Boathouse 19 — Restaurant in Tacoma

DECLICIOUS FOOD but portions are SMALL My BF and I stumbled across this restaurant on Saturday night. Originally planning to eat somewhere in University Place, I am SO glad we came here! They were packed. There was a 30–40-minute wait but you can easily go to the brewery next door to pass the time. We lucked out and found seating next to another couple at one of the high tables that's part of the bar area.

The menu has an array of things. Plenty of drinks to choose from, mostly seafood, and they do have early dinner specials (stops at 530pm).

I opted for the Pike Place Fish Fry Combo which included Cod, Prawns, and Calamari with a side Ceasar Salad. The Pike Place Fish Fry is dipped in tempura batter-YUM. BF ordered N'awlins Po Boy and an IPA. He was so upset by the portion size. His Po Boy was about a 6" sub with Jimmy John size bread. Mine came with one piece of Cod, 4 Prawns, and 4 pinky size fingers of Calamari and about 8 French Fries. The portions were large enough for me but a hearty eater will be disappointed. The portion size threw my BF for a loop, he said the food wasn't that good.

The taste of the food is SO YUMMY!! Not salty at all. They give you tartar sauce, ketchup, and we asked for a side of ranch. The ranch is like a Cajun Ranch so don't think it's your typical buttermilk ranch. Its super thick too. Caeser salad was fresh with enough dressing and perfect crunch. Food is not salty.

If you don't like Seafood, you should find a few things to eat. (Salad, grilled cheese, tomato soup.)

If you want the Calamari, I suggest ordering the appetizer. The portions for the appetizer are JUMBO compared to the Pike Place Fish Fry.

I'll probably order the appetizer next time.

FYI-quite pricey.

Service. Service. Service. Oh, Jess T. Our waiter was nice, but she took forever to get our menus, order our food, and deliver my BF's beer. He probably would have had two if she was more attentive from waiting. I understand they were swamped and probably understaffed. Unfortunately, she was attentive to the table next to us. They got their drinks quickly. She wasn't the bartender so that wasn't the reason for being slow.

Despite Jess T, I would come back to the restaurant.

There is outdoor seating with gorgeous sunset views.

Also, you can see the kitchen from where we were sitting, and I really like that transparency.

• Beware, the ladies' bathroom only has two stalls. It was a dirty bathroom. My BF said the same about the men's and they only had...

The food was unappetizing and expensive. We would rate it 1.5 stars if we could but it doesn't rate a two with the cost of eating food that left us hungry, frowning at the taste experience and felt like a large rip off with the expense.

The atmosphere was casual and pleasant. The food had amazing descriptions that seemed impossible to dislike however of the 5 things we tried only one would we order a second time but neither of us would be willing to go back to do so.

My sister had the salmon, corn, potato chowder and the pear salad. I had the Alaskan cod sandwich with lemon caper aoili dressing. The good was served on small plates to make the portions seem bigger. The soup did not seem fresh and though the flavors described could have made an outstanding soup it was rather bland and flat. The bread on the fish sandwich was dry, lacking flavor and even hid the flavor of the fish, aoli sauce and the veggies so much that in order to taste the food you couldn't eat the bread. This left a handful of fries and one slice of cod as a $12 meal. The salad was delicious according to my sister however we were both still hungry.

We didn't have time to stop somewhere else so we ordered their scrumptious sounding sweets thinking that those couldn't be described wrongly. We ordered the Kalua Cheesecake and the Apple Carmel.

The Kalua Cheesecake was lacking a flavor of Kalua and appart from the large topping off light whipped cream the cheesecake itself was 6 small, non-heaping, spoonfuls. Though my sister loves Cheesecake it was hard to finish as it was not appetizing. The Carmel Apple pie dish was a larger portion and finally filled us but was hard to choke down. This dish had perhaps a whole apple in it but saddly was so overcome with oats that it was like eating apple cinnamon oatmeal with sparse apple slices strewn through it. This was so sweet that it was like a 5 year old got a hold of the sugar bowl and dumped it in her oatmeal.

If you want good fish and chips check out...

Hubby & I first date night out in a couple weeks, & we wanted to try somewhere new. Been on WA for 4 years now, I have only been here once for an event & it was just for drinks, so I suggested this place since I never got the dine in experience. I read some of the reviews before hand & I almost passed & I am so glad we didn’t. Boathouse 19 definitely hit the spot. Everything was great. Our server Grant was fantastic, didn’t hover but made sure we were taken care of. Knowledgeable of the drinks, witty, & overall couldn’t have asked for a better server. The food was amazing, hubby had the burger (not posted) but I asked him if it was actually good or just okay, & he said it was really good. I had the shrimp po boy sandwich, haven’t had one in a minute, & loved it. Shrimp was perfect, sandwich stayed together & the bread roll is served on was crunchy but soft. Babe, had a beer I had the coconut margarita! It was absolutely perfectly made, tequila isn’t my fav but coconut is & it was delicious & refreshing. The atmosphere, well you can’t beat a beautiful sunset outside on the water, so that can speak for itself.

I made sure to take a pic of my drink and food, bc pics speak volume but honestly so do personal reviews. Why there are bad reviews on the place I don’t know. I’ll definitely be back. Even at good places you can have a bad experience I get that but that also determines on you. Some people you just will never please in life & that’s on them not the other person.

I can’t wait to go back for happy hour 🍹

If you want good food, good atmosphere, and possibly a waiter who doesn’t hate his life, than definitely check out Boathouse 19 if you are in the area, vacationing, or just need a drink by the...