We decided to try Molly Quinn's last night.
Our server was too preoccupied with lotto scratch games to look up and she asked us to seat ourselves. After shuffling over to take our order, she took her smoke break near our table and never even stopped by our table to see if everything was OK.
It wasn't OK. We were short on time, so we just ordered nachos. They had cooked the nachos in a MICROWAVE! Most latch key kids have already experienced the horror of chewy, soggy chips crusted-together with burnt cheese and glued to a paper backing. Now you can get have the same experience at a pricy establishment touting its "good bar food".
I want to cut them some slack because this isn't their specialty (one might ask what we were doing on East Lake street ordering nachos from an Irish Pub). But I will never, ever go back and give them 9 more of my hard-earned dollars to experience an Irish Pasty, given their cooking standards and total lack of pride in their establishment. Would they also serve a microwaved pasty? And will I have to get it myself? I'll stick with Captain Jack's from the grocery store.
When we got up to leave, our server was nowhere to be found. We negotiated our way out with the bartender and ran like hell. We made our way to the Riverview theater, where my heart sank when I saw their pump-cheese nachos. At 1/3 the price, they would have tasted at least twice as good.
It's a shame, because Molly Quinn's is a cute place and I thought it had a good reputation. But with such appalling service, terrible preparation standards, and an overpriced menu (not a single "poor irish farmer" entree under $8); It's no wonder they only had 3 other patrons (barstool regulars) at 6:30 on a Wednesday.
It's especially sad because I suspect that the apathy was related to poor business and possibly some inside knowledge of the restaurant's impending demise. Getting your customers to want to come back for more has much better odds than a lotto scratch game, and just the tiniest effort on their part would have yielded more than a $.44 tip (my first stiffing ever!). I would have loved to make Quinn's and Riverview a regular thing.
If my suspicions are correct, it only goes to show how much harm that wallowing in self-pity can do. I'll choose to interpret it that way so I can learn a lesson (because I already knew not to put cheese in the microwave)
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