The Federal — Restaurant in Youngstown

Went here for lunch, and the food was great! My girlfriend got a western burger with their garlic parmesan fries and I got their grilled cheese smashburger with plain fries. Both were excellent. Nice beer selections as well, with some varieties of local craft beers on draft as well as some standard domestics. They also have a full bar for any cocktails you might want.

Prices were a bit on the pricier side, with appetizers ranging between $8 and $12, and the burgers ranging between $14 and $17 for single-patty, or more if you wanted to make it a double or triple. Drinks seemed to be about average for bar prices. Overall, with the burgers and one drink each, our check for two people ended up being a little over $50, but it could have been closer to $40 if we didn't both get a double-burger. The good thing is, they don't skimp on portions, so you get a good meal for the price.

Service was good, waitress was friendly and attentive, food came out within a good timeframe. Only negative is that, despite the place not being very busy, our waitress took a little longer than expected to bring our check after dropping off takeout boxes at our table. Other than that, everything was great.

Atmosphere was decent, with a nice quality interior and quality tables and chairs. Standard pop music played on the speakers overhead, but the song selection at least seemed to be curated to appeal to even my 30-something music tastes. I hear the place has a really nice lighting setup during the holidays, but during this time of year it seems a bit more understated. Not bad by any means, but nothing to write home about. Could do with a bit more art on the walls.

Overall, a great place to go for a bite to eat, as long as you don't mind paying a bit more for quality food and nice...

We were going to get lunch here but after ten minutes inside we changed our minds. When we walked in the door the first thing we noticed was that the floor was incredibly dirty for being only about noon. We were told when we arrived our food might take longer because of some kind of Santa-themed bar crawl that was going on that morning (side note, really Youngstown?) and the kitchen was backed up some. We had a small child with us when we walked in and the greeter saw this and thought the best place to seat us was at a high top table barely big enough for one person let alone two adults and a child. Personally, I'm not a big guy but I like my elbow room. Menu was a bit small but everything sounded good; would that I had tried something from it. Five minutes after the first guy took our drink order another lady came over to take it again.. she went to the kitchen then came back and said she would be taking care of us and asked for our order again. We waited for drinks for ten minutes, listening to morning-drinking patrons scream at the college football game, then left without even getting our drinks. Folks gotta clean up in there,...

We went to The Federal for an anniversary celebration. We were impressed with the decor. We were seated at a nice table. They were out of the one appetizer by 6:00. The one appetizer we did order came with 6 small pieces of toasted bread and we asked for more bread because over half of the cheese and peppers were still left and was charged $4 for 4 more little price of bread. The other appetizer was delicious. Speciality drinks were ok. We took a cake for dessert beings it was celebration for 10 of us. They couldn’t put it in frig. Manager said no. So we ask if they could put it in the back while we ate which was another issue. It took our food a while to come out. So we felt rushed because they only give you a two hour time slot and we were there over an hour before our food came. So we left and took the cake back with us because there was no time for cake. Just disappointed. The food was average. Although the salads were good. We were not sure but our waitress seemed new. Could have been so much more. Just few things made it not the best...