3 Monkeys Pub

Went with a large group, they were so inattentive that my friend had to ask for their check 3 times! My food was sub par, my husbands dish was a plate of grease! We won’t be back

The food is decent bar food the burgers a good. I just don’t understand why everyone in the place is smoking. It the smoker drinker crowd loud and obnoxious.

Great place to watch sports games. Spinach dip wontons, buffalo wing, and the shrimp spinach salad were all delicious

Best secret in Northwest Indiana! They have 21 big screens so you can not miss any games. Their burgers are great served on a Pretzel bun with all the fixing. A generous serving of fries. In my opinion is GREAT! The staff is very nice and it is very well cleaned. It was great to see the staff clean instead of just stilling around! Very refreshing!

Prices are good on food and drinks. Come on you have a sign at the door NO SMOKING within 50 feet from the front door and you walk in and everyone is smoking.

Stopped by to meet Sweetie’s friend, and it was fine for that, though I wouldn’t go there for anything more. A basic sports bar in a strip mall: plenty of screens, a decent beer selection (okay, I was disappointed, but as these places go it was decent.) Prices were very reasonable. There are plenty of tables, service was very good, and the décor was interesting enough. Smoking is allowed in Indiana, which is a turnoff but not the bar’s fault. We had just eaten so didn’t try any food, but the menu looked interesting.

If someone never left the immediate Crown Point area, I’d imagine that 3 Monkeys Pub would probably qualify as a fairly good «gastro-​pub» experience. However, knowing that there are much better bar/​restaurants in Lake County, it’s very, very hard to recommend this spot.
I should preface the rest of this review by saying, if you’re just out for a night of reasonably inexpensive drinking with indoor smoking, this might be your venue. It is fairly rare to find a smoker-​friendly spot in the Region, so good on the owners for sticking to their guns. I’m not a smoker personally, but I respect a business owner’s right to make that call.
They tout an extensive beer list, but basically didn’t have any of them in stock. Our craft-​brew snob friend literally just held the menu up and asked the waitress to point at what they had. There wasn’t much. I think they probably just deal in domestics and well drinks… but I’m not much of a drinker, so your mileage may vary.
That said, we come to the food… ugh, man, the food. It is rough.
We are experimental when we go out to eat… we like to try as many different things as possible. So, we went with a table full of appetizers to start. Now, for what it is worth, it was delivered quickly. But:
Apps:
The «Chips»: Soggy, devoid of flavor (something that will become a bit of a theme in this review), served with irrelevant dips.
The Wings: Underdone, undersauced, and, again, largely flavorless. Avoid, or, perhaps ask them to make them crispy. Otherwise… not good at all. I enjoyed McDonalds’ «Mighty Wings» more, and those were vile.
The «Monkey Rolls» (some kind of pork in what tasted like cream cheese): My personal «favorite» of the apps. My guests thought it tasted of warmed tuna salad in an egg roll wrapper. Well, I like the idea of warm tuna salad in an egg roll wrapper, so, I felt this one passed. It wasn’t great. Just good. The chili sauce helped enough to make them edible.
The Bacon Wrapped Shrimp: As described. Pretty standard upscale bar food fare. Bacon was good. Probably the most evenly seasoned thing we got.
The «Sushi»: Hoo, man. It takes some nerve to call what this place serves as «sushi.» We ordered the tempura shrimp roll. I have literally eaten sushi from a gas station that I’d happily have again over this nightmare. Now, to be fair, we thought the tempura part applied to the shrimp which would then be put into a roll… not at 3MP. They put some kind of shrimp salad in a sushi roll, and then deep fried it in tempura batter. And they serve it nice and warm… just like sushi is supposed to be served (kappa). It was gross. And I don’t use that word lightly in restaurant reviews, but I mean it this time: gross.
The Dinners:
The Wagyu Beef Burger: Actually, this wasn’t terrible, but be aware that if you order it mid-​rare, ours came out red. Now, we’re cool with that, but just a heads up. Also, and I hate to keep belaboring the point: the burger itself is, we thought, unseasoned or woefully underseasoned. I understand maintaining the integrity of the «precious» Wagyu burger, but seriously guys. A little salt and pepper won’t hurt it.
Chicken Panini: Chicken and Cheese on garlic toast. I thought they played a little fast and loose with the idea of a panini, but our guest who had it favors the blander foods, so she thought this was pretty good. I felt it was marginal. But at least she didn’t get…
The Beer Can Chicken Sandwich: Phew, man, this was terrible. I mean, just awful. The chicken was dry, cold, totally unseasoned. There may have been some kind of aioli or mayo to mitigate this, but it wasn’t nearly enough to offset the barren wasteland that was this sandwich. At the time, I said it was «the worst sandwich I’ve ever had» to my guests. Might be a bit of hyperbole, but it was bad. Really, really bad.
Post script:
The «Duck Fat Fries»: Palatable, but largely indistinguishable from the regular fries (we had both at the table). They may shake some parmesan and truffle oil on it, but otherwise… save the extra (!) $ 2.00.
The Pizza: We didn’t order the pizza, but the table next to us did. It looked pretty good, which is a drag.
Overall, not a great experience for us. The food is on the low end of edible. The atmosphere is… vaguely sportsbar. There’s nothing to actually do in the place but eat and drink, however. And, obviously, since we’ll have no desire to eat here again, there’s no real reason to drink here, either.
Personally, I’d avoid Three Monkeys Pub. I’m all for local businesses. I support local restaurants whenever I get the chance. But seriously, if you want food, go elsewhere. Basically anywhere else.

Works burger w/​Duck fries… This review requires no further description, this is amazingly good burger! Keep in mind, this is a pub and not a fine dining establishment (even though I would argue the food COULD easily hold it’s own). Expect smokers, it’s a pub. Expect it to be loud… It’s a pub. Expect when it’s busy that it may take a moment to get a drink. Want instant service and the same experience every-​time? Well, McDonalds is down the road. If you want a warm, inviting atmosphere and to eat some pretty amazing food… in a PUB! Then, Three Monkey’s Pub is for you!

Had a blackened chicken sandwich, it was good. Not a lot to eat, but good. Service was great. Fries in duck fat taste like normal fries, not worth the extra $ 2

Super slow service we called ahead for reservations for 12 drinks were ok… Food came out one at a time every 20 min to a half hour. Seriously get your act together, or just stick to being a bar.

Three monkeys has redeemed themselves, only because their manager Melissa there is great. Bought us a round from the last time we went there when it was horrible and gave great service all night. I will be returning… please keep good management :)

There’s a playoff game on tonight so I expected it to be busy. You’d think they’d be well staffed. That’s not the case. Our server has had to take out her pad and pen to write down 1 beer which takes her 2 minutes longer on the already incredibly long wait for beer. We were served our appetizer without any napkins, plates, silverware or drinks. And then she stopped by several times to let us know that our meals were almost ready. Almost an hour later she came by to apologize and say that our ticket got lost in the kitchen. I’d have no problem with the long wait and kitchen mistake if our server hadn’t come by at least twice telling us it would be right out. Once the food finally arrived it was terrible. I’m not sure if it’s the poor quality of the ingredients or that all the cigarette smoke has killed my taste buds from sitting here so long.
Horrible experience.

Not a good place to watch any game. management lacks the understanding of the tv system, No sound in the big «empty room». incapable turning on the colts game. As the many colts fans were leaving the owner drunkenly said «I don’t care leave.» Felt bad for wait staff… POOR!

We are pretty sure we got lung cancer. Put some smoke eaters in if you want more customers. Went home and changed clothes. Wont go back not worth the health risk.

Another NW IN bar that decided not to follow the extremely convoluted and ill-​enforced no-​smoking policy in Indiana. Despite the high ceilings, the smoke is EVERYWHERE, the same way all bars used to be before the smoking ordinance. The allowance of smoking in bars here is one of the worst things, if not the worst, that’s ever happened to NW IN in the long –running comparison to Illinois (Chicago), in which we are (somewhat aptly in this case) described as gapped-​tooth moronic hicks with a death wish.

We’ve been here a few times. The food is average. If your starving, well, anything tastes ok. I believe the chef has forgotten his spices. I had a chicken panini, it would have been excellent if the chicken had been s&p, or blackened or ANYTHING! I wanted to go «Robert Irvine» on them and go into the kitchen and help ‘em out a bit.
He’d have a FIT!!!
One of the regular bartenders should take a «be nice» class. She lacks, just being nice. Not the first time we’ve noticed. She just appears crabby, like the customers are a burden. DUH!!!
We’ll go back, cause we like the tv’s and light atomosphere. And it’s great to be able to have a smoke.
I will change my rating, if on the next visit the food has some flavor, and the bartender is nice.

Probably won’t be back to this one. The service was fine. Of course, the place was nearly empty, so I would hope so. The food was pretty, but so very, very bland. We both got burgers and fries, but I don’t think there had been a salt shaker within 30 feet of either of our meals. No salt, no seasoning. I walked out craving flavor!
Update ⁰⁷⁄₂₀₁₃: So, we tried again. Mostly because we wanted ice cream from the Coldstone Creamery next door afterwards. *sigh* My buffalo chicken was acceptable if uninspiring. My husband’s Southwest chicken salad was too hot to even eat. The dressing the chef put on it had so much sriracha in it, it was not just hot, it was flaming — and we love our spicy food. After my husband mentioned it, the waitress asked the chef and he agreed there was too much sriracha in it, but no mention was made of replacing his salad. She just shrugged and walked off.
I might give second chances, but not thirds.

I hate giving a bad review over service. It was my fiancée 35^th birthday and we wanted to go bar hopping for his birthday (free drinks on your birthday sorta deal). We come in and sat at a table and wait for the waitress. She takes a while to get to us but we did not mind because we where talking. We tell her how we are out to celebrate his 35^th birthday and she responds with «Ok. so do you know what you want?» in a sarcastic tone. We did not want this to get us down on how pissed she seemed so we place our order of 2 of there mixed drinks and they where alright. She then asked him if he wanted a draft beer because they where a special and he said sure I’ll take one and an order of duck fat fries. Those where great! but she brought us out 2 beers and charged us for both! I told her «I did not order a beer.» she said «opps my bad» and walked away. then we got the bill. She charged us of all the drinks (even the beer I did not order) and I figured because 1. it was my fiancees birthday she would at least comp one of the drinks and 2. charged us for a drink I did not order. We left and went home because that waiter kinda killed it for us. This is not the first time I went here and it was disappointing because how I was treated. Will not go back if this is the kinda service I get.

Great beer selection and local hang out. Great bands and the food is excellent.

So the bff and I had to take a random road trip out to IN… On our way back we were looking for something different for our lunch stop. We stopped in Crown Point for a fast food place we saw an ad for… As we past the 3 Monkeys Pub we knew we needed to turn around and go back!
It was late afternoon on Friday, so we missed the lunch rush which was fine with us. We sat at the bar with bartender Kelly who was an absolute delight! We just wanted some apps to hold us over until dinner instead of a heavy lunch and she let us know what her favs were! She also informed us that everything is made fresh every day! This is key!
I picked the Caprese Salad Tower… Holy Moly was this full of win! The balsamic reduction was amazing with the fresh basil and mozzarella cheese! I’m a little bit of a tomato snob as we grow them, so the first three ingredients far surpassed the poor mater. I could have eaten three of these salad then taken a nap and my day would have been perfection, but wait there was more…
The bff choose the Crab Cakes… She loves to get them wherever we go! I cannot have spicy things so I didn’t eat the Spicy Remoulade Sauce that came with it though the bff cleaned out the side cup of it so it must have been great! The cakes were very crabby! It was delish to have a crab cake full of crab and just a little of all the other stuff to add to the flavor!
We also agreed on the Godzilla Roll… They offer three sushi rolls at this non sushi place… This roll was better than most of the sushi place around me! The tempura shrimp in combination with wasabi mayo and sauces that were drizzled on the dish (I can’t remember what they were) were the perfect combo! It made my mouth water!
Just thinking about this lunch again is making my mouth water again! They also have cider which is great as the bff and I have beer allergies. The prices were all VERY reasonable for what they were offering up!
This has officially become our new lunch /​dinner stop on trips to Indy! Very well done Monkey Smile Chef (we didn’t get you’re name, but you know who you are!)!!! Even the owner had a great sense of humor when he stopped by to chat with us! Give this place a try to truly appreciate the homemade goodness they have to offer!
**NOTE: In Indiana if smoking is allowed in a bar, then it is NOT a family establishment and you MUST be 21 or older. If smoking is not allowed in a bar, then it is a family dining establishment. Please disregard the below two posts that completely do NOT understand the law in Indiana!