Nick's Lakeside Grill — Restaurant in Spring City

We were driving around the lake looking for a restaurant where we could eat outside with our dog so we happened across Nick's Lakeside Grill. We thought we would check it out as it might be a place we would want to come back to when we were on the boat sometime.

First of all, the positives. The location and ambiance outside was very wonderful and relaxing. The other customers around us seemed to be very friendly and having a good time. It was also very clean.

The negatives - the service was super slow to visit our table. The server wasn't overall friendly or responsive to our needs. The food wasn't anything to write home about but it wasn't terrible either. It just wasn't anything I would have to have in the future.

The kicker - my daughter ordered the "Chicken Tenders" meal. When she received her order there was literally one chicken tender and few french fries. You are probably thinking, well it was probably a giant chicken tender. No, it was a normal size one. Had we known she would only be getting one chicken tender when the menu clearly stated "Tenders", which is falsely advertising that there will be multiple tenders.

Anyway, I am not sure if it was because we were sitting outside but our server never reappeared so I had to go track her down inside. This was a beautiful day with multiple other people sitting outside so it wasn't like we were the only people out there but I had to go inside to track her down to pay. Thinking that maybe the cooks just messed up on the chicken tenders order by putting only one small tender in the basket, I inquired about the chicken tender situation. Nope, it is only one chicken tender when the menu clearly states "chicken tenderS". No apology or any kind of discount was offered when I brought up this subject. This is really just a hilarious story to tell friends and family at this point.

Our dog did seem to enjoy her time waiting. We won't be visiting again. I hate writing negative reviews but the whole chicken tender situation did have me laughing...

We actually ate here twice. The first time wasn’t bad, the service was a little slow and the food took longer than I thought it should but they were a little busy it was a Saturday evening and the band hadn’t started yet. The waitress was very nice and took care of us as well as she could. The owner did stop by and thanks us for coming in which I thought was a nice touch. So this evening, Saturday, May 18th I give them 5 stars all the way for food and service!

Now let’s talk about Memorial Day weekend, Sunday, May 26th. This time it was a COMPLETELY difference experience from the time we walked through the door. We were a party of 7, so not a big table, our waitress was completely clueless about EVERYTHING from the start. She messed up our entire order from the first drink order to our food order. The service was lousy and 90% of our order wasn’t right. They tried charging us for stuff we didn’t order! When we confronted the manager she told us, “not to get so dramatic”. Those were her exact words! All we did was question the food order on our bill, very nicely mind you. We were not loud or rude to either of them. The manager stood in front of our table, along said our waitress and told us we were basically wrong and her waitress was right. The manager was awful, disrespectful and RUDE!!! She doesn’t need to be anywhere related to customer service. The owner genuinely seemed to be a great guy, he really needs to rethink who he leaves in charge of his restaurant. I'm giving them a 1-star only because you can't give 0. My cheeseburger was awful and burnt, the only thing we can honestly say was good was the pizza, everyone else at the table were also disappointed with their meals. Trust me we WILL...

DIDNT EVEN WALK IN YET AND JUST ABOUT LEFT!!!! Apparently an employee was hollering with a manager/owner and was calling out all the problems with the place.

Employee: “Yall are the ones dropping chicken wings on the floor, picking them up and putting them back in the fryer”

Manager/Owner:”Quiet down, you’re making a scene”

I guess they never knew I was on the other side of the fence with my brothers listening for about 5minutes and was about to record over the fence just to see who was arguing lol. Still decided to still give it a try since we were starving from working all day. Didn’t order wings after hearing what the employee said. Only the burger was just decent enough to eat. Mac n Cheese brisket and brisket tacos were really bad. Brisket tasted like it was smoked in a burning house instead of a smoker.

Service was really bad!!! Employees were more focused on the drama going on vs actually their customers. We were the only ones in the building along with 2 other tables on the patio and yet spent 1.5hrs there. Our food was in the window for 20min while we sat across from it and watched as employees ran around talking about the drama unfolding. Getting our ticket was the same. Told us they’d get it right over only to run around again talking about the drama. Overall, this was the worst experience I’ve had in a restaurant....