Boathouse Restaurant — Restaurant in Peninsula Township

I am so impressed with Boathouse!! This is my second time coming here and I'm still in love with the quality of food and service they provide! We were seated immediately in the sunroom upon arriving to our reservation of 6 people. The view from there was wonderful during the sunset overlooking the water. Our server, Mary Grace, greeted us immediately and put in our drink orders. She brought them out right away and they looked beautiful and tasted even better. I'm not much of a drinker so I was really excited to see they had mocktails and even more that they had an alcohol free espresso martini. I cannot even describe how amazing it was, it was so good. It was a foamy coffee drink with a cinnamon rim that just hit the spot. We also got a blueberry lemon drop cocktail and Manhattan that were just as good and balanced very well. For appetizers we ordered a half dozen Rockefeller oysters and two salads to share with the table. When our server came back she surprised us with an additional set of raw oysters from the east coast that the kitchen mistakenly made and gave to us on the house. This was my first time trying oysters and both the raw and cooked ones were phenomenal. My friend that was eating with us and knows oysters and said they were well above average and enjoyed them as well. We also thought it was so cute and smart that they wrap the lemon to prevent the seeds from falling into the oysters. When it came time to put in our entree orders, almost everyone ordered halibut and one ordered the wagyu filet. They were plated so beautifully and tasted great. We really enjoyed the food and ordered dessert to finish it off. We got the creme brulee, dirty ice cream with chocolate cake mixed into the vanilla ice cream, and some sort of chocolate hazelnut cake. We loved all of them. We were celebrating our soon-to-be bride and I asked our server, Mary Grace if she could split the bill 5 ways so we could all pay for her and she wasn't sure if she could get the POS system to do it but managed to make it work and for that I am so thankful! Each of our checkbooks had souvinir post cards and stickers for us to take home and it was so cute I loved it! Anyone that comes into Traverse City, I will always recommend going there to eat. They are always booked so make sure to book reservations in advance! Shout-out to our amazing server Mary Grace...

Updated review. After a not so great experience during this year's restaurant week, i went back last night with my husband for another dinner. I'm happy to say, it was back to it's usual high quality. We actually had the same waiter that we had during restaurant week, and he was very engaging, pleasant and attentive. I would have given straight 5 stars except for a couple small missteps. The Tuna Tartare appetizer was so delicious, served with the crunchy potato chips, that it was my favorite course. Highly recommend. I then had their Morel Chanterelle Bisque. It was absolutely delicious in it's creamy texture and tons of mushrooms. I mean, it was surprisingly full. Perfect - except - it looked quite unappealing in appearance when served. A dull grey/brown flat mass. It didn't show off those fantastic mushrooms at all. You didn't see even a hint of them. Perhaps a slightly shallower bowl so the heaps of mushrooms show through? Or a pile of them in the center? It needs to look as good as it tastes, and it definitely did not. I love mushrooms and i almost didn't want to try it after presented. Very glad i did. Hope they change the presentation because i loved it and would highly recommend it despite it's appearance. My main course was their Sea Scallops. They were presented atop small lobster cakes. The scallops were perfectly cooked and seasoned. Beautiful golden brown sear with melt in your mouth interior. Wow these were delicious. The lobster cakes seemed a bit overcooked, so dried out a bit, but the taste was pretty good. No match for the star scallops though. Highly recommend those. For dessert we had their famous Carrot Cake and Creme Brulee. They did not disappoint. Cake was moist and delicate and frosting devine. Creme Brulee has lovely thin & crispy top with perfect crispy layer to filling ratio. Cannot go wrong with either one of those. So happy to have gone back and had this wonderful experience again. If you've never been, you really need to go. Beautiful setting on West Bay, great service and wonderful menu full of professionally executed food choices. Once more I'm thrilled to say i...

Honestly, this place ruined my wife's birthday. For starters, the service was running slow. For a Friday night, that's understandable to a degree. Me, my wife, her mother, and her partner were having a celebration. The waiter was informed of this when we ordered drinks. We ordered 3 mocktails and got 2 of the dinner for 2 surf and turf. Our reservation started at 6:45, we didn't receive our salads until 7:30. We finally got our entrée at 8:20. Once we got our entrée the entire plate was luke warm or cold. The asparagus were cold and limp, the lobster was barely warm, the steak was luke warm (warmest thing on the plate), and it was hard to cut through. Our waiter checked on us once, and barely. When he came by to ask how the food was, I didn't start eating it yet, so I couldn't even let him know about the issue. 20 minutes went by before I saw him again, and once I told him, he got extremely defensive. At no point did I blame him, the cooks or anyone else, just wanted to point out my food was cold and I could not eat it. He said he couldn't do anything and got his manager. The manager got defensive as well, saying there was no way my food was almost cold because she asked the cooks. We were offered drinks and free dessert, which we declined. The mocktails were taken off, but when I brought up that I barely ate any food, and if I could have part of my meal taken off the bill, I was told no because they think the food was hot. I don't know about anyone else, but I can tell when I have food that is not freshly cooked, and it truly tasted like it. I didn't enjoy the staff towards the end as they were rude about the issue and refused any real compensation. For context, the mocktails were $11 each, and the surf and turf for...