Buckley’s Tavern

Came here Monday night during the Holidays. Sat in the original tavern area, which to me is far preferrable to the new area in the back. Wife enjoyed her drink and I ordered a single malt — Craggenmore. Soon learned the menu had not been updated and that one is no longer available – try again. Ok, how about Bruichladdich? Great choice I was told… Exxxxxxcept then that wasn’t available either. Ok so Macallan? Yes on Macallan! Served with one big rock? Nope none of those type of rocks. Ok this is a TAVERN, right? Well, kinda.
Then food … Wife had mushroom soup-​real good. I had beet salad –very good. Wife had Shrimp and Grits for her entrée – fair, grits cooked too dry. And I ordered fish tacos… And was presented with … A reuben? The servers comnent – «not sure how that happened.» Guess what – neither am I. So time later I got my order … But it’s more like a burrito than tacos.
In summary – 3 for drinks, 4 for food, 2 for confused service, 4 overall cause it’s Christmas.

I really want to love Buckley’s. It is in a great location and a historic space; I have been here many times over the years. The bar usually seems to work out, but the restaurant is not great. Two of the past four times I have sat down to eat, they have gotten the order wrong for someone in the party. And both times they were painfully slow and disorganized in resolving it with a correction. The servers seem so inexperienced, not great at being attentive and the food is average. In fact, last time I was here I noticed the table next to me had gotten their order wrong and it took so long to get a corrected entrée that they just took it to-​go for one in the party. (shouldn’t there be a way to rush an incorrect entrée order)
The Sunday brunch is popular, but I always feel shortchanged when I get it. …it is $ 18.50 and the sides (like bacon) are served family style — getting french toast and shared sides for that price is a little rough especially if you add in a bloody mary.
Anyway, the bar area could be a low 4 but the restaurant experience is a 3. Bottom line is that they tried to reinvent the place a few years ago and I had high hopes, but it is best as a well located bar and mediocre restaurant.

Attended for a high school reunion. Found the banquet rooms to be small for the 25 – 30 people we had. Limited space to move around and talk with people. Found service to be relatively slow and unresponsive. Took a long time to receive food. Asked for drink menus as guests at our table wanted to purchase adult beverages. Got menus but not asked what I wanted for over an hour. May have been short staffed, I dunno. Choice for dinner, fish tacos, Buckley burger or Cajun chicken salad. Guests who got fish tacos were not impressed. Buckley burgers looked on rare side but may have been what guest ordered. I had Cajun chicken salad which was different. I enjoyed it for that reason but not sure I’d order it a second time, so I could try other things. All in all, I give it a 3. Not sure I got the complete value for my $$ there, would have expected better service and food being the location it’s in. Parking was really hard since two large groups there. Enjoy!

Love hate relationship! Some visits it’s fabulous and other times the food is ok. But brunch is always so fun, especially in pajamas, and I love the family style portions. Driving the back roads on a Sunday morning to get here is so relaxing. Mom and I love the early American décor.

Great environment and location.
The food was ok nothing special and the drinks were nice.
I would definitely go there again very soon.

What a disappointment snippy servers why can they not hire competent polite people who are not staging themselves it is a nice spot

Been one of my favorites and still is. Had their crab open faced sandwich yesterday and loved it. Their extensive beer/​whiskey /​wine menu is as good as always. Go. You’ll enjoy it.

What a disappointment!!! We called and inquired about making a reservation and were told they don’t take them. The hostess then proceeded to tell me that it isn’t crowded now but would be with in the next hour. She was engaged in a quick but polite cover conversation with me prior to ending the call. We were optimistic. We drive to the restaurant and arrive 15min later and were told that for a party of our size (7) their was an hour wait. (Their is literally no where to wait. The two small benches are not enough as people were on top of one an other. If they cannot turn tables over then they need to reconfigure the space) To make a long story short, 45 minutes into our wait when I noticed many people coming in after us being seated I went to the hostess stand. The person ahead me states my name is «XYZ» and I called ahead. The response was, your table will be ready in a minute. I inquired why I was told that they don’t take reservations and at that time why wasn’t I told about call ahead seating. Essentially, I got a blond hair flip, slight giggle and an I am sorry. REALLY?!? Two other «large» parties were seated before us and we wasted a lot of time because staff doesn’t know it’s own policies.
Our food was sub par to average at best. The mac and cheese bites were doused in salt (per the kids), the bruschetta was nicely presented but greasy, the fish and chips were decent… the fish was light and airy but the chips were like led, they were out of the special before 7:15, one of the dishes for our table was not ready when the rest were served and it arrived after everyone was finished lastly, the filet was a RIP OFF. The portion was insanely small for the price (unless you are eating Kobe) and the entire dish was SALTY! A salt lick for deer probably had less of a concentration than their filet and hash.
The two stars are for our awesome waitress, Johana (?) and good drinks.
We may try it again since it has potential and it smells a zillion times better then before the remodel. They need to rethink the balance of the menu and the quantity of sodium in their food. As I am typing this my fingers are super swollen and my lips rival Donald Duck.

Pleasantly surprised by how good overall our dinner was based upon the mixed reviews since they changed things up
Cheese plate and mushroom flatbread very good
Seared salmon was good and veggies and risotto very good
My sister in law said the fish tacos were good, wife liked the salmon salad, son ate the pizza, and brother in law really liked the shrimp n grits.
Service quite good apart from forgetting to bring us silverware n plates
We will come back

Love love love the renovation! MUCH needed! Thank you! Food and service are wonderful!

3.5 stars, but I’ll round up to 4. This place is so quaint and simply adorable! I found out about the pajama brunch via Unilocal,so I simply had to try it out while I was in town for a baby shower. It was fun seeing most of the other customers dressed in pjs. We got there around 10:15 and had a very short wait (5 – 10 mins) before we were seated at a booth. Our waitress was not the greatest. She would disappear for long periods of time, didn’t offer creamer with our coffee, etc. It wasn’t a huge deal to me, but my friend was super annoyed. The food was average, but you get a LOT of it at such a great value ($ 9 if you’re wearing pajamas!). I’m from the DC area and used to paying $ 35+ for brunch, so I was amazed at the price. The pastry plate brought to the table wasn’t too great, but they had a nice variety of breads, muffins, scones, etc. The meat plate (ham, bacon, sausage, etc.) was generous – the three of us couldn’t even finish it all! I had scrambled eggs (overcooked and lacked flavor) and they came with homefries. BF had an omelet and BFF had eggs benedict. I would definitely come back here again!

What happened to this place?
We arrived for a quiet lunch around 2pm, and were seated quickly. Then we waited… and waited. Finally a waitress arrived, and while leaning on the side of the booth, grumpily asked us what we wanted to drink. I felt bad disturbing her from whatever else she was doing, but I was thirsty, so we ordered soft drinks. Another 5 – 7 minutes later they arrived.
The waitress, seemingly annoyed that we decided to also order food, asked us what we wanted. First question– is the mushroom ragu vegetarian, or is it made with beef stock? As if she was purely guessing, she said «Its mushroom, there is no meat in the dish» (We skipped that to be safe, as we are pescetarian.) We ordered the soft pretzels to start, my Wife had a beet salad, and I choose the «Chef» Tom’s Clam Chowder. (Again, as I am pescetarian).
The pretzels arrived warm and fresh, and we dove into the honey mustard. To our shock, both of us were overcome with the insane amount of horseradish in the mustard. I like horseradish, but this was like some sort of sadistic joke. We waited and waited for our waitress to check on us, and nothing. So we flagged down another waitress and asked for any other mustard. (It never came).
Finally our waitress comes by and we explain that the mustard was inedible, and her response was (and I quote) «What do you want me to do about it?» Are you kidding? How about giving us any other mustard you have. She stated that the mustard was made ‘on site’ which is lovely, but whatever cook whipped it up failed to taste it. After a grumble from our star waitress she left. (Again– NO mustard ever arrived, the pretzels went cold as we stared at them longingly).
So– food arrives. She slammed it down and quickly retreated to her hiding spot. I took one spoonful of soup, and immediately spit it out. All I tasted was meat and salt. I fished around and sure enough, there was Bacon in the soup. Who the hell puts bacon in Clam Chowder? Bacon is a lazy chef’s way to add flavor, and in this day and age with large amounts of people not eating meat (or specifically pork) Why would that not be in the description on the menu?
So we wait some more, and finally the waitress comes by to check, and I asked her about the soup. At this point she simply didn’t even care. She just walked away.
A manager, who was very nice, appeared to try to explain to us why we had both horrible service and terrible food. While she was nice, and offered us a free dessert, all I wanted was the check and to get the hell out of that place.
TERRIBLE SERVICE and if we have already explained that we are pescetarian, WHY WOULDN’T YOU WARN US THE SOUP HAD BACON?
It’s too bad this place has gone downhill with the new owners. It used to be a great spot for brunch and drinks. Oh well.

Sunday brunch (not buffet)
What a great first visit for my wife and I,
About three quarters of the crowd in the bar area were dressed in jammies the pastry plate was absolutely delicious.
The breakfast meat plate was very very tasty could tell that the meets or either local or fresh.
Our server was Ashley she did a great job explaining the menu.
I would recommend this for a very informal relaxed Sunday brunch

Always our go-​to when in the area. Buckleys is casually sophisticated with an awesome drink menu at decent prices. The food is excellent and pairs well. I can count on them to have the popular craft beers as well as the classics and to make a good martini. They specialize in at home hospitality. The pj brunch was great

Stopped in for a drink before a wedding. That was all. Bartender was either hard of hearing (thinking this was the case), or extremely rude. She was still somewhat rude to start with, not very friendly or welcoming.
Menu looked promising, and other people seemed to be enjoying the food okay. If I’m in the area again, I’d stop in and try it out, but I hope I get a different server. At least the drink list was fairly broad and enticing.

My experience at Buckley’s today was less than mediocre. Not only was the service slow, but our waitress had an attitude. To make matters worse, we found not one but two hairs in our Mac and cheese appetizer. We identified the problem with the manager who addressed the issue by taking it off the check. I ordered the turkey panini which I did not finish because it tasted like bad turkey lunch meat on bread. I could have made a better sandwich at home. Finally, my friend ordered the crab cake sandwich which was just as average. The meat was not lumped and there was little sign of real crab meat. Overall, I will not be returning to Buckley’s tavern.

Been to the tavern many times and always enjoyed the food and beer selections but never really the service. Slow, in attentive and bothered seemed to be there status quo.
Today was different, my server was pleasant, very attentive and aimed to please.
My son and I stopped in for brunch (11−30−14) and I gotta tell ya… Delicious. Started with the sweet breads, and I’m not talking about thymus gland, house prepared muffins, doughnut and scone. OJ was fresh squeezed (seemed to be). My spinach & fontina omelette was perfect, Joeys ham and cheddar omelette was also spot on. Both plates came with diced potatoes with caramelized shallots and a communal plate of sausage, baby scrapple, bacon and ham… Really good!
Plates were almost licked clean. We finished with dessert… Mint chocolate chip ice cream sandwich and an apple and vanilla ice cream dumpling. I think The pajama brunch is a bit long in the tooth but it works for them.
$ 50 for the two of us plus tip. I’ve spent more on eggs at other places but I would do it again here. Good job staff!

Typically a reliably good restaurant, it was a disappointment today.
Although the service and food (at the time) was superb and much appreciated, I was violently ill about 30 minutes post meal and having had food poisoning enough to be intimately familiar with the symptoms, I’m confident it was the Thai soup.
Nothing is more disappointing than a good meal resulting in food poisoning :-(
They curry chicken salad was a little dry and underwhelming, but I barely touched it since the bowl of soup was a meal in itself.
I will probably be back since this was a first in many years of dining here, but I won’t order the Thai soup again, which I have had before without issue.
I’ve had better meals here, but the service was superior today.

It wasn’t bad. But food was mediocre and service was not great. Atmosphere was very cozy.
Mushroom soup was not what I expected It was chopped mushrooms in salty broth. Pizza came out burnt. Burger was good as were wings.

This place was incredible! Morgan our server was so great, the food was perfect and the atmosphere was perfect. We got all appetizers the first time and then the Buckley burger, chicken pot pie, mac and cheese the second time. With just coming in town for the weekend we found the best place to come relax and get some great food! Don’t pass this place up! !!