Traverse City has many wonderful places to eat. We've tried almost every restaurant in town and have had good experiences at most of them. But we've hit a stretch of bad luck going back to mid-June before our trip to Paris and Greece. Oh, the vicissitudes of life and eating out in a resort town.
We play volleyball on Wednesday night, and before or after the game, we hit the town to either get our pre-game energy or drown our sorrows with a beverage or two. (My shoulder injury isn't helping our cause this year.) It was the latter case when we visited The Workshop. It is under new ownership, and I'm happy with the changes in the drink menu. They have their old favorites and some excellent new ones. And the annoying window dressings from before are gone, a big plus.
We happily got a seat outside to enjoy the view of the bay before it disappears as the Marriot Tribute (or whatever the final name will be) gets nearer to completion. Drinks in hand and food ordered, we sat down with our buzzer to wait. And wait we did. For a buzzer that never buzzed. After who knows how long I checked the food desk, and he had never got the order. We got fast-tracked for our food order with a consolation quesadilla to make me feel better. The food was good, and I would eat their again, though with the lesson learned that I need to check in with the desk after 15 minutes to make
Next up was North Peak, a semi-regular after-volleyball spot. This one is nice because it also offers outdoor seating, and you have to take advantage of that during the few months where eating outside is actually pleasant. And it's got quite a gluten-free menu if that is needed by your party. But again, service let us down. We were told to city anywhere clean, and we did, and it was between 10 and 15 minutes before a server paid any attention to us. It's not like we were hidden in a corner. The server who came to be ours passed us several times. Perhaps a mix-up, I don't know. Food was good, beer was the usual at North Peak - OK.
Finally, and this is from just this week, Tacos and Tequila. A newcomer on Front Street, taking over from the recent departure of California Pizza. In fact, the restaurant still has a heavily California look. Again, we sat outside at one of the three tables overlooking beautiful West Front Street with views across the pavement of the Record Eagle offices.
Perhaps it's because we sat outside, but service was truly awful. Our server was new, and English wasn't his specialty, but we rarely saw the guy and you don't need great English to show up at the table. No drink order for 15 minutes, food was slow, and in the end, the food wasn't that great. Take any chain Mexican restaurant and you can imagine what the food at T&T tastes like. If that's your thing, you have found a new place. Or you could go to Margarita's or Frida's and get the same thing. It wasn't bad, and the portion size of my burrito was good (no so much with the Nachos Supremos), but when you have to compete with Loco Boys, Mama Lu's and Barrio all less than a mile away, you need to up your game.
And the margaritas are better at those other places, too. The pitcher we got was some weird color that was reminiscent of some dye color that probably should be banned for health reasons. Not the best flavor either.
At the end of our meal, we had to go inside to pay the bill because we hadn't seen our server in about 30 minutes. Not a great experience, and we have no desire to return. My high hopes were smashed by mediocrity.
But we'll be back around Front Street next week to hit some old favorites, and hopefully our bad run ends then.