Juicy Bucket Seafood & Bar - Stafford — Restaurant in Virginia

My first impression was that the restaurant look really cute and clean the decor was right on theme. The table paper covers were cute interactive pictures to color for kids or adults. Their LED light menu was the first ones I’ve ever seen and it was really cool.

The service was good, there weren’t many dining people there and just 1 server at the time.

The food was less than desirable in my opinion, I will start by say we are both from Baltimore MD where we have some of the best seafood fresh and flavored wise so I have high expectations for seafood, boils and food alike. I am now a vegetarian of 2 years. My dining party was myself, my daughter and her dad.

The boil the I ordered consisted of Ramen, eggs, potatoes, corn with the juicy mix for my sauce/seasoning. When my bag came it was disappointing as I had little to no sauce, like no liquid in my bag. I raised this concern with the waitress and she initially told me it would be $2.50 for extra sauce. I showed her my bag and with a puzzled face I just said okay. She saw what I meant and said she wouldn’t charge me for more sauce. While waiting for the sauce I decided to try the ramen. It was dry (lack of juice/sauce) ,super salty, the ramen had strange congealed and undone texture. My other ingredients had not flavor to them and were bland as it wasn’t covered or absorbed with any juice. When my sauce came it still didn’t seem like enough but the flavor was okay. I poured it over my other ingredients and tried mixing my noodles in it. It just made the ramen worst so I opted not to eat them and tossed it. I had to keep dipping and rubbing my potatoes ,eggs and corn into the sauce with each bite as they didn’t have any flavor.

My toddler also did not like my boil I shared with her but we all liked the sweet potato fries!

Her dad had an actual seafood boil with all the seafood options including ramen he also chose the juicy mix. He also felt the same way about the ramens taste. Too salty and not good so he also tossed it in the trash bin. His boil did have more liquid than mine but not “a lot”, he said his boil was fine but not in comparison to MD’s or other places he’s been.

The picture with the fork in it was what I first received I had not eaten anything yet, I moved the noodles to the side to show the lack of liquid. The picture without the noodles is after I poured the extra sauce in and tossed away the noodles, as you can see it still wasn’t a lot of liquid in the bag.

I don’t think I’d be coming back just off...

2/8/25 11:40 AM Inclement weather is coming and very few people are out. Great Saturday for a lunch trip. No one in the restaurant but my wife and I. The place is clean and the staff attentive.

The menu has enough offerings but no broiled seafood options. Being from SC I know what a "Carolina seafood boil" is and we have boils frequently at home. This place does not offer that. It offers cooked in a bag seafood with sauce on it after the fact. We didn't come here for that.

The half dozen raw oysters were good. The crab rangoons were ok but you only get two small Chinese restaurant duck sauce packs as a sauce. That's sad.

The Margarita was great. My wife's fried flounder basket (not really a basket it was fish and fries) was very good. Cajun seasoning on the fries is not so good. My fried oyster basket was good. (not really a basket it was oysters and fries) Plain fries were good. Pricey for the fried food. A pet peeve of mine at any seafood restaurant is being served tartar sauce, cocktail sauce, and ketchup condiments in little single serve tubs with lids. That's how condiments are served here. I prefer they bring out refrigerated condiments in squeeze bottles so I get to use what I want where I want it. Meal was OK overall. We won't be back. Better options available in the area.

*Note this review was completed without using ridiculous un-discriptive terms like out-of-bounds, OMG, on point, awesome, the bomb, yummy, delish, to die for, do yourself a favor, trust me, flavorful, or kids emojis etc.. Describe the food, service (or lack of) and provide details on the cost/copy of check and include pictures! Is the place clean? No disrespect to the employees but no one cares about the waiter/waitress/clerk names, or if they look like they fell face first into a tackle box. They get changed like underwear and you don't get to pick one. We don't care about your allergies or the need for gluten free food.

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Our family wanted to love this place, but today’s experience was super disappointing. The food was ok but the service was horrific.

We were greeted and sat right away, although we were crammed between two occupied tables when there were plenty of empty tables available. We waited more than 10-minutes before a server stopped by to advise she would be with us shortly; another party was seated across from us, greeted by a different server and served an appetizer before our server returned. After a couple more minutes, I approached the host to remind them we were seated and had not been helped.

Finally, our server stopped by to gather our drink, appetizer and entrée orders. Our appetizer was never served, and our food arrived warm, not hot. We weren’t given plates for the seafood boils - my son had to get up and walk to the kitchen door to ask for plates. There were several dirty, seafood (shallow metal) plates scattered on the table beside us that hadn’t been cleared at all by the server prior to the party leaving, which is why we assumed there was a shortage.

There was absolutely zero urgency from our server - the table behind us could be overheard complaining of her service and a gentleman from the table in front of us had to track her down to ask for their check (literally get up from his table and approach her). She returned to their table with said check after 10 or so minutes.

Final straw? Since our appetizer was never served, my husband carefully reviewed the check to ensure it had been removed. It had but the server had added herself a hefty tip to our bill! The menu clearly states gratuity will be added for parties of 6+ - we’re a party of 5. No wonder the service was terrible - what’s the incentive for providing excellent service if you’re tipping yourself off the top anyway! This was brought to the attention of a manager, who apologized and corrected it.

Service, therefore servers, can make or break a business. Needless to say, we...