Stone Street Tavern — Restaurant in New York

My expectations for the overpriced Stone Street tourist traps have been pretty much non-existent, so this was a very pleasant surprise. After being burned for the second or third time over here, I pretty much avoided any of these restaurants as potential lunch spots for months. My Skipper and I came here for lunch yesterday (a Friday) around 1pm. Despite the excellent weather and prime mealtime, this place really wasn't crowded, even in their more-heralded outdoor picnic table area. No matter. We secured a high top close to the bar with zero issues.

Since we passed several people in Halloween costumes and there was a very slight Fall nip in the air, I decided to go with a Hot Toddy ($14); tis the season. It was very good. A LITTLE more citrusy than I would prefer (lemon is usually pretty prominent in this drink, to be fair, but I like the sweeter variations of this) but still hit the spot. And the temperature remained hot throughout consumption of the beverage, which was a selling point.

The menu item that caught my eye earlier and ended my Stone Street boycott was the Braised Beef Pappardelle Pasta entree ($23). Huge fan. In an interesting decision that paid off, they cooked it with fresh mint throughout, which gave it a fun, refreshing taste that I wouldn't have guessed paired well with everything else. It was a decent portion that I polished off pretty quickly.

The service was pretty good. The waitress was civil and pretty attentive but I wouldn't classify her as friendly, per se (which was a little surprising given how heavily a place like this caters to tourists). It took about 10 minutes to get my drink despite the fact that the bar area and overall restaurant were pretty empty, but the food itself arrived quickly and the waitress DID stop by a few times to check in; beyond the initial drink, I don't recall any point where we were actively waiting/looking around for someone to assist, and we were in and out of there probably within 45 minutes or so.

Even if this restaurant wasn't on Stone Street, I think the price point was pretty reasonable for the area overall - a legit $23 entree and $14 drink are arguably slightly lower prices than the average here. It's definitely possible and maybe even probable that the dinnertime crowd experiences higher prices than this, but I'm pretty impressed by the lunch...

Spending Cinco de Mayo at Stone Street Tavern seemed like the perfect plan – until a disappointing incident left a bitter taste in our mouths. My coworker and I were enjoying pitchers of drinks and delicious food on the lively outdoor festival. As the evening cooled down, we decided to move indoors. I kindly requested for my burger and pitcher to be brought inside, but to my dismay, the pitcher was brought inside but my burger never arrived.

After inquiring about my missing meal, the waitress admitted that the wait staff had mistakenly thrown it away, despite my not being finished. Shocked and frustrated, I was left speechless by the careless oversight. What infuriated me even more was the lack of apology or attempt to make amends. How could they discard my food without so much as an apology or offer to replace it?

The entire ordeal completely ruined my appetite for the rest of the night. It's disappointing when a simple request is mishandled with such disregard for the customer's experience. While the atmosphere and drinks at Stone Street Tavern were enjoyable, this incident overshadowed any positive aspects of our visit. It's a shame that one careless action can spoil an otherwise...

Poor service and food was not worth it. Went on a non-busy night but found the servers to be very inattentive— our main server took our appetizer order then never came back to check on us or get our main order in until we flagged them down. The main server seemed to end their shift early but never let us know so we just sat there wondering who was taking care of us. Another server eventually came to offer us a box as we were clearly done eating but didn’t ever bring the check (which seems like it’d be common sense?). And our water glasses did not get refilled throughout our time there.

As for food, the truffle Parmesan risotto balls were yummy! The chicken pesto sandwich was fine. The macaroni and cheese was not good though. It said it had a béchamel on it which sounded decadent— but when it was served, it was like the pasta was sitting in heavy cream and was barely cheesy either. Pretty flavorless and kinda made me queasy to keep eating. Béchamel should be set, more like a custard…

The atmosphere was a typical tavern/pub vibe. Nothing special. If anything, reminded me of a college town bar… The TVs were pretty distracting too, and it was very...