The Rooftop

The good:  A unique outdoor space that's in a great neighborhood.  Very nice staff. Food is good.

The bad:  Street exterior and entrance is rundown. The entryway is messy and in poor condition.  Bathroom toilet stalls have no doors. Strange place.

I'm back in Des Moines again! So fun!

Today I decided I'd try something a little newer. The Rooftop is classified as "Cocktail Bar" and "American (new)". Sounded like modern American style food and well crafted drinks. No reviews? Mysterious! So I went for it.

Well you walk in and up a flight of stairs, and quickly realize that I'm heading back outside. This is the middle of July. It's 95 degrees in the shade. What have I done?

The deck looks nice, but there's literally only the bartender up there, and he's taking chairs off of tables and setting up for the night. Apparently they had been closed all day because of the heat. I wonder why. He tells me that he's open now though and invites me to have a seat.

So the place has an alright selection of bottled beers and ciders. I settle on one and when he brings it to me I ask for the menu. I had a very hearty appetite but upon looking at the menu I knew this was going to be tough. Handful of appetizers, some salads, flatbreads, burgers, and sandwiches. Not one thing about this says New American food to me. There's also an entrees section, but get this...they only serve those Thursday through Sunday, and after 5pm. Apparently people during the week don't want real meals.

Well I settled on the Bacon Wrapped Shrimp appetizer, and the Basil Pesto Chicken Flatbread. They need to be talked about.

Bacon wrapped shrimp. Sounds easy enough. Comes with a Mango Chipotle BBQ Sauce and on top of a Vegetable Slaw. These came out looking like popcorn shrimp covered in BBQ sauce. Shrimp were a little overcooked, and I'm honestly not even sure if there was bacon or not. The Vegetable Slaw was just bad cole slaw. No flavor whatsoever. The BBQ itself was great though! So I put some of it on my flatbread...

Which was lacking in the flavor department. It was DECENT, sure. But nothing to write home about. Pesto sauce on a flatbread (which was a little too crisp), mushrooms, onions (which they went overboard on), chicken, and mozzarella cheese. The BBQ sauce from the shrimp definitely made it taste better.

The service was lacking, I must say. I get that I was the only person in there, but that doesn't mean that everyone that works there (who slowly started showing up) should sit in the corner talking. I wanted a water and the bartender serving me didn't even ask. Hell, he didn't even introduce himself to begin with. And he didn't ask if I wanted another beer or anything either. Had he asked, I probably would have said yes. Oh well, bro. He dropped the check. I dropped some cash and got up and left. Some random waiter yells after me "Hey thanks!" and that was it.

All in all, very underwhelming.