Jake's Old City Grill — Restaurant in Saginaw

Hosted my husband's milestone birthday celebration at Jake’s last night; we were a party of 14, separated into 2 tables, which wasn't expected. We were seated in a very loud room, so very difficult to talk between the 2 tables. Our server greeted us relatively quickly to take our drink order but missed part of the table when he was distracted by a request for a wine list, which wasn't presented with the menus. Our drinks were delivered within about 20-mins and it was almost 30-mins before we saw him again. We were ready to order appetizers and I asked him to take our entree orders as well since I was afraid he wouldn't be back for a while. We ordered calamari which was delicious but served with plain ketchup, which was confusing. Normally it is served with some sort of cocktail sauce or aoili. We also ordered the spinach artichoke dip which was served with only a handful of chips... certainly not enough for more than 2 people to share. I would have ordered more than 2 appetizers for each table had they been more explicit about the portion sizes. Salads were delicious and the entrees were served promptly after the salads were cleared. I ordered the Land & Sea, my husband ordered the prime rib.

Shortly after taking our orders, we were told that they had run out of baked potatoes (this was a 530pm reservation) so those who ordered them needed to re-select their side dishes. The entrees were delivered within a reasonable timeframe after that. Our party seemed to enjoy their meals but my husband and I both agreed that the beef was over-seasoned. After the tables were cleared, it was another 30-mins before our server appeared to inquire as to whether we wanted dessert. There was no offering of a dessert for my husband, in honor of his birthday, as most restaurants will do. At that point, we were ready to leave. The bill included a 20% gratuity which was not obvious, but I was aware of this in advance. There was a suggested gratuity calculation at the bottom of the receipt and a separate line item for a gratuity to be added. Be careful to read your receipts, folks.

When I made the reservation arrangements (email is the best method of communication with the owner, Paul) he told me “…we allocate about two hours of dining time for a group your size so you may want to anticipate that the table may possibly be booked again around 7:30-ish. If there is no need to do so, would not disturb your celebration time.” To which I replied, “As long as servers are attentive and service is prompt, I wouldn’t see a need to remain more than 2 hours.” There were signs on the tables asking guests to limit their seated time to 1.5 hours, which was off-putting. We were never asked to leave, or told that there was a reservation after us, but the owners each mentioned separately to us as we were leaving that they had to turn “at least 50 people away” during dinner service this evening, which didn’t make us feel like they appreciated us having dined with them.

The owners are very hands-on and were friendlier upon our departure than on our arrival. They made it a point to tell us that they were in their 70s and that they were always very busy. They also made it a point to express their displeasure at the fact that some of our guests brought gifts for my husband, in the form of sealed bottles of alcohol. It's a busy time of year, they may have been short-staffed like everyone else, but almost half of our party drove 2 hours to join us for dinner and it was not the warm, intimate, attentive experience that I was expecting for my husband's birthday. With the other options we have for meals in the tri-city area, I'm not sure...

Where do I begin? What a disappointment. My girlfriends and I had reservations yesterday at 4 p.m. We were looking forward to a much needed night out together and decided to start the evening off at Jake’s, before heading to the theater in Flint. We each ordered a different martini to start with. After taking our order the waiter, Christopher H., scooped up the drink menu from the table. We asked if he could leave it there in case we wanted a second drink. He said “No my boss doesn’t want me to leave it on the table in case something gets spilled on it”. That seemed odd. The reason that I gave even 1 star is because my drink, the Mystery Martini, was fantastic! The bartender made a Blueberry Lemondrop Martini. Kudos to her! We gave the waiter our dinner order. Throughout the entire evening I never saw our waiter smile, not even once. He seemed very unhappy and like he would rather be doing anything but serving at Jake’s that night. I ordered the vegetarian Pasta Primavera. Let me just say it was less than mediocre and tasted like jarred sauce, with some frozen bagged vegetables thrown in. For $22.50 it didn’t even come with a house salad, nor was I asked if I would like to order one to go with my pasta. However, I would happily have paid that price for a TASTY pasta dinner. After dinner, we asked if we could see the dessert menu. After each of us ordering a dessert, again I was disappointed. I had the Creme Brulee Cheesecake (for $9.50) and it was just blah 😕. In spite of all this, my friends and I were having a lovely time catching up with each other. Then at exactly 5:30, the owner, Paul, came over to our table and said “I hate to do this, but we have another reservation coming in soon for this table”. After 1 1/2 hrs. We had planned to leave at 5:30 anyway, to allow us time to get to our engagement in Flint. However, we were never told when making the reservation that we had an hour and a half time limit. I have been to Jake’s many, many times and always enjoyed it! But the treatment we received on this visit was enough to ensure that I will NOT be back. Subpar food, an unhappy server, and the owner overbooking the table-no thanks! I...

The first time I went to Jake's it was for my first anniversary in October. The wait was a little long but the owner came out and apologized and said they were short staffed, which was fine and we understood. The service was good and the food was great so we wanted to take a couple of friends there to check it out last night. When we first got there we were asked if we had a reservation. We didn't, we never had one the first time we went so we didn't know it was necessary. We saw many empty tables but were told we had to wait 15-20 minutes. That was fine, so we waited. Everything was going okay until our waiter forgot our drink orders and then kept forgetting several times after that. We didn't get the bread that you're supposed to get with your dinner. It took well over an hour to get our food which was only sandwiches and burgers. The table beside us was seated after we were and got bread, salads, their entree and were leaving before we even got our food. My husband ordered soup to come before his meal and it took 20-30 minutes to come out. When it was time for our bills the waiter had forgotten what I ordered and had to ask me. I was dumbfounded and just stared at him. I watched as the owner went to many tables except for ours asking people how everything was and treating them like royalty while we were being treated like garbage. We weren't even offered dessert and everyone else was being offered and even brought out samples of what they had. The ONLY reason I gave two stars is because the food was good. A doctor had a reserved table behind us and when he ordered soup it came to him in the blink of an eye. They got a bread basket and the owner came and brought them another just so they would have extra. They got shrimp cocktail and it was promptly served and the owner continued to visit their table to make sure everything was going well. Well, I'm sorry we don't have DOCTOR MONEY but we do alright and I am very offended to be treated like such garbage. I was appalled at the end of the night and we will NOT be coming back. Whether someone is a doctor or a lawyer or a garbage truck driver, they deserve to be treated with the utmost respect no matter...