Rogue Salem Public House — Restaurant in Salem

---April 11 2025 update--- Tried it again and wow! MUCH better experience!

Busy Friday night. Service was friendly but still a bit on the slow side. Hey it's a Friday night, I can deal with it.

This visit we got silverware and water as we were seated.

My Reuben sandwich was a 5 out 5. One of the best I've ever had! Other people in my group has mostly good food experiences. Say 4 out of 5 average.

I'm updating my old review to 4 stars and will for sure be back to try again!

---March 29 2025 review--- First the good. Love having a new restaurant in West Salem. Staff was friendly. Today was a special day, as they had a taste of Newport event that included a sample of some delicious oysters. VERY good oysters! By far the biggest positive food experience of the visit.

The bad. Service was a mess. We got seated fine, but waited nearly 30 minutes before finally having to go track down someone to serve us. Never got water, even though we asked 4 times. Asked 3 times to get silverware and finally after our food arived I went up front to make sure we actually got silverware. It was busy, but this goes beyond busy to a failure to cover the basics.

Now the really bad. The food. It was pretty bad. Especially considering that the menu is not exactly on the budget friendly side. Food was cold. Small portions. Nothing had any real taste to it, just basic stuff. Fries and fish seemed like they had been setting around under heat lamps for some time, soggy and cold. The nachos are down right ridiculous. No way those are home cooked chips. Cubed bland chicken. Generic cheese. Served cold as well.

Maybe it was off day. But we left very...

Front of house staff is in desperate need of leadership. I’ve worked in the food and beverage industry for years so I know a thing or two about what is needed for a restaurant to function well. While our food and drinks were fantastic, the service was absolute chaos. Our server was doing her best and literally had sweat dripping down her nose. Initially, our server asked if we’d been helped, we told her no, I have to give her kudos because instead of saying that she’d be right back or she would find someone to help us, she stopped what she was doing and immediately took our orders even though she was out of breath and looked like she was going to collapse. She revealed to us that we weren’t in her assigned section but she wasn’t sure who or if anyone had even been assigned to our section but since we’d been waiting a while she was just going to take care of us which I appreciated but the customers nor the servers should have to be subjected to this kind of disorganization and chaos. Where is the shift lead or manager?? Especially on your second Saturday of being open??? The staff all looked overwhelmed, confused, and there was no cohesion amongst the servers. Our server was fantastic and did her absolute best given the circumstances but where there are ill equipped staff there is even worse management, leadership, and training. Rogue, you need to...

Heard about this new location opening. Went for dinner last night and was very disappointed. There was literally one waitress for the entire restaurant. It was packed as well. It took 10 minutes before we were greeted and able to put in our drink order. 45 minutes until she was able to come back and take a food order and over an hour until we got our food.

We felt so bad for the waitress. No manager on duty. One bartender and sadly no IPA's were available except one that wasn't a good option. Food was delicious even as it came out slowly.

There was one other employee that was helping to bus tables, but they were so poorly understaffed that they lost so many paying customers. No hostess either.

Especially with this location just newly opening, they don't have the staff to support the customers. Well-known name, and of course, it brings in the crowds, but we saw so many people leave without ordering due to the wait.

Needless to say, if you want to try out the awesome food, be prepared to wait for a long time for service and your food. We were there for almost 3 hours when we would normally only have to be at a restaurant like this for maybe 45 minutes from...