Purdy's Farmer & the Fish — Restaurant in Town of North Salem

After several great visits to this lovely place, today was a very disappointing, awful experience. We will not be back.

Arrived at 2.45 - the last seating for lunch on a Saturday so they can prep for dinner, starting at 5. Booked online, table confirmed that morning. Hostess showed us to the porch, and even moved tables for us, unprompted, to give more shade. Brought some nice bread and water, given a few minutes to settle. Asked around 3pm if we wanted drinks - we needed a few minutes to look at the menu, not a problem at all! Placed a drink order, and left for 5-8 minutes to review the menu. The very nice waiter helped us with some questions, made some suggestions, and took our order - seafood tower for 3, shrimp cocktail, a couple of other apps, and then 4 main courses. Mouthwatering stuff to be sure!

Soon after, our waiter came back and asked some odd questions - who seated you, did she let you take this table or did you pick it yourself? A few minutes later - sorry, just to let you know, we do have a wedding coming, so the whole restaurant is booked out later - you may have limited time today. OK...?

An app arrived - delicious bacon rib! And with it a comment - sorry, we have a wedding, so we may need to move through this a little quickly...

Seafood tower arrives. More clams than oysters - opposite of the menu listing. No explanation, and no change in price when the bill came. Shrimp cocktail just added to the tower - no explanation, the party who ordered it had no idea until she asked. Can't tell if we got all the shrimp we were supposed to get - 6 plus a cocktail is how many?

Not even halfway through the seafood and other apps - the main courses arrive. "can you make room for this?" Umm... No - I would like my raw clams to stay on ice...? And your porch tables are tiny, so...

4 main courses deposited on an empty table about 10 feet away. Lots of foot traffic checking out those entrees for the next 10 minutes...

It's now about 3.35, 3.40. Waiter: "I'm sorry, did anyone tell you when you sat down that you would need to be done by 4?" Ummmm Every couple of minutes - sorry, we have a wedding, do you think you can be done by 4? One person in the party has had a couple of shrimp and a polenta fry. And she's being asked to leave in 15 mins... Still have a good sized seafood tower on the table - "can we bring these entrees over now? " What? To put where exactly?

3.50 a hostess shows up:. How is everything? Umm...a bit rushed tbh? "I checked with mgmt, and we can give you all the time you need to finish up, as long as it's by 4.15. can we bring these entrees over?" Eh, nope. Trying to eat lobster here, on a really small table. No room...

A few mins later - can we bring you the entrees now?

That was enough. I told them we did not have time to eat the entrees. They said we could wrap them to go. I said no - you can take them back and take them off the bill. " Ok, will need to check with mgmt"

Where's the mgmt? No one came - they hid behind the poor waiter, who was put in the middle of an impossible situation.

Some other waiter we had not seen yet brings a bill - ok, we took the entrees off... Still, $230 for lunch that was rushed and harried the entire time. No offer of drinks, no compensation for the experience. Just - pay for what you ate, and leave quickly please... One mocktail over charged as a cocktail, the seafood tower with more clams than oysters... No adjustments or explanation on the bill.

Why take a booking if you can't serve it before your private party? Why harass and annoy your customer after you take their order, but don't explain the situation when they arrive? Why not show some good will, to ensure we left with a good experience, albeit shorter than planned?

We planned our day around this visit, and sold this restaurant to friends as a great spot for lunch. Our day was marred and we were embarrassed to recommend the place.

Shame on you farmer and the fish...we hope your other customers enjoy their...

To start, I love the old building. It has a real sense of charm, beauty and history to it. With that said, it would probably serve better as a museum; considering the current state of the restaurant that occupy s this property.

Smell: The smell outside is reminiscent of a baby's diaper. The plumbing here has to be as old as the building itself. I do not know to many people that wish to smell digested food while walking to their car - A good reason why North Salem should convert this into a historical preserve. It's a foul smell, and flushing those toilets is not helping... so that's the greeting one receives while making their way in and out of Farmer and the Fish.

Now that we are inside (I can breathe). The hostess comes off rather as a spouse poacher. Good thing she only seats people - anything beyond that comes off a bit awkward. But at least the servers' will be more hospitable, friendly and knowledgeable right? Maybe they would be if they were not over worked or rushed? Its a restaurant with a farm but its hard to find out where my food came from which left me bit unsure if I was eating produce from Acme or produce from a farm- the servers did not have an answer for me. Is it me or did I not see multiple greenhouses by the parking lot (which smells foul)?

We found dinner to be lacking. Gave me Twisted Oak (tarrytown) vibes. Uninspired and unremarkable. My scallop salad had 3 overly cooked, burnt scallops next to a bed of baby greens and spinach (those greens reminded me of the ones I get at Acme, in the plastic tins). Very overpriced. And clearly we like to pay for good food. We came to Farmer and the Fish after all. Very disappointed.

On our way out we noticed the farm store was still opened so we checked it out. I can't remember the girl with pink hair's name but she was sweet but could tell she was uncomfortable being in this secluded store by herself. A man with an unkempt beard (i think there was food in it), fairly large size, and apparently he worked their, thank god. He left as soon as we walked in. Having anyone work by themselves next to an establishment were people are drinking could be dangerous. Why is this little girl in here by herself? The farm store did not offer anything other than confirm our suspicion that most of the produce in their restaurant I could get at Acme for half the price.

Don't be fooled by the name - Everything on the menu is grocery store to table.

Will I return...

Had a 6:15 reservation and we were promptly seated which was great. The atmosphere is really very cool with the farm beams and pictures/fireplace. We ordered apps (mixed oysters for my husband and the summer squash /lobster soup for me) oysters were brought to the table in a reasonable time but my soup never arrived until my husband was almost finished. Furthermore the soup dish was so hot it would burn your hand... Which tells me it sat unattended under a heated shelf in the kitchen for way too long. I saw my server filling sugar caddies while I was waiting for my soup but he never though to check if I had received my soup. Finally got the soup but it had not been flavored and I had to put a bunch of salt to finally get the squash part of the soup to come alive. Once the salt was in it was tasty. We both had fish for dinner (salmon and also a Dover sole special) both were delicious. but for the price I would have expected a slightly larger slice of salmon and a little more veg than they provided (2 very small carrots, a fingerling potato split in half and a grilled shallot which was inedible.) ... And the Dover sole was $42! Wow that's a bit much. We also had desserts... Warm chocolate cake and peach cobbler. The chocolate cake was good. The peaches in the peach cobbler were not sweet at all.. To the point it was a chore to continue eating. Do they taste this stuff before they put it out? All they had to do was sprinkle a little sugar on the peaches! To top things off my water glass remained empty for far too long and I did wait a long time to get refreshes on drinks. I would watch our waiter continuously walking by, eyeballing our table with the empty glasses (or my missing app) but he just didn't think to stop and check on things (or maybe he didn't care to?) Service was far substandard for such a pricey place and I'm not really sure he actually had a lot of tables to tend to because there are a ton of servers working in this small restaurant. This was our first time there but we have decided for the prices they charge - - there should have been more consistency and higher standards experienced in the food and service. Unfortunate...while the fish was tasty overall we did not get the value for the large bill we paid. I can't remember the last time I gave anything less than a 20% tip but it happened last...