.

My daughter had a kids quesadilla. She liked it but it was a bit too much food for her to finish. A sentiment reflected by a few of us.

I had the Reuben Smash Burger. I don't recall reading it on the menu, but this is a double. Two beef patties, a layer of delicious corned beef topped with a small layer of flavorful sauerkraut. I loved it. Unfortunately, I wasn't hungry enough to eat the fries that came with it.

The fries deserve s special not-so-positive mention. I am normally a huge fan of the thick spiral cut fries, but these didn't quite taste as expected. I think it might have just been an issue with cooking temperature of the grease being used, so your experience may vary (and hopefully it does). On the other hand if you like dense and not fluffy fries, these may be perfect. The overall seasoning is good.

They serve craft beer and designated which brews are local. I saw Lost Forty and Flyway offerings on the list.

Overall, I am definitely coming back. The service was good enough and the food interesting enough that we have plenty to try next time. The family we came to visit.seems to like it as well. It was also cheaper than what I would have expected based...

I don't think a business in Mountain Home could be a better representation of the community. Of the items I have tried so far, the wings, cheese sticks, jalapeno coins and buffalo tots are all amazing. Unfortunately that's about the extent of the good. How does this represent the town you ask? Let's start with the parking lot. When you pull in on either side of the building all the parking spaces are angled for cars pulling in. ON BOTH SIDES! Which means you are going against traffic when leaving either side. How about the fact that they have a drive through that isn't mentioned on the website, which is only open during certain hours/depending on how busy it is. It's not always monitored, so if you do decide or are forced to use it, just call the restaurant and eventually someone will answer who can get someone to come to the window. Don't order online because you can't order through them without calling them and they may not receive the order otherwise. I guess depending on who you voted for you might enjoy the atmosphere. Lastly, the portions/condiments may vary depending on what bartender is working. Usually the wings are huge, but I recently received an order of boneless wings that were the same size if not smaller than McDonald's nuggets. Sometimes you get the tots in a big box, sometimes a small one, so no way to confirm that you are getting the same amount. How does this represent the community? In summary, there's a few really great things about Buckets, but there's just as many things, if not more, that are areas of...

Gotta start by saying there was no more than 20 others eating when we got there and appeared to have ample staffing. We ordered drinks and appetizers. Our appetizers showed up before drinks (bar drinks). The waiter came by asking us 2x if we were ready to order main meals yet and I told him on the 2nd time, "We are but it'd be nice to have drinks before we got our appetizers let alone ordered main course". He was pleasant enough then went to get our drinks. We ordered and the wife wanted mushroom and Swiss burger, they didn't have mushrooms... go to the store and buy some! They didn't have the sidewinder fries, the one thing I was looking forward to so she asked if they could substitute for onion rings, they did but didn't tell us it was an upcharge but whatever.. I ordered "boom boom" chicken tacos but what showed up was bbq sauce tacos, if that was their boom boom then know it's just hickory bbq sauce. The menu was terribly written and even had drinks repeated verbatim twice. Zero descriptions.

Everything went good enough after that, I'd go again but if it was similar results I'd be...