The Dutch Mill Diner And Catering — Restaurant in Shelburne

My boyfriend and I went and had breakfast at The Dutch Mill for the first time. We had high hopes considering it looked family owned and we love brunch style menus. We were greeted by a not so friendly server who commenced to tell us to sit anywhere. After trying to navigate the overly complicated menu, our server came and took our order. I ordered the french toast and a side of crispy bacon and my boyfriend ordered eggs, toast, home fries, medium bacon and pancakes. The wait wasn't long when our meal started to arrive in portions. The crispy bacon that I had ordered was so black and overcooked that it turned to dust when touched. After taking a few bites of my thin and wonder bread like french toast, I noticed a brown, curly hair swimming in the maple syrup. Across the table, my boyfriend was experiencing his own breakfast disaster. His toast was more like soggy bread. His scrambled eggs were overcooked, brown, and dry. The home fries were more like plain, under-seasoned fried potatoes. We tried to get the manager's attention when he was dropping the pancakes off, but he ran away so fast and ignored us as we tried to bring his attention to the hair. We proceed to stare at this hairy french toast for another twenty minutes before the server comes over and asks us if we need anymore coffee. We politely refuse and point out the hair. She says something about a brush, doesn't apologize, and runs back to the kitchen with the hairy plate. We both work in the restaurant business and know what is to be expected. We also know that these things happen all the time and we are usually pretty tolerant when it comes to complaining. But this was just wrong in every way imaginable. The server never once communicated with us about the food. Not even a "How is everything?". We never even got a chance to tell her about anything other than the french toast and even then she couldn't apologize or offer any remorse. She comped the french toast and coffee off of our bill and at this point we are just ready to leave. We waited again, card in book at the end of table, for another ten minutes as she ignored us walking by several times. Finally, we just walk up to the front counter to pay for it ourselves. As we are standing there paying for the disappointing meal, a man in the kitchen begins hollering "Hey guys!" waving a butter brush saying: "This is what was in your food guys, not a hair." Again, we both work in the business and know the difference between hair and a plastic butter brush bristle. We shake our heads, pay for the meal, and leave unhappy and disappointed patrons.

Hopefully this will offer some insight on your next...

So we get there and they point to the general direction of our table. The lady hands us menus to carry to our table (so far nbd) so we hear the three people who are trying to wait tables, make coffee and seat people argue nobody has assigned jobs. Finally our waitress/hostess comes over to take our order we tell her we know what we want and caitlin says we will have coffee, now instead of taking our whole order and bringing us coffee after we tell her she rudely walks away slams coffee down and then says okay now your order very gruff like. I ask her about her sausage and she basically forces my choice making us feel rushed. Then leaves, a few moments later our food comes out. I had 2 over easy eggs sausage and home fries with toast. My toast wasnt toasted it was bread that looked in the general direction of the toaster, one egg was fully cooked hard yoke the other was over easy, the sausage was just basically Walmart patties which is whatever, and the homefries were cut potatoes that were on the grill no seasoning. Also the coffee sucked. So we are in the middle of eating and she doesnt ask us how our food is but instead in the middle of our food slams our check down and says no rush. Meanwhile while we are trying to eat our bland boring food she is yelling at the other workers in front of everyone. The only reason this diner is second to worst on our list is because our food was actually cooked and came...

Very much like going to gramma's house for a home-cooked meal. The hospitality is top-notch and even though the small dining room of about 10 tables was packed, my husband and I were seated for brunch on a Sunday in about 5 minutes. Clearly this place is popular for the service and the food and not for the atmosphere... which, in my experience, atmosphere isn't a necessity for some good eats. We sat at the 2 seats at the bar and the view was a pile of old office equipment and clutter ever so slightly covered in dust, and a wall that has been tarnished by years of serving up some fried goodies. Again, the service made up for this. We had three different staff members wait on us during our time there - the coffee gal, the host, the waitress - all speeding around constantly tending to the needs of the patrons. The cooks whipped up our meals in less than 10 minutes! Eggs Benedict with the corned beef was a huge hit and my husband ate every bite of the giant plate! I had a veggie omelet which was a bit dry, a delicious buttered English muffin, homefries were perfect, and a side of bacon which was a bit thin (almost like mivrowave bacon) but cooked crunchy how I like it. Overall a very decent brunch to energize us for a day of exploring the area - we...