Dogwoods Kitchen and Bar — Restaurant in Pontiac

I had an incredibly uncomfortable experience here with the manager. We walked in as a party of two, and were sat at a small table. Normally this is fine, however I felt like the placement and size of this specific table was smaller than normal. We moved over to another, larger table that felt more comfortable right next to our original placement. The waiter came back, and was nice enough - he never mentioned any issue with us being at this new table. He took our order and answered our questions. The restaurant itself has patrons, however there were many other open spots with a variety of seating sizes.

We ordered drinks and apps, and then our mains. About 20 mins later, as we are eating and finishing our apps, the manager John comes over - we found out later he was the manager, by the way. Dressed extremely casually, and didn't introduce him as such at the time - I thought he was another customer at first. He told us that we had to move tables because they had a larger party come in, that they did not place us there, that they have the restaurant set up a certain way for a reason. Normally, in this situation, we would have no issue moving - obviously we know we were placed at a different table. But he's attitude and demeanor just felt so unprofessional. Looking at the table, we had many dishes already, and were in the middle of eating - it felt very bizarre to expect us to move at this point. Looking around the restaurant itself - still many tables open. At this point, we were uncomfortable and asked for the bill. His response was a huff and a "what is the problem?" We replied it's no problem, that we would just like to leave and again asked for the bill. He scurried off - never saw him again. We went up to the front to pay for our apps/drinks. The party of 6 was standing there waiting - I am sure they were uncomfortable with the situation as well and likely overheard some communication between the staff. It was incredibly awkward.

I felt like the manager could have handled the situation better, even if that meant just being a bit more pleasant when addressing us. If you cannot pivot, you probably do not deserve the title of manager. I was really excited to try this place after seeing a review on TikTok - it put a damper on what was ultimately a really great night. When we first walked in, we noticed a strange vibe in the restaurant and it was uncomfortable humid/hot - however, I wanted to stay to give it a try. We should have listed to our gut at this point, because it turned out to be a waste of...

Going to try and be as detailed as possible.

TLDR: I truly hope this place thrives. We don’t have many places like this! The service, vibe, and atmosphere check all the boxes! The food and drinks are complementary to those things in this case. I know, I know…. it’s supposed to be opposite, right? Read on for more.

————The long read ————

Our waitress was a joy to be around. She was courteous, fun, and took care of all of our needs.

The place is beautiful! I’ve grew up in Oakland county and it’s amazing a place like this exists here. And in Pontiac of all the places.

The food and drinks:

Bang bang shrimp - too die for. I will order this every single time, hands down.

OG Chilaquiles - they used Salsa Roja. This was my first time having it with Salsa Roja and I have only ever had it with Salsa Verde but I decided to try it differently this go around… I have to say I LOVE SALSA VERDE more. The Salsa Roja tasted a little more bitter and “less” flavorful. My other WISH for this dish - CARNITAS! The steak was good and well cooked but carnitas is such a classic with Chilaquiles and having that option would’ve been awesome. Also more avocado please!!! The sunny side up eggs were perfect - so,100% points to the chef on that!

Love you Lox - overall we thought this was pretty good! Make sure to get a bit of everything in each bite. My opinion is that there could be more dill (or perhaps mixing the dill in the cream cheese).

Churro waffle - loved it. It was sweet but what churros aren’t right? Order it! Mouth is watering thinking about it right now.

Chicken Tenders and Fries - I am not going to lie, I loved this this most. BUT that’s because I am a huge sucker for finger food like tenders, fries and good ranch. The seasoning was perfect on the fries and the chicken was juicy while the batter for the was nice and flaky! Totally knocked it out of the park with this dish.

The drinks - all of our mixed drinks were pretty good. The only one that I thought could use more work was the espresso martini - dressing this one up with some milk froth/foam would have been a nice touch for presentation and taste. All in all, we’ll definitely be trying more drinks the next...

Our second, and unfortunately, probably last, visit to Dogwood. We have had very hit and missed experience here. Some things are wonderful and others not so much.

Tonight, we had a variety of bad experiences.

We got two margarita flights. One of the flights came with a chipped glass, and then it took a long time to get help to replace.

We got the bang bang shrimp and the tuna tacos. The tuna in the tuna tacos seemed to be mixed with properly cut tuna and maybe ground tuna...it was weird.

Then we ordered the featured maple bourbon drink, but what came was a regular old fashion, and again, it took forever to fix. Even when the drink was fixed, a comment "we put extra maple syrup this time" was made. This is annoying being obviously, it was made with no maple syrup and not "too little".

The smash burger was good. The fries showed with a lot of "deep fryer debris". It looks like maybe there is a cleanliness issue here? I have a picture of the extra bits of stuff with the fries.

We got the short rib tacos and were disappointed that the meat had a heavy gravy. It doesn't mix with the fresh ingredients of a taco. We would have complained, but again, service took so long to check on us that we gave up on more food. They did remove this from the bill, but my wife left hungry. She would have ordered a replacement but not after the wait.

Finally, we tried the pumpkin latte feature drink. Very sweet in the butterscotch and no coffee flavor. We decided not to complain, which meant it was just a waste.

There are lots of great places around. These things need to be spot on for our continued business.

It's a shame because lots of potential at Dogwoods! I hope they...