The Tavern 19 — Restaurant in Town of Hamlin

My wife and I have been here exactly 3 times because we ended up with 3 "Groupon" coupons...and each time was terrible.

VISIT#1 The first time we ordered a fish fry and "wood fired chicken parm" pizza...both were disgusting. My wife's fish fry was soggy, greasy, bland and rubbery- my wife immediately informed our server of the problem, the server said she would take care of it, but did not return to our table for over 30 minutes. My pizza was a bad joke, crust was slimy and soggy, sauce was awful, and there was barely any topping, not to mention there was a chunk of chicken bone in what tiny bit of parm topping I had....since the server never came back until over 30 minutes after our food arrived neither of our meals were corrected...the server "apologized", asked if we wanted her to do anything about it, then and offered us a dessert to go?!?!? We paid the full price of the bill (using our groupon of course) and we left hungry and tired.

VISIT #2 The second time at Tavern 19 my wife and I both ordered the chicken parm dinner. The sauce was really gross, the pasta was soggy and over cooked, but the portion size of the chicken itself wasn't horrible. However, the service was terrible and the inside of the restaurant (from what we could see, including our own table) was pretty filthy. We were offered no refills on our beverages and after waiting about 25 minutes the waitress finally came to the table with our bill. Again, we paid the full bill (using groupon #2) and left disappointed, thirsty, and a bit hungry.

VISIT #3 This visit (we still had one more groupon we had to use :-( ) was no better than the first two. My wife and I both ordered the chicken parm dinner again and requested a different sauce...this time the portion of chicken parm was TINY (literally 1/3 to 1/2 of the portion we received on Visit # 2) and dried out / burnt black from being over fried (this dinner is $17). Despite the visually obvious "burnt" condition and tiny portion, the waitress set the food in front of us and walked away. Roughly 15 minutes later she came back to "check" on us. The waitress asked how everything was and my wife stated "not real good", so the server, seeing that my wife and I only took about 2 bites of our meal, said "sorry, do you want me to box it up for you"....and then she proceeded to try and sell us dessert....again, we paid the bill in full (using groupon #3, thankfully the last one :--) I have NO IDEA how this establishment is still in business, but yikes- I know we will NEVER be back. Honestly, had it not been for having been given 3 groupons for this place, we never would have come back after the first time, but since the groupons were given to us we had no way to change them out, and decided to just use them. After 3 bad experiences we can honestly conclude that this place is terrible. After reading all of the reviews (and the obnoxious owner replies) I can see that many people have had the same or similar type of bad experience that my wife and I had, and I can...

As promised to the second waitress, my review.

I can't remember a dining experience as awful as this. We decided to try Tavern 19 for the first (and last) time tonight. I moved to the area last year (2020) and have tried most of the few dining options in the area. Finally, after a year, I convinced my wife that we should try the "famous fish fry". I arrived at approximately 7:05. After waiting about 5 minutes at the bar for help, I finally got to ask where I should check in for the restaurant as it was my first time. Checking in was easy and my party of 6 could be seated immediately as it was NOT BUSY. I gathered my family of 6 and we were seated. Our server did not arrive for several (5+) minutes, we did not receive a place setting and the menu does not have drink options listed. When the server did arrive to take drinks, we didn't know what options were available. We ordered fried calamari and tavern fries as appetizers. Drinks arrived two at a time and we're delivered incorrectly. The fried calamari was undercooked and we didn't finish it, the fries were good. After an HOUR AND A HALF, MOST of the food arrived. The kids meals appeared to have been sitting for a period of time. My wife's seafood platter was huge. Unfortunately it was simultaneously overcooked and undercooked at the same time. The scallops were mushy inside and blacked outside and the fish fry followed suit however the shrimp seemed fine. After the kids finished their food and my wife decided not to eat the rest of hers, mine finally arrived. I guess they only have one fryer?? Mine was obviously undercooked immediately but after an hour and forty-five minutes, I was willing to eat what I could. Our server checked in ONE time besides ordering and bringing food and check in TWO HOURS. There were 3? servers and roughly 10-12 total occupied tables. The table next to ours was occupied before we were seated and they did not receive all of their food until after we started getting ours. The lady next to us stated that they had been there for over two hours. Our server never asked how the food was at any point. And I didn't see her between my food arriving and asking for boxes and a check. After our check arrived, a separate server asked how everything was and I told her that I would leave a review online. After she pressed for an answer I told her that the service and food was awful. I explained why it was as well. She walked away and apologized from about 15 feet away. I would not recommend this business and will not return. After reading other reviews I expect the owner to respond. Please know that there is nothing that I would accept in return for my future business. No apology, credit or reimbursement would...

On Sunday, June 15th my husband and I figured that we would give Tavern 19 a try before buying coupons. We heard about their wood burning oven and figured we would give the pizza a try. First off, we were not impressed with the interior of the place. You could either sit at the bar or out on the porch. We asked to sit at a table in the game room and Dave was nice enough to let us do so. Dave is a sweetheart, and was doing his best even though it was apparent that he was running the place by himself (plus one other who was upset cause he was called in on his day off cause someone quit) We ordered a 16 inch pizza w/mushrooms and a beer. The pizza was horrific! Hardly any cheese whatsoever, and very little mushrooms. The crust was good but did not make up for the lack of cheese and the sauce that was terrible. The atmosphere was another problem. We had to move to a table on the porch because a guy at the bar was dropping the f....bomb and making lewd sexual comments as well. Not family oriented at all. I hate to think what the place is like on a Friday or Saturday night. I e-mailed the owner Craig, to explain to him what a terrible experience we had, but that did no good. He simply stated that he would talk to his employee's. I asked him when a good time would be to get a decent pizza, and he replied on Thursday cause he would be cooking. When I later informed him in another e-mail that we decided not to give them another try, he simply e-mailed me back and said OK. That tells you a lot. Then, he gets upset with my reviews and basicly calls me a liar. No one seems to be addressing the problem, but they want to dispute reviews. I honestly, based on our experience, can not recommend Tavern 19 to anyone. Funny, all these other reviews pop up raving about the food and the place after my review. Something is fishy. All I know is that the place can't even get people to come in and drink....they advertise that they are opened till 2 in the morning, but many nights they are closed by 11. What does...