Northwoods Family Grille — Restaurant in Silver Bay

Rude waitresses and less than great food. Our family chose to visit the North Shore of MN with our children and grandchildren as we made this trip several times when our children were small. As a whole we had a wonderful trip and made many new memories. We stopped in to the Northwoods Family Grille on a Sunday for lunch as we had been sightseeing in the area. Upon entering the restaurant a young waitress rolled her eyes and said seat yourself. My daughter asked for a high chair and was rudely told they are in the closet over there and the waitress simply walked away. So my daughter went to the closed door closet and found a high chair. Several waitresses walked by our table but we sat there for 15 minutes with young children waiting for menus so we could order. The restaurant was not busy at this time. Finally another less than happy waitress came to the table to take our order, she stated that she wished to take our orders in a certain order, after my husband tried to order for himself while we were assisting a child in making his order choice, the waitress refused to take my husbands order because it wasn't in order. Once our order came the BLT's were not edible the boar bacon on them was barely warmed/not cooked or edible, the burgers tasted ok but nothing special (supposed to be award winning), waitress forgot to bring my daughters drink and the soup my husband did order, when I asked about them she said, "oh that's right," and walked away for another 10 minutes (finally returned with drink and soup). Once we were done eating waitress had disappeared and had to be found to bring our bill, she acted like it was an insulting request even thought we had all been done for 15 minutes and the kids were getting restless. Staff in general were negative and very unwelcoming and food was not that great! I wouldn't recommend...

We had brunch here on Saturday, September 23, 2023. This was our first time giving it a try. Super cute place on the inside!!

Crazy busy with a 45 minute wait time, only two waitresses, and two big tables reserved for large groups.

Once seated, our waitress was friendly and prompt with the order for our drinks (just water). Placed our food order, and waited forever for our plates.

I had the biscuits and gravy. The gravy was lukewarm (at best), the biscuits were gummy on the inside (seemed they hadn't been baked long enough to rise/fully cook), and the gravy was so over-peppered it wasn't palatable.

The meal my friend had...the flavor was phenomenal (even if it was a tad greasy). She chose the Fajita Omelet. I tried a piece, and wished it was my brunch.

We also split an order of hashbrowns. Those were perfectly crispy on the outside, cooked and hot on the inside!!!

Serving sizes - I wish my biscuits had been fluffy, with pillowy layers. I referred to them as "biscuit wafers". Also, I had a ton of gravy, and nothing to soak it up. The hashbrowns seemed rather small for a $4 side (neither of us had more than 3 forkfuls). However, the Fajita Omelet was HUGE.

Our waitress was so busy, and hard to flag down for our bill. So, we walked up to the cashier stand, and asked if the gal running the register (2nd waitress) could print ours out? She was very abrupt, and sounded snippy when she loudly told us, "go back to your table, and just wait for your waitress to bring it to you...K?). We could have done without her eye roll, too.

Our server would get 5* from us. She did stay cheerful, even though she never stopped moving! The 2nd server wouldn't even get 1* - she was simpy rude.

All in all, we'll give it another chance. Just please, modify the gravy and cook your biscuits...

I visited Northwoods Family Grille over the lunch hour and the positive experience started as soon as I entered the door.

TL;DR - absolutely worth hopping off Hwy 61 for a visit. Great service, great food, and reasonable pricing... you can't go wrong!

Service Upon arriving I was immediately seated and got my order taken all within about 5 minutes, with food arriving within another 10 minutes. 15 minutes from entry to eating is a pretty amazing achievement and if I lived in town, I probably would have just found my go-to for lunch.

Food I'm always on the lookout for the next great burger place, and so ordered the Brunch burger: burger with hash browns slice of ham, and a fried egg with cheese. Hooboy, was I in for a treat, as the burger was fantastic. The hash browns were thin and crispy so they added a great texture without the potato muting any of the other flavors (a very common problem with breakfast burgers). Burger patty was also very well prepared, and the carmelization on the outside was great. Personally I felt the burger was better without the ham; it didn't really contribute to the flavor and added a chewiness that didn't fit with the rest of the burger, but this was easy to remove. All in all though, probably the best breakfast/brunch burger I've had, and I've tried quite a few.

As for sides, the burger came with fries which were great: nice and crispy with a light batter in them and a good sized portion. Got the seasoned fries which were a $1 up-charge over the included fries. Added a nice peppery zing but not sure it was worth the additional cost. Still, I just wanted to keep eating them!

I definitely plan on making this a regular stop on my trips to the North Shore in the future, fantastic...