The Sand Bar, Bar & Grill — Restaurant in South Hero

This place is beautiful. Great ambiance. Sadly, that's the best part of it. Keeping in mind that they have been open for less than a year, there are few areas for much improvement. I ordered the steak frites which was cooked correctly, albeit stone cold. However the chimichurri was horrendous. As you will see in the picture, I picked out several stems. One of them could have been used as kindling! There were several others too. Also, there was no oil, minimal vinegar and not salted. No picture of the gazpacho but I was not fan. If you want a blended non chunky soup, blend it all the way. I had two tomatoes that were the size of the spoon. Overall, lack of flavor and unseasoned. My beautiful girlfriend ordered the tortellini al Vodka. The sauce was pretty good but it was a bit spicier than I think it should be for the general public. The biggest problem with it was the shrimp we added to it. It was very overcooked. Stringy and rubbery. There was even a strand of something that chewed like grizzle. I still don't know what it is. Also, the toasted baguette needs to be buttered or oiled and seasoned. It was so crispy and dry it was inedible. I make this review so those who need to see it, will do so and make some changes. As this was our first visit, we look forward to going back to, hopefully find some changes! The apps were good and the cocktails were delicious!

Our server was kind but somewhat inattentive. We asked if there was bacon in the clam chowder. He didn't know and said he would go check. He apparently did check but did not return to our table for 15 minutes. I had to ask him once again if there was bacon. He said there was. I think he just needs some more coaching. He seemed fairly new. I want to reiterate that he was...

Came here with family and decided to try this place out since it's new! We saw that the parking lot was full, but decided to go in and just see how long the wait would be. Once in, the hostess told us that you could only sit in the dining room with a reservation, but that we could order food at the bar and then sit at open tables outside that were more conducive to chatting. This sounded good to us, but after ordering drinks at the bar, we looked at the menus and realized that the food we hoped to order was only available to order in the dining room and not the bar. This was a bummer as we had our eyes on what looked like some really delicious dishes. We had already ordered our drinks, so we couldn't back out and had to choose something else. We all only ordered sandwiches and a salad, and they took about 45 minutes to come out (our server at the bar was lovely though - no fault to her). I figured the separate menu items might mean that bar items are a bit quicker to make, but it was clear that the kitchen must have been very understaffed. The food itself was fine, but nothing worth waiting that long for, especially since we only had sandwiches to choose from! This place has potential, I think they just need to make sure they have the staff to accommodate and potentially do away with...

Went two days in a row this week with separate groups of friends. Both visits were subpar with the second day being the worst of the two. Our server was super sweet, but running around like crazy and that resulted in really long wait times/inattentive service. We felt like the server was set up to fail, as she didn’t know a lot of information and as mentioned appeared to be running all over. The cosmos were not good and they use a super sweet cranberry cocktail. A friend ordered the pickle drink, which was sweet and tasted almost like elderflower which did not make sense based on the ingredients listed on the cocktail menu. Our food came out cold after a very long wait. In my opinion, you should be embarrassed of your cobb salad which was essentially a mound of ice berg lettuce. It had a long hair in it. The steak sandwich had mold on the bread. The sandwich was cut in half, so someone in the kitchen neglected to notice, chose to send to a table, and not to mention then put their moldy hands elsewhere in the kitchen. I really hope they pull it together and get some experience in there to right the ship as it makes a nice addition to the islands dinning scene. Rooting for them, but won’t be back...