Riptides Raw Bar and Grill — Restaurant in Ormond Beach

NOTICE... 2ND REVIEW: It has been 4 weeks since.. we stopped in again thinking about the previous time here, and I have to change our review to - THIS PLACE HAS INCREDIBLY AWESOME FOOD! We ordered different food this time just to see if it was a fluke, or maybe we were just starving before... and again, bam, it was more than we expected! We started with Shrimp and Guacamole Spring Roll, and more Casino Oysters.. it was a very good choice. And mixing and matching the sauces they give you even makes them even better!! We finished sharing the Key Island Grouper, omgosh, we've died and gone to heaven, 'again', here at Riptide; don't tell me it doesn't strike twice in the same place... what's the chances of finding a place where the food is that consistently good! And a shout out to 'Tom the bartender' who waited on us... you know when your server agrees with what you order you are in for a good meal! PS... we realize we were so take with how good our food was we forgot about their Fried Green Tomatoes, so we order a to go box of... is it possible to die twice eating from the same place!?! Even warmed up the Tomatoes are fantastic!

ORIGINAL REVIEW: Staying in the area we dropped in after reading reviews, glad we overlooked the slanted negative reviews and went for the truth! First, we ordered specialty drinks - Pina Coladas, the ones with the coconut heads, hers a monkey, mine the pirate - I scored some really big points with my wife on that... just saying men!! And yes the heads cost more, but if the one on your arm isn't worth $8 more... then stay home!!! Andrea, our waitress, then came back and took our order for Casino Oysters and Fried Green tomatoes - omgosh, these were amazing! We travel FL and the east coast quite a bite and these appetizers are some of the best we have ever had, my wife even said the oysters were good and she 'doesn't like oysters'!! We then shared the seared grouper with coconut rice... there were three 'big' pieces of grouper, so flavorful, tender, even the veggies were cooked perfect. We kept looking at each other ooing and ahing on how goòd it was... one of the best meals we have ever had! We then mentioned to Andrea to relay to the chef how good the food was.. she said she 'already told him there was a couple out front going goo-goo over the meal'! I am just glad she didn't see us fighting over the last bite!😀 Overall my wife really enjoyed our evening so I am in the good.. thank you Riptide! And speaking of.. Andrea.. she was spot on for the evening. Patient, charming, sociable, polite, tentative... be sure to ask for her! Now the only word of advice - besides go there to eat - is go early, we went around 4:30ish, but when we left there was quite a long line... so you were warned! This was our first time eating here... it won't be our...

I booked a table via their new site app for Monday at 4pm. When I called with a question,i was told they couldn't access the system, so the nice man on the phone took down my table preference and time manually just to be sure they had it. We arrived about 5 minutes prior to our reservation, and had zero wait time. We parked our own van in the valet parking on request of the valet, as we have a huge, brand new vehicle and he said he wasn't sure he could back it into a parking space himself. No problem, as my husband isn't a fan of letting others drive it right now anyway. Lol. There were several empty tables both inside and out. I ordered the new York strip with fries and seasonal veggies. Husband had the all you can eat crabs with unlimited sides (he did onion rings then sweet potato fries). Food came relatively promptly... I think the only wait was because of my steak. Crab was okay... Bland for him, as it was merely boiled and served with butter. He asked for any more crab brought out if it could be boiled in old bay... Was told yes, no problem, them given a condiment cup of old bay seasoning with the next bland platter... If you've ever had old bay, that's quite a gross way of eating it! But, being the person he is, he just said thank you. My steak was okay... A bit tough, dry, lots of gristle along the edges, and overcooked. Fries were very salty.. And that's coming from someone who likes a lot of salt on my fries. Summer veggies were highlight of my plate... Very good. Husband's onion rings were awesome. Sweet potato fries were also excessively salty. Music started at the stage next to us about halfway through our meal... Music was a little better than okay for background. Not something I would pay a cover for, but the young man could carry a tune and had decent rhythm. Our waitress was very friendly. Other staff members walked by and asked how everything was and if we were doing okay, including management. During one of these encounters, my husband mentioned he would appreciate another plate of onion rings, and received a confused look and a "do you know who your waitress was? You need to ask her" as a response. Okay. No problem. We flagged her down as she finished taking another table's order and she was happy to help. My husband mentioned he felt they shouldn't ask if we were doing okay if they weren't willing to help. I also had two drinks-frozen strawberry margaritas, which were delicious. My husband had ice water with lemon. Overall... Food: B-. Drinks: A. Individual Server: A. Other staff: B Cost versus Value: C Wait time: A Ease of booking a table : A

Not sure it was worth the $120 we spent, but it was a nice atmosphere, clean, and...

Quite a bit overpriced. The food is alright, but I was by no means blown away.

The cocktails are a total BS price, but they offer refills on them for a discount to somewhat round it out.

The waiter lost my debit card and took us about 30 minutes to find it. I think there should have been a discount or comp in some way, but that did not happen.

WAY too loud if they set you next to the live music guy, and the fella that was there that night was doing meh covers of classic songs.

Edit - in response to resturaunts reply:

As far as the cocktails go, you guys need to be a whole lot more up front with the fact that your cocktails are significantly more expensive than the resturaunts of the area. Yall have it in big bold letters that you can "buy a drink and keep the souvenir cup" but, when you charge an additional 8 dollars for any of those drinks, thats not at all a bonus. It's something I paid for at that point. No cocktails made of standard liquors is worth $25. Thats a terrible value, and I never would have expected that.

The food - again, the food is pretty average. The reason my food rating is only 3 stars, is because the shrimp in the po boy came out cold. Not room temperature, but literally cold. Cold fried shrimp is disgusting, and I can only imagine the reason was that the food sat in the window for an extended period of time, or that shrimp is pre fried and kept in a warming basket until its ordered.

My comment about the music guy was not a matter of personal taste, the songs were fine, its just that frankly, he wasn't that good. The volume being cranked so loud that I couldn't hear my wife sitting 2 feet from me is insane. I severely doubt yall get many compliments about that situation. Just have the guy turn the volume of his amps and speakers down a little bit, or preferably, hire a better musician because seriously, some of his performances were terrible.

Service incident - things happen. I didnt use the waiters name for a reason, it was a mistake and im pretty willing to understand. They were busy, and they put in the effort to correct their mistake, but yeah, the fact I paid 120+ for cold shrimp and a lost debit card is not a good experience.

In the future, if we decide to return, I really hope some of these issues are corrected. There are too many similar resturaunts within a couple miles for the value and experience to fall this short...