Rí Rá Irish Pub

I came here for a bachelor party and we had reserved the room in the back right corner. This place is huge and sits with a nice view of the water. I give the waitress all of the credit in the world for dealing with 18 guys drinking and eating for a few hours.

The food was surprisingly good. We started off with bread and salad, and then some sort of fried potato cake (like a thicker latke). For the main course I had fish and chips, which was also very good. The batter was a bit thicker than I like it, but it was crunchy enough nonetheless. The portions were large, and by the time dessert came I was stuffed. By the time we left (around 10 on a Friday) the place was packed, and the 1st floor had a live band.

All in all, there are probably a lot of cool and eccentric places near the water in Portland, but if you pass Ri Ra and feel like eating some Irish grub, you won't be dissapointed.

We had a family get together at Ri Ra last night.  When we arrived, it was so incredibly loud in the restuarant we had to yell to one another to hear. I was disappointed that the menu was not what was shown on the website.  It was a much smaller menu. Two of us ordered appetizers and they were "out" of them - and we arrived at 6pm!

The worst part was the service.  It took over an hour to get our food.  Two other large tables of 6 and 8 people who arrived after us got their food before ours came.  We complained to the manager, and it still didn't arrive.  

The food was pretty good, at least it was hot when it arrived, however it didn't make up for the wait.  I was disappointed.

Let me paint the picture.

Ben: Hey Christine, are you going to bring the rest of your fish home?  
Christine:  I already ate it all.
Ben: Puzzled look on his face
Christine: I ate all the fish out from underneath the breading.  

Moral of the story, the breading should not be able to "stand-up" alone without the fish underneath. Bottom line, avoid the fish and chips unless you like a batter that an inch thick.