How to start a review of a place that has so many faults? Â Reservations taken only on the 1/2 hour, not an issue, unless when you get there about 5 minutes prior to the res. time, the "host' says the others in your party must be seated since the name is crossed off. Â Where are they sitting you ask?, he has no idea (it is soon apparent he has no idea about much) and he replies they may be at the bar, at a high top, or in another section. Â Of course they have not yet arrived and are thus not seen when you look about the place. Â When they arrive, the res. was in their name, you are made to wait 25 minutes PAST the reservation time to get a seat. Â While waiting one of your party inadvertently leans against a dimmer switch which makes the some lights go higher and lower. Â Why it is placed where folks who are waiting can easily move the switch only the management can answer. Â However the "host" glares at my friend and is rather rude when telling her to not move the switch, as if she was aware she was doing so..
Finally seated, we order. Â When ordering one guest asks the waitress if the cilantro and tomato can be left off her fish tacos. Â I ask for a side of russian dressing and tabasco sauce. Â No problem we are told.
The apps/soups arrive.  The black bean soup is too spicy for my friend so she puts it aside.  Next come the mains.  My friend's fish taco comes with, you guessed it, cilantro and tomato.  When we note this to the staff who brought it to the tablet he says he's only the food runner and stands there in silence for a moment.  He then says he'll take it back to see if he can correct the order.  Before he leaves I ask him  to also bring the russian dressing and tabasco I had ordered for my dish.  He says they do not have russian dressing ias it is not offered as a choice.  When he returns with the correct fish taco dish for my friend he loudly informs me, as he puts some seemingly russian dressing down on the table, that "he made it himself".  Nice of him.  BTW since we received the apps we've not seen the waitress again, despite our drinks needing refills and any other issues she should have been interested in checking on. Â
OK you may think so they got the "special" fish taco order incorrect but they fixed that.  I might tend to agree, except my spouse's fish taco (standard regular order, no requests re same) has been served without the  chipotle aioli sauce listed for it on the menu.  At the time the correct taco is served to my friend we note to the "runner',(still no sighting of the waitress), that one of us needs a fork.  After an initial blank look, he goes and brings one to the table.  Unfortunately the folks was not a clean one, as he had gotten it from another table and it arrived with bits of food on it.
As for the food, who cared at this point. Â To be fair the hamburger i had was fine. Â Other items either arrived not as ordered, see above, and/or, were not anything special.
BTW as we ate someone else made the mistake of leaning on the dimmer switch near the entrance, Â I know this because for about five minutes the light fixture set above our table put on an annoying light show as it brightened and dimmed. Â
When we got our check:
it needed to be redone as we had been charged for items not ordered;
the waitress noted that my friend had not eaten the soup.  This after the bowl having sat on the table for at  at least 45 minutes after she moved it from her place setting (the charge for the soup was removed from the bill); and,
the waitress apologized for the situation stating it was her "first day working at the place".
All in all a very poor excuse for a restaurant. Â Also i am still waiting for my tabasco sauce to arrive as requested.
Four stars if for nothing else but their burgers. Â Went with a group not knowing Thursday burger madness. Â We have been here before to find the food mediocre But wanted to try it again. Â It is extremely crowded on Thursday...burger and beer for $10. You need a reservation but we were able to find seats at the bar. Which worked well since we chatted with interesting people to the side of us. The burgers were perfectly prepared, juicy and flavorful. Â The service at the bar fast and friendly. Â If it is a burger you crave I recommend Hillview or Square One....two of the best places in Sarasota for burgers.
Review Source:I'm very underhwelmed by this place. On a weekday, 12:30 pm, off-season, there's no hostess or server in sight to seat you, lots of empty tables and booths. Was with a friend, we ordered 2 entrees, Gyros sandwich and the Chicken Cobb Salad w/grilled chicken. Food was slow to materialize, it took 30 minutes, during which time I went to the rest room, then out to my car parked a block away and back before it arrived. But service was pleasant and attentive, not their fault about the timing.
Cobb Salad. Very skimpy. 1/2 a hard boiled egg, cut into 2 quarters, a sprinkling of bacon, a nice portion of blue cheese, and 2 tiny strips of avocado. 1/2 of a chicken breast. Bleu cheese dressing was ok. But the Romaine lettuce was rusty red and brown, obviously from a bag. I had to pick out several pieces too brown to eat, although I ate some that were brown on the edges. Then I just gave up eating the lettuce. Blech. This is NOT FRESH food.
The Gyros was right out of a box, and not the best quality from a box, either. It was served on a brittle, dry, toasted pita that was smaller than the portion of gyros meat (I think it was 3 slices of meat), so you couldn't fold the pita without it cracking in half. One should have the option of folding the gyros inside a nice soft piece of pita, but I'm willing to bet that pita bread was STALE to begin with (thus the toasting), so it wouldn't have been pleasant to eat it untoasted. Also NOT FRESH.
This place seems to be the darling of the wealthy and elderly, although it couldn't be about the banal food. It exemplifies my major complaint about Sarasota's darling restaurants - their patrons are elderly (hey, I'm 61) and IMO, ignorant of good quality, flavor and freshness. These patrons have lost their senses of smell and taste, as well as their ability to see clearly, Thus places like this get away with serving poor quality food.
I'd been there before for hamburgers, which were good, not great. That was in-season and the wait was ridiculous.What's the draw here? I can't figure it out.
Been going to this restaurant for years and decided to go today to celebrate a friends birthday. Since I haven't been for a couple or so months, I was pleasantly surprised to see a revised menu. The menu was clear as to what the food selections are and not confusing, like some restaurants who have choice over load. The service was fair, but the food was very good. It's nice to have a restaurant you can count on to be consistent. I'll keep going for more years to come!
Review Source:great time,Great food and great service
What can I say ,I loved the place.
The atmosphere was great , the service from the host ,waitress to the bartender was fantastic.They were not only very attentive but also patient
and all possessed a good sense of humor.Last but not least , actually most importantly;the food was very tasty .everything was cooked to perfection.Best prime rib since Peter lugers in Brooklyn.There were four of us with 4 different meals and every one of us raved about the food.
Amen baby Amen
Remember to get five stars from me ,must have three great visits.
I have eaten here twice with my family and enjoyed it very much. Â Both times we happened to go on a Thursday, so I ordered their Thursday burger and beer special ($9). Â I have to say that both times the burger was excellent and cooked to perfection. Â Their blue cheese burger (along with a draft of Sierra Nevada) is especially good. Â Hell, the kids hamburger is good! Â My wife has tried the pasta dishes, and they too, are surprisingly tasty and well-prepared. Â Â Service is efficient and both times our food came out of the kitchen within ten minutes of ordering.
My only complaint is that the restaurant is small and surrounds the bar area, which can be excessively loud at times.  Last night, some blow-hard from Ohio was sitting at the bar loudly telling everyone what was wrong with Florida.  There was just no way to "tune" this idiot out.  But hey!  Floridians are used to tourist know-it-alls  like that, so go to the Hillview Grill on thursday and get the Hamburger and a beer special.  You won't be sorry!
Came at 6:30 on a Thursday for their $9 burger & beer night and didn't have to wait so I was pleasantly surprised. Although it is off-season so that probably has something to do with it!
I really enjoyed my Cigar City Maduro Brown Ale and hope to be able to find it back home.
For the burger I made my own - avocado & swiss. My burger came out cooked perfectly (medium rare) which it almost never does because most places like to cook burgers medium. Very refreshing. Fries were good but nothing special. I really enjoyed the burger except for the roll - it needed something else, maybe to be grilled or toasted?
Waitress was friendly & helpful.
3 drinks + 3 burgers for $27, you can't beat that!
This review is not about food.  You see, I didn't get a chance to eat. My friends  and I were kicked out by the classless buffoon manning the host station.
I've been lucky enough to have dined in restaurants all over the world. I've been visiting Sarasota every year for most of my life. But what I saw go down at the Hillview grill was beyond comprehension.
I wish I could say my party got tossed for dancing on the tables or for participating in a wild food fight. (Okay, that's highly unlikely since they are my elderly friends.) But no. Our party was bounced for simply inquiring what time we would be seated.
Here's the edited version: We had a reservation, but after standing around for 15 minutes, the gentleman in our party asked the host when we would be seated. That's when the host went postal. He snapped, "when I tell you you'll be seated." It deteriorated from there. My gentlemen friend is a soft-spoken grandfather, hardly threatening, and never raised his voice. T
I felt like I was in a Seinfeld episode--remember the car reservation scene with Jerry and Elaine?
The host became belligerent and told us to "go someplace else" and we didn't have a reservation anymore. Then he dramatically erased our name from the reservation book.
This has never happened to me anywhere. Not in New York, not in LA, not in London, not in Beijing, not in Paris, not in Sydney. Nor had it happened to anyone in my party (all well-traveled and well-heeled.)
So, dude at the host stand, you obviously hate your job. Get out of the hospitality business ASAP before you cost your boss anymore business. Â After you threw us out, we had a wonderful sushi dinner, just around the corner. And by the way, the women in our party think you need a toner on your over-processed, bleached hair--it's way too brassy. Â Try a different box of Miss Clairol. Â There. I said it. I feel better. Meow.
Hillview Street is a vibrant area with many restaurants and shops. Â I chose Hillview Grill to get a burger, but was enticed by another option on the menu...bacon-wrapped meatloaf for $15.00 Â The menu offers "inexpensive" ($8.00) sandwiches all the way to filet mignon $26.50 or seared scallops $22.00. Â Sitting at the bar is the best place to dine if you want to feel a younger vibe.
Review Source:This is a neighborhood place in the busy SMH area. Â We had a reservation on a Friday night and though they were busy we were seated promptly. Â
It was hard to pass up their current $9.00 burger and brew special which I imagine will disappear with each arriving snowbird, which this place seems to attract. Â The burger special is offered in a few different configurations; choices of cheese, grilled onions, mushrooms, bacon etc., along with a choice of French fries, sweet potato fries, Cole slaw or chips. Â It is nice to have choices on such a "value" offering.
The burger was large and served with lettuce and tomato cooked exactly as ordered; medium rare. Â It tasted good and I ate the whole thing, but somehow it looked better than it tasted. Â Why can't higher end restaurants make burgers that are tasty like Five Guys or In-N-Out?
My wife cut her large burger and ate only half also leaving a handful of sweet potato fries. Â At the end of eating, the waitress scooped it up so quickly that we couldn't request taking it with us, although I did call out "Miss" and was ignored or unheard. Â I would think a server would inquire if you wanted to take it with you, or seeing a large portion uneaten if everything was alright. Â Thinking about it now it was borderline rude, "Are you done" would have been nice. Â Oh well, it was a busy night.
Friends (who are only occasional meat eaters) love their ribs. Â This is a casual place with good menu choices and reasonable pricing.
I'm giving them 4 starts for value and atmosphere.  The food and service gets 3 stars.  Come on YELP, lets get half stars I know  we can handle it!
We went on a Thursday night, for their $8 Burger and Brew special.
First the good - the burgers were great, large an delicious, perhaps the best I've had. Â Mine came with extra crispy house made potato chips. Â The fries and coleslaw our friends got were also good. Â Wait staff was friendly, and the place was very nice, if a bit noisy.
The bad - we had a 7:30 reservation and they were so overwhelmed we were not seated till 8:15 and our food didn't come till 9:00. Perhaps they were having a bad night, but with such a popular special, I suggest coming early.
Wow! Another surprise... Great little place right next to Sarasota Memorial. I had the turkey club -- delicious sandwich, full of fresh ingredients, like avocado, and tasty meats like turkey and bacon. My wife had the chicken panini and soup combo. She pronounced the gazpacho "one of the best I've ever had"... That's saying something, my wife is VERY picky about her gazpacho.
Place was fairly full at lunch, mostly people in their 60s or up. Prices are good, sup-$10 for most sandwiches and combos. They have Pork and Kobe sliders -- and they're under $8 with fries. I kinda doubt either is freshly made though, since they have no other BBQ Pork or Kobe on the menu.
Service is efficient, almost aloof, so be prepared for that...
Looking at the crowd, I'm going to guess this is a little-bit of a local secret, so don't screw it up, okay?
$5 Martini specials on Wednesday -- other specials every day.
TIP: They have a party room in the back for your birthday or wedding rehearsal dinner...
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