Rooftop at The Envio — Restaurant in Portsmouth

We tried Envio this past Thursday night. It was interesting for us to find out they have music on Thursdays – an added bonus. Also, it was happy hour (4-6) which was nice. We were greeted by a warm and friendly host named Deb. She brought us to the attractive outdoor deck. It was windy that day, but Deb was accommodating, even offering a blanket to my wife when she said she felt cold. Deb worked with us to give us a table protected from the wind. Little did we know, we would need Deb’s help later in the visit. Our server, Hannah, was very helpful at first. She was knowledgeable about the menu and very helpful. We decided to have drinks and several rounds of appetizers. We started off with drinks for each of us and an order of nachos to share. The happy hour menu (very limited) on their website lists Neon Sails IPA. We like IPA’s but Hannah advised us that they have never carried that beer in the time she worked there, so we ordered regular priced brews. Food and drinks came out quickly. Nice service. The nachos did not look like a quality dish to us – different than a nacho dish construction that we are used to. When we ate it though, it was really good tasting. I think we were thrown off by the lack of heavy dose of cheese. This shows that you can have great nachos (and perhaps a little healthier) without burying them in cheese. We ordered a second round with Hannah at 5:45 PM. I noted the time because my wife ordered a drink off the happy hour list 15 minutes before the curtain dropped on the lower price. That’s when Hannah went missing. We waited and waited. No Hannah. We did have a brief sighting of her, across the room, but she never came over. As we continued to look for Hannah, and as our concern increased that perhaps she had been abducted, we observed Deb. She was everywhere. Helping serve stuff, grabbing empty containers, laughing and talking with customers. After just two minutes short of a half hour, I went to see Deb. Her response was amazing. She took over, brought our drinks so fast I asked her if they were sitting for a half hour. Nope, she must have poured them herself. We ordered two bowls of clam chowder. They came out so fast that she must have put us first in line in the kitchen. The chowder was very good. Rich thick and creamy. A little while later Hannah reappeared, walked right by our table, but made no contact. Maybe ten minutes later, she came back to us and pretended that nothing happened. No explanation. Why did she not acknowledge what happened? There could have been a good reason. Even if she just had simply forgot us, why not just own up to it? We are not mean people. Most people are forgiving. We went on to order honey pork belly burnt ends with homemade pickles. They were very good also, especially the pickles. I’m not big on pickles, but I would buy a few jars of them if I could. They were that good. The service became good again. Summary: Very nice setting. Great outdoor and indoor space with a big bar. Limited menu but very good food. With one exception, good staff, and at least one superstar. Rating calculation: Hannah, one star. Deb, food and facility, 5 stars. 5 + 1 = 6. 6 divided by 2 = 3 stars. Overall, a solid place. And...

By, far, Envio has the most limited dinner menu I have ever seen during covid, so much so that I was worried we would leave hungry. (more of a lunch menu than a dinner menu). Given this, the selection process became more about not leaving hungry vs choosing something that sounded interesting or different, which there wasn't much of anyway. Another reviewer characterized the menu as quasi-tapas, and I would say that is pretty accurate. We each ordered two meals (several double orders again due to the limted menu) and that ended up being about the right amount of food. Most menu items were reasonably priced for a hotel-based restaurant, but when you have to order two meals each to get an adequate amount of food, it adds up quickly. The food quality was actually very good and I especially liked the meatballs as well as the very petite filet. They also had a good old fashion cocktail. Service quality was ok as was the view. Just not a lot to see four stories up on the outside of town. The atmosphere of the restaurant was new, modern and upscale. The main downside was that it felt cold outaide for dinner, even with a jacket on in July. So cold in fact that when the meal was over, we couldnt get out fast enough. This place could really benefit from some heat lamps and maybe taller glass railings to limit the breeze. On the plus side, given the outdoor environment, it did feel relatively safe from a covid perspective. Someone mentioned that meals were being served takeout style. That was not our experience. We were given real metal silverware and cloth napkins, although drinks and food were still being served using plastic plateware and cupware. Granted, the plates and cups were high quality plastic, but still plastic nonetheless. Really surprised by that. Everywhere else we go these days is using normal plateware and cupware. It felt like Envio is not keeping pace with other comparable restaurants in NH on this point (and several others) Bottomline: Check the menu carefully before you go. You can't assume you will have lots of choices. You won't. If you are on the fence about going, maybe go for lunch on a sunny day. The menu definitely feels more like a lunch menu than a dinner menu anyways. Unless they actually come out with a real dinner menu, I can't imagine we would ever go back. There are just too many other better options...

This place came highly recommended, we were reluctant only because it’s in a hotel. Granted it be a high end Marriott we had our reservations. However due to 27 degree temperatures with 30mph winds, we decided not to go for a walk and tried it out.

We stood at the host/ess stand for 5 min and not one person greeted us. (First dig) several servers, bartenders and bar backs all saw us (it’s a wide open restaurant yes I’m sure they saw us), yet not one offered to seat us or even so much as say someone will be right with you.

We decide to head to the bar, where we sat for not terribly long before we were “greeted” if you can call it that. The bartender slapped down a drink menu and a dinner menu down in front of us and kept walking. (Second dig) She comes back to take our orders (she never offered her name, and I didn’t observe a name tag), my boyfriend orders a common beer, the bartender smirks and says yea we don’t have that but we have …… As if he should have known because the drink menu was right in front of us. But he didn’t look at it because it wasn’t presented as a drink menu, it was just slapped down in front of us, so he thought it was the menu and the actual menu was the specials. (Easy and commonly made mistake) even still she doesn’t offer us the drink menu, I am observing the liquor selection behind her, when she says “do you just want more time?”….(No but a more pleasant service would have been nice)

The food was ok at best. The ravioli was tasty but extremely extremely greasy, as were the carrots. Worse yet there were LITERALLY 5…yep 5 raviolis on the plate.

The burger my boyfriend says “it was a burger”, I don’t like burgers so I can offer no more judgement than that. I will say the fries were hot, fresh and crispy.

The apple tart was amazing…but it came with whip cream not ice cream….I found that strange…AND the dessert menu was literally on a 4x6 paper “card” with food stains. That had my boyfriend not seen her lay down, I would have thought it was trash.

We regularly eat at a highly reputable restaurants, this place was not that. The service and food here were just ok. I don’t know what draws people here but can’t be the service or the food!

Definitely a place I would go for after work drinks or cocktail and dessert, but other than...