Jam — Restaurant in Town of Oyster Bay

Unforgettable experience but not in a good way.  I wish I could give 0 stars!

New York City may have its "food deserts" but Jam in Massapequa has developed an unique "service desert". Our brunch was doomed from the start.  When we arrived at 11:15 AM on this past Sunday, we were told that it would be a 35 minutes wait for a party of five.  When we checked after 45 minutes, the hostess said the seating request was for a party of three.  If the hostess thought our request was for three people, maybe we could have been given a table for four?  We saw parties of four and five seated even though they had arrived after us.  Did they have reservations?  No.  Jam doesn't accept reservations.  Clearly you could cut the line and be seated regardless of any "list".  Meanwhile while we were inside checking on our table, we saw the restaurant packed with diners.  Outside there were families (mostly maskless) including young children waiting to get in.  We didn’t see diners asked for proof of vaccination nor checked for raised temperatures.  How do  you know who is or who isn’t vaccinated?  Delta, wazzat? Isn't that an airline?

After we pointed out the error, the hostess finally offered to seat us outside but it would take another 15 minutes for the table to be ready.  I thought maybe outside dining would be a good thing.  Wrong.  There were two available tables for four outside: one by the front entrance and the other by the parking lot in the back.  The hostess gave us the table by the parking lot and actually moved a chair from the front table to ours.  Why didn't she seat us at the front table and move a chair from the rear table?  IDK.  Maybe if we're closer to the kitchen our food would come out quicker.  Wrong again.

We waited 15 minutes before our waiter took our drink orders.  He apparently relied on his memory because he only got five out of six correct.  He delivered the missing drink and then vanished for 5 to 10 minutes.  He finally reappeared to take our food orders but warned us that the "kitchen was being slammed".  We waited another 20 minutes during which the waiter twice assured us our food was coming out soon.  Then I saw him peek around the corner with a surprised look on his face.  A few more minutes passed and he came back with the now familiar refrain of "the kitchen was being slammed".  He asked us to repeat our food orders to "make sure the kitchen got it right".  RIGHT.  After another 20 minutes our orders were delivered to our table by a different person and were still messed up.  We were missing a side order of sausages and syrup for the pancakes.  We even had to ask for knives to eat our food.  Wow, that's a concept and an innovative breakthrough!  During all this, nobody apologized or showed much interest in our dining experience.  We finished our coffees in the first 20 minutes.  Nobody asked if we wanted more coffee and obviously the empty cups weren't cleared.  Clearly attentive service (at least for outside dining) is not a priority.  Their policy must be "out of sight, out of mind".  We asked for our check as soon as the knives were provided.  We saw our waiter more often after he gave us the bill than over the first hour.  He even said to let him know if we needed anything else.  I think he was serious but for me this was textbook situational irony  That's three hours that we'll...

Terrible service. Arrived at 11:15 on a Sun, told there was a 35 min wait for a table of 5. Ok, no problem. 44 min later I went to check in on our table and the hostess had put us down for a party of 3 instead. When I corrected her she said there would still be 15 min before we could be seated for an outdoor table. Ok, annoying but fine. We finally sat down after waiting more than an hour at this point when we were initially told 35min. Then waited 15min for the waiter to come over — we knew what we wanted and were ready to place our full order but he was not prepared to take anything more than our drink order. He didn’t write anything down and then forgot part of it. We finally placed our food order and waited 20+ min, during which time he assured us multiple times that our food would be out shortly only to come back and ask us to repeat our order to him so he could “make sure the kitchen got it right.” 20+ min later our food FINALLY arrived after we had been waiting more than 2hrs to eat. The food runner dropped off the plates but we were still missing parts of our order (side of sausage and syrup for pancakes) so we then had to go back inside and ask for these specific items because we were downright starving and frankly tired of waiting. It doesn’t end there — when the hostess set up our table she didn’t even give us knives, which we all needed to eat our omelettes and pancakes. Another trip back inside to fetch someone. The runner returned with the side of sausage but wouldn’t bring out syrup when I asked. The waiter finally brought out syrup and we immediately asked for the check so we could GTFO ASAP.

TL;DR strong menu but horrendous service, which makes the food taste considerably less good. Not returning ever. A word of advice to Jam: take reservations and train your service staff properly because they ruined the whole dining...

Hubby and I ventured to south from Queens NY to find out what's the rave about the place since we are breakfast/brunch people. We don't mind driving for delicious meals. Arrived at around noon and of course, there's a wait. A nice young woman took my name/cp and told me that I will get a text when it's our turn , a 15 minute wait ( maybe ). A lot of people so I don't think only a 15 minute but i estimated a 30 minute wait and I was right. Not a biggie because we are prepared to wait.

Once seated, the server came quick and we asked for coffee/water. Please do this if you want water to be served because they aren't a diner so there will be no support staff to go around to fill out your coffee or water. I like the seating arrangement because tables are spaced well. They have some booths too. Place is very clean and there are 2 bathrooms.

We ordered short rib omelette, homemade corned beef hash , banana walnut pancake and blueberry pancake. All nicely presented... I enjoy to have a meal like that otherwise what's the point of eating out , but of course , that's me. My husband find the short rib greasy. Pancakes are very good , cooked the way I like it. Had blueberry, Brie, thyme pancake and banana walnut pancake. Both solo servings and perfect serving for us. The Brie and thyme are on top of the pancake... not cooked with it and same with banana / walnut. The homemade corned beef hash was excellent and the highlight of the meal. Yes, we will be back for sure. Server...