Heritage Hill Brewhouse — Restaurant in Town of Pompey

Heritage Hill is a place we used to enjoy visiting, but after today's experience and the recent changes they've made there, I am not sure we will be returning anytime soon, if ever. The kids love to be able to see the animals and run around while we wait for the food. The food and service used to be spectacular. I'd always tip well and sometimes even buy a 4-pack of their craft beer to take home, as I do like to support local businesses and local craft brewers. But again, today's experience was a complete 180 from our past visits. We arrived today just after noon - my family of 5 and friends visiting from out of state (family of 4). Having never visited on a Sunday before, I was eager to check out the Chicken & Waffles on the brunch menu. First problem: when we arrived, there is no longer anyone to greet you and a sign at the door said to seat yourself. Didn't think much of it at first, it was surprisingly empty/quiet. So we found a seat. Next problem: nobody comes to your table to take your order. You're expected to scan a QR code with your phone, which brings up a terrible online ordering system where you're expected to place your own order (see photo #1). There's nobody to ask questions (is "hot honey" spicy hot or temperature hot?) and there's nowhere to type in modifications (like "no hot honey," which I tried to put in the "who is this item for?" field since there was no other place to type things in -- but the kitchen ignored it). After the chore of entering the 5 food items and 5 drinks for my family, I got to the payment page and had trouble getting my browser to auto-fill my credit card info. At this point, the page refreshed for no apparent reason and said "something went wrong." I tried to click "back" and my "shopping cart" was empty. Had to do the entire order all over again & then manually type in my CC info. Third problem: when the server finally came out with the food, she brought everyone's food BUT mine. No explanation. I figured maybe it was too much to carry in one trip and she'd be right back. Nope. I had to go back inside, find her and ask. Only then, was I told that my food would be "a few more minutes" without any explanation. It was another ten minutes before my food came out -- the entire family was done with their food by this point. (My wife commented that some of hers and the kids' food were cold. However, the mac & cheese was excellent.) So how about my chicken and waffles? For $18, PLUS another $2 for syrup (seriously!!) they were garbage. The chicken was just a processed patty you could get in the freezer aisle at the supermarket (see photo #2). It was hard as a hockey puck and very difficult to cut with the PLASTIC utensils they provide. The waffles weren't impressive either. I've made better chicken & waffles at home with frozen chicken tenders in the deep fryer and frozen store brand waffles. These were not at all worth the $20 they charge. And to top it all off -- every online order comes with an automatic tip of 18%. We sat at dirty plastic picnic tables, we placed our own orders on our phones, we had to get our own waters from a dispenser, and the servers only showed up to deliver food -- never a check back to see how things were, so that's why I'm posting here. why are we being charged a tip for barely any service??? For the prices charged and the mandatory tip, I'd expect clean tables, metal utensils, a human being taking our order, a human delivering water to the table, and having ALL the food delivered to the table at the same time, not 15-20 minutes apart from each other. This whole approach is just terrible customer service. I really hate places where I'm expected to tip before I even know if the food is right or the service is good. A tip is supposed to be a reward AFTER the meal for excellent service, not a mandatory charge up front before you know if it's deserved. Seems like the owner is trying save a few bucks by running the place with fewer staff, but in my opinion, this is a horrible move. Will not be back unless...

Well, let me first start out by saying I used to like this place a lot. This is also not a one-time incident. First it was long wait times on Friday and Saturday nights which is to be expected; however this was due to short staffed and down 2 cooks for months (straight from the hostess’ mouth). Then they closed down the after dinner ice cream/coffee bar which my kids loved. They the playground was broke in multiple places. Then yesterday (which is the straw that broke the camels back) we got there early and got sat right away. It then took 17 minutes for someone to greet us and take our drink order. I have worked in the restaurant industry for over a decade and probably been to over 500+ restaurants in my lifetime and it has never once taken this long to be asked about a drink order. Next because it took so long to greet us, we placed our entire drink, app, and dinner order all at once. After 10 more minutes of waiting for our drinks we then waited 40 minutes for our appetizers. I didn’t see our waitress once during that time to freshen up drinks or let us know why it was taking so long (probably not enough cooks on the line). When our apps came she dropped them off and didn’t ask my family if we would like refills or extra plates/napkins. She looked stressed and busy. There were only 3 servers on for the entire restaurant. Not enough for Saturday night peak hours. When the food came after that (actually within a decent time frame), I asked the runner if I could please have another ice tea because it had been over an hour at this point since my first one. She said sure. I never received that ice tea. Also we were never checked on by her with a “how does everything taste?”When we were finished with our meal we waited 10 minutes for her (or anyone) to ask us about desserts or check and nobody showed. My wife finally took the card and tracked her down in the restaurant and we paid. And although it was a very trying experience I always leave a 25% tip no matter what. It is not her fault she is one of 3 servers running around taking care of an entire restaurant by themselves. There should be 5-6 at least on a busy Fri/Sat night. Unacceptable. Secondly, I didn’t see one manager on duty walking around for these very moments. Unacceptable. I told this story to two friends when we got back home and BOTH said they have heard that this place I had gone down hill. Take this for what it’s worth but if you are planning on spending your hard earned $200 on a Saturday night for a dinner out with your family, there are a number of quality places that you will actually be waited on and feel relaxed. Sorry Heritage Hills but you are losing very loyal, willing to spend, intelligent customers who are only asking for BASIC/FAIR expectations. At some point this will be your downfall. It takes awhile but people eventually get sick of being mistreated and they will go somewhere else. Any questions,...

Horrible service!! Over 2.5 hours to get burgers. Very rude manager. Our waitress didn't even stop at our table for over an hour. We had to get our own drinks at the bar. When we finally got our food after waiting 2.5 hours it was cold. I wish I could leave zero stars because this is by far the worst restaurant experience I’ve ever had. Definitely won't be coming back here and will be sharing our experience with friends, family, and social media. Don’t waste your time or your money!

Customer service was hardly taken seriously! I personally shared concerns very politely with our waitress twice during the first 2 hours of waiting. She never mentioned anything about any kind of outage. Instead, she sent out a manager who seemed to care less. I explained to him how long we had been waiting and that a drink order hadn't even been taken and instead of asking what he could get us like any manager who runs a successful establishment would, he rudely said it was busy, which it was not. Lots of empty tables. Any establishment that gives someone like him a management title certainly doesn't care about its customers.

We watched several people come in after us and get served before us. After two hours of waiting, I personally asked the manager how much longer it would be and he said 10 minutes. 40 minutes later, our cold food finally arrived. It was nearly 9pm at that point and I have a 2 year old and 4 year old who had been at a restaurant for nearly 3 hours. That's when I asked to speak to the owner. The owner was incredibly arrogant and also couldn't care less about the lack of customer service or how long we had been waiting. Instead, he asked us to leave. I am appalled and how this situation was handled. Customer experience means nothing to this family or establishment.

In addition, there are a number of health concerns. There are farm animals that people are petting with no hand washing stations or hand sanitizer nearby. Barn cats are climbing on tables that people eat food at and I watched a staff member carry a large tray of uncovered meat from outside somewhere. It was probably a blessing that we never got to eat the cold food that took three hours to serve.

One week ago we dined at Grimaldi's with the same party size. It was Nationals Weekend, so it was very busy. While it took an hour or so to get food, the staff was incredibly attentive to our table. That's the kind of experience that's expected when...