Mike's Penn Ave Grille — Restaurant in Salem

I just ate dinner here this evening and came to write a review and read the first one which happened to be much like my experience and coincidentally has a picture of coconut shrimp that isn’t burned. I took my mom, my aunt, and my little niece out to eat after a fun day of shopping. My mom and I have eaten here often and are generally happy with the food and the service. All of the food was great except my coconut shrimp which were obviously overcooked and burned. They were VERY dark. My mom and aunty even commented on it. I decided to get some other dipping sauces and try to eat them anyway but they were mush in the middle and the burned coconut just sort of crumbled into dust in my mouth. They were inedible. I told our server who was very nice about it but sent the “manager” over who had a terrible attitude. Definitely not apologetic in the least. In fact she stood there and argued with me that the coconut shrimp is ALWAYS dark. “ that’s just how coconut shrimp is”. I explained that I love coconut shrimp and that this is not the case. They come out golden when cooked properly. As one can see in the picture on the review directly under mine. But this woman stood there and argued with me until it became quite uncomfortable and actually started to make me angry. This is not how a manager is supposed to handle this type of situation. We are very happy and fun people. We were laughing and having a great time up until this woman approached us with a terrible attitude. I expect a good manager to apologize, remove the food, take it off the bill (I ate 2 out of maybe 10) and ask us to please return again. This woman told me they don’t just take the food off the bill “just because a customer doesn’t like it”. She was insufferable standing over me speaking to me like I was some kind of imbecile. Had that not happened we would have shrugged it off and come back, but after this we will never eat here again. I would love to have taken a picture to post of how burnt my food was so everyone could see what this woman claimed was normal. Terrible...

We have had mixed results at Mike's. Been there maybe six or seven times in the last few years.

Today, they knocked it out of the park.

Most importantly, the server was attentive and knowledgeable and showed up just the right number of times. Perfect.

Secondly, we tried a lot of new stuff and everything was great.

Deschutes Wheat Ale on draft was excellent.

Specials menu had a brisket egg rolls app that was really, really greasy, but really, really good. Dried them off in a napkin and tucked in. Comes with a horseradish sauce, but they're better with ranch and a touch of salt.

Side salads are great. Fancy lettuce and enough fixings on top to make it a real, big boy salad. Comes with egg, which is a requirement to me.

3.5 Bread is only available on request (???), but it's really good bread and butter. Dip in the salad's ranch for bonus taste.

Specials menu also had a Floridian Grouper which was not only mighty tasty, but also presented well. My wife gets on me for ranting about plate presentation. A poorly presented meal obviously looks terrible, but makes you think it tastes terrible, too. Some of Mike's entrees suffer from this, but the grouper tasted good and looked good doing it.

Wife had a regular menu item, the chicken and sausage thing, called something like the Dejavo. That's not it, but it's close. Think italian ramen.... because that's what it is. An odd combination with chicken, italian sausage and noodles, but pretty good. A bit wet for my taste, but she loved it.

All in all, this was by far the best experience I've had at Mike's. So we'll...

I had three issues

First, we made reservations for 4 people the day prior. Me, my girlfriend, a friend and his wife. We arrived 5 minutes early, and the hostess didn't find the reserved name on her sheet. I looked at the sheet, and the name was there, but mispelled. We were then seated in a tiny booth right by the door that was constantly opened. and it was right next to the bar. While being seated, we walked past at least four or five empty 4-person tables in the other dining sections and much further away from the bar. So it didn't make sense to be walked all the way across the restaurant to get the worst booth in the place. Why even make reservations?

Next, the food tasted OK but not good enough for $85 for 2, and that included 1 mixed drink and an appetizer. I tipped 20%, so my bill was over $100. I had a T-Bone steak, and it had a lot of fat on it. It was also medium rare, and I asked for medium.

Third. By the time I got home, I started having bloating and severe stomach pains. That continued for several hours until I vomited violently a few times. I texted my friend, and he said that his wife had the same exact issue.

I won't ever be back. This is a bar pretending to be a restaurant with good restaurant prices... and apparently, food...