American Tap House & Grille

Decided to meet friends here for my birthday yesterday, Tuesday. We had 4 adults and 4 kids in our party. We arrived at 6pm and there was 1 table of 8, a table of 6, a table of 5 and a couple of other smaller tables. This place is very small so there wasn’t room to seat all of us at one table. So 2 booths, which is fine. We received 4 menus. Maybe 10 mns later our drink order was taken. Those drinks arrived about 10 mns later. 10 mns after that our food order was taken. The salad bar was gross. Brown wilted lettuce. Pasta salad looked like it had been sitting there for the entire day. Stale hard dinner rolls. Vegetables were 5 seconds from being bad. Our food took about an hour. When it was delivered most of it was cold and over cooked. Our waitress did not stop back for drink refills… It was my birthday! I would have ordered a couple more drinks. They are a tap house… With no beer list. A couple of us decided to reach out to the owner, Troy, today with our complaints. We were given excuse after excuse and were told he would use our complaints at an upcoming staff meeting and told us to give them another try. Giving us no real reason to try them again. We aren’t usually this busy on a Tuesday he said. I take Tuesday’s off because I need a break he says. I’ve worked in the food service industry, this isn’t how you win customers. This is actually the first negative review I’ve ever written for a restaurant!
Poor food quality. Unresponsive, no communicating staff. This is one local business I will not be supporting.

FABULOUS burgers! My daughter and I ate here for her eleventh birthday, We wanted something fun and different then McDonald’s. We found it! We enjoyed the quirky tables and fun historical place mats. Great value, friendly waitress, «Cheers» at home friendly feel.

Being in a small town I have come to realize that a new restaurant opening is quite a big deal. I guess I didn’t realize how big of a deal until starting a new job in Mankato and when saying I was living in Waseca people demanded to know if I had been here yet.
Well, the answer is yes. I have been here two times now.
When you walk into American Tap House & Grille you are greeted by the opening to what seems like a 1970’s mall. There is wood paneling, glass enclosure, and frame-​less stairs. There is what appears to be a buffet set up, but nothing was out when we arrived.
The décor here is very odd. On weekend evenings they have a dance floor where they play club music and have the young crowd in for entertainment, so that area is completely open with lights hanging from steel framing. Surrounding that is a 90’s era decorated seating area with booths and tables, next to the bar area that has over sized tables, bar stools that don’t feel like the correct height for the bar, and a bar that really doesn’t seem like it was set up for people to eat at comfortably even though they serve food at it. For this place to make sense they should have closed off the restaurant area from the bar area completely, and bar stools that were a little bit taller, and a bar that was wider with more usable surface.
The bartenders seemed nice enough, but I could definitely tell that the one that served us was either new to serving entirely, or hadn’t quite finished her training yet. She forgot to bring us silverware, and told us where we could retrieve things like the ketchup and mustard for our food rather than just getting us a caddy for us to use.
I’m nitpicking on this one, but it’s the little things that make the service.
The food here completely saved the décor and the odd service. The food is unbelievable. I got the Southwest Burger and subbed out the BBQ sauce, but added jalapenos. My fiancé got the Bacon and Blue burger, we both had their hand cut fries. Their burgers are amazing. They are super juicy, actually seasoned, they use flavorful cheese, and their bacon is thick cut and cooked to perfection. The fixings on the burger were crisp and obviously fresh.
The hand cut fries were fried JUST to done so they weren’t as crispy as I would have normally preferred, but they were seasoned perfectly.
I have to say, I have not had a burger like this in a long time, and I would eat here every single day if I could!
To summarize. I have to knock a star off for the dated and lacking interior, and the odd service. But I had a lot of fun dancing here after hours, and the food is second to none in this small town! I wish this business well because I can see myself bringing friends and family that come for a visit here for dinner.