Best Little Roadhouse — Restaurant in Salem

Looking for a good steak at a reasonable price? Don’t come here.

My wife and I decided to have a date night and ordered two filet mignon steaks—supposedly a higher-quality cut—along with an appetizer of loaded potato skins. No drinks, no dessert, and our total came to $116 plus tip.

Now, let’s talk about what we ordered versus what we actually got.

The loaded potato skins were nearly inedible. Normally, who doesn’t love bacon, cheese, and butter on crispy potato skins? But these were old, tasted deep-fried, and were so crunchy they were on their way to becoming potato chips. Worse, they had that awful, dried-out flavor you get when food sits in a warming oven for days. Absolutely disgusting.

Next, the side salads. A simple, fresh salad should be easy, right? Apparently not. Ours tasted like they had been sitting in the fridge for several days—soggy, limp, and far from fresh.

Now, the main event: two 9-ounce filet mignon steaks. At a steakhouse, you expect decent quality, especially at $40 per steak. We ordered medium-rare, which shouldn’t be difficult to get right. One came out practically raw (blue), while the other was cooked to the consistency of shoe leather. We hesitated to send them back, but we did. When they returned, they were exactly the same—almost as if they had just been taken back to the kitchen and brought right back out to us.

We ate what we could, but the meat quality was terrible. It tasted gamey and musky—something I’ve never experienced with a filet mignon before. I’ve ordered hundreds of medium-rare filets in my life, and none have ever tasted this bad. The texture was bizarre too, almost like the steaks had been glued together with meat glue to pass them off as better cuts. On top of that, they lacked any seasoning, flavor, or fat. Truly one of the worst steaks I’ve ever had.

The baked potatoes were just as bad—completely overcooked and so dry I didn’t even know it was possible to ruin a potato that badly. And the butter? It wasn’t real butter. It tasted like margarine or some awful substitute.

To top it all off, this meal left my wife and me with stomach issues.

The restaurant itself is rundown, poorly maintained, and felt unclean. Sometimes, hole-in-the-wall places surprise you with great food, but this was not one of those times.

At $116, this meal was beyond disappointing—it was downright awful. I would NOT recommend this...

I always come here and have never had an issue until last night. I’m really bummed we took my mother for her birthday, first off when you walk in you can tell it’s young teenagers working their not greeting you or professional in any way you have to approach them to get there attention. Than the table we had requested for one was next to the fire place out back and they said it was available and that they would seat us as soon as the rest of the party of 6 walked in so I’m waiting for everyone to walk from parking, than a group 4 walked in and the hosts seats them right at our table and another hosts didn’t realize someone else did so now she’s scrambling to find us a spot. But things happen so no problem, it gets “better”. The waitress does not ask if anyone wants drinks we all got stuck with water the entire night, until I had to ask someone can I please get a drink my brother and his wife wanted alcohol beverages with their meals but everytime they tried to get the waitress attention for a drink we where ignored. Not even our waters had refills we had to ask once all our food was gone for a refill by waving her down. And for my food to not be cooked right twice in a row to the point they packed it to go because I never got to enjoy a meal with my family made me really upset and emotional I spent so much money and still tipped on a nice dinner for everyone just to not enjoy it. And than we wanted my mom to get her birthday dessert but no one ever bothered even though we told them that’s why we are there so on the way out I said can I get one to go for her atleast we where given one scoop of plain vanilla ice cream what a joke. How come 2 other tables got song happy birthday with nice looking desserts. I have no idea why our service was so bad I’ve never experienced such poor service before, we were ignored and treated like crap all night. Than to end the night she never asked how was the check being separated just brought it to us and said all on one here you go and we said no we are all separate and she didn’t care she walked away. One stars because no one’s made it right or reached out after I asked to speak to a manger the hosts ignored me and said the waitress was under stress, well than she needs a new job because she treated...

We've been eating here since they opened, and have never been disappointed. The food is all quite good, and the service is excellent.

If you like places like Original Roadhouse or Texas Roadhouse, this place is pretty similar, but without being able to throw peanut shells on the floor like some sort of monster. I'd say the food is a few notches up from either Texas or Original Roadhouse.

There's a variety of seating options, including an indoor dining area, and a large semi-permanent covered area with a large fireplace. We usually prefer eating indoors, but the covered are is really comfortable as well - though due to the space can be a little loud.

We really enjoy the yeast rolls - and have even bought a tray to cook for Thanksgiving once or twice. The tri-tip is awesome, though, if you're ordering for kids, they tend to cook it closer to medium-well unless you specify otherwise - our kids both love theirs medium-rare, which they're always happy to do.

They have a couple of sauce options. A very sweet watermellon sauce, and a slightly less sweet sauce that has a tiny hint of spice. Both are good, and I usually end up asking for a bit of both. I wouldn't mind either a much spicier sauce, or one with more of a tangy component, but the ones they have are great for what they are.

There isn't much on the menu for folks who want a lighter, lower fat meal, but they do have some salad options, and they're all pretty delicious.

We don't usually drink alcohol here, but the few times we have, the bar does a decent job. We've only ordered drinks off their small drink menu, which are usually some sort of fruity cocktail, often with a lemonade base. Their bartenders are pretty consistent, and drinks aren't overly strong, or weak.

We've played mini golf her a bunch of times. The course is fun - not too difficult as to be frustrating, but significantly challenging that it's not super boring. Last time we played, it was looking a little worse for wear, but this was also during the off-season, and it was also intermittently pouring down rain. Haven't been back on the course since the end of Winter to see if they've...