River Rat Restaurant

First time here. Staff were very attentive and nice. You don't see that level of kindness often these days. The food was ok to solid. The prices don't make sense though. If you want a sandwich and fries that's an extra 7 bucks for fries and coleslaw. I never eat the coleslaw anywhere. So 7 bucks for a side of fries. Potatoes are cheap so what's going on? Another restaurant tried to charge me 8 bucks for a baked potato yesterday, but mashed for no extra charge. I'm seriously irritated with this potato price issue. Anyway. So a sandwich meal would be over 22 bucks. A full dinner with salad and 2 sides for about the same. The decor is ok. Seating is comfortable. Not sure why it was constructed the way it was. Odd layout. The chicken on the pasta was boring, but the chicken was prepared well in the parm. Use that preparation for the pasta dishes. Cut back on salt too. Salad was very fresh.

All the food was great, loved the cheeseburger pizza, got a lot of food for a good price. Will definitely go back. The place was nice and clean too and updated.

This was our first time visiting the River Rat. Decent Reviews and close to home. The parking lot was full when we arrived, usually a good sign. We were promptly seated in the dining room. The bar seemed to be playing music for a younger crowd that can be heard in the dining room. The restaurant appeared clean and we thought we may have found a good place to go for dinner. The waitress was very attentive and made suggestions for us. Unfortunately, the glass of wine fell off her tray and sprayed my mother and my purse. My mothers white shirt and white undershirt were destroyed. The undershirt and the shirt in price were higher end items. Not only did it hit her shirts, it also hit her white north face coat on the chair. My purse was the least of the worry. We were served dinner and another glass of wine to replace the one spilled. Still shocked how one glass of wine could destroy so much. I will say this again... The waitress was GREAT. Accidents happen. However what happened next is what I want all of you to read and take in. The owner of this establishment has no customer service and is doing illegal practices in this business. We were shocked the whole night, we saw no manager presence in the dinning room or bar. During rush, no one was around. I stopped a busser and asked if I could speak with a manager. I saw some side talking with staff going on, and the waitress next to my waitress section approached us. She said "Are you the table asking for a manager?" As if she could not tell with all the wine all over my Mother's clothes. we of course said yes. I asked her again if she was the manager, she said yes, her boss was on the phone because he had lost his work partner. They have to call him to come up there for issues.... ??????? SO FINALLY this BOSS arrives at my table non-schalantly, non concerned, etc. Didn't even ask how was your dinner tonight which I feel is the first thing you ask when approaching a table with a problem. He listened to what we had said regarding the clothing being ruined and how great our waitress had been. He said "Well she is going to have to pay for this meal" I stopped him to clarify and he said "You want a white shirt I'll buy you one pick it up tomorrow." No size, no who made it, on top of being a terrible manager. DO NOT GIVE YOUR MONEY TO THIS PLACE, THEY TREAT THEIR STAFF TERRIBLE AND ARE AN ILLEGAL PRACTICES COMPANY. The waitress should sue him. Sad story for a place that has real potential. Also makes you wonde4r how fresh is this food really if it is ran by people like this.

River Rat Has been an institution in Harrison Township for decades, with good reason. Do you know what you're going to get when you come here. The drinks are large, reasonably priced, and strong. The food portions are substantial, and there are a number of solid offerings. The coleslaw is good if you like the creamy type. But, after my wife said she wanted fries with her meal, the waitress assumed I wanted the same thing. It's a $6 up charge for coleslaw and fries. It would've been nice if she would've asked, and told us how much it cost.Having said that, the fries are crispy and tasty. And, there are plenty of them to share. If you have two people getting sandwiches, you really only need one up charge. We decide to get a lemon rice soup, which was good. May 24 ounce beer was only $8, and it was a high quality beer (from Bell's). The Moscow Mule was good, too. The chicken sandwich was nicely grilled, but it was on just a plain bun. One stand out was the River Rat Dipper, a perfectly executed French dip. There's a massive amount of meat. The French roll with a hard crust is just right for taste and sturdiness: it stands up to all warm, the salty jus you want to dunk it in. Soak it up! Not surprisingly, prices are a bit higher than they were 2 years ago. The food I described cost us $80 before tip. It's a solid dining experience, and there's nothing wrong with that. But, at that price, I have to think about going to eat here again.

Went with friends last night, sat in the dining area and we all had a nice time. We liked our waitress and the food was really good. The house salad is a very nice size. What we had for dinner: Walleye, perch and seafood fettuccini. The Greek salad is large and filling and they don't use pickled beets, which is a plus for me!

The name of the restaurant is very deceiving and uninviting to me, however, this is such an amazing restaurant and is ALWAYS busy. It's also very clean and the staff is exceptional anytime I've ever been here. This past visit I got the fettuccine Alfredo and we split the appetizer calamari. The fettuccine Alfredo was seriously so creamy and the portion was huge - I had left overs for days. The calamari *chefs kiss* is literally amazing, it's in this cream sauce that is literally to die for. Other people in our group got: crab cakes, pizza, ribeye and ribs and everyone was so satisfied and impressed with the food! Way to go, River Rat!

We stopped for a drink after having dinner nearby. We sat at the bar and enjoyed the live music. The bartender was excellent. We will be back to try the menu.

Tired of the chain restaurant so decided to try something different. I was pleasantly surprised. The food and the service was great. What a hidden gem. We has fish and chips, walleye, and the Michigan salad. Next time we'll take pictures.

We ordered carryout for my husband's birthday. We ordered a fish and chips dinner and a walleye dinner; each comes with 2 sides - we ordered fries and coleslaw, and santa anna potatoes and clam chowder (on the phone I was told that was ok if I paid the difference, which was $1 more than soup of the day). When I got there the area by the door was packed with a group saying they were waiting to be seated. It was very loud, with blaring old 1950s "surf" music. I waded through and found an employee, and asked where to go to pickup a carryout order. She didn't know, and said ask another employee. I asked another, and she pointed at the host station, said, "ask her". No one was there, but when someone came up I asked, and she said she'd go see if my order was ready. The total was over $40. Actuallly, it was $47, which means they charged the full price for the clam chowder that replaced another side, which the person taking the order said it was $1 more, and also we didn't get that side that was replaced. But it gets worse from here.At the car, my husband said he wanted to try the fries before we left. Bad move. They were rubberized cardboard-texture pieces of oversalted brown things that, if you could chew them, tasted like they were cooked in old oil several times and then microwaved into hardness. We didn't even think to go back and ask for a replacement - they were that ridiculously horrid: why would we want more of bad? So we left, hoping the fish and coleslaw would be edible. At home we unpacked the bag. The coleslaw was also inedible - because there wasn't any. Since each meal was supposed to come with 2 sides, we should have had 4 sides, and also, we had paid for FIVE sides because they charged full price for the chowder she said I could pay the $1 extra for instead of soup of the day. In reality, we paid for five sides, and got 2 sides that were edible: the clamless "clam chowder" (a potato soup, with maybe clam juice in it?) that was tasty but not clam chowder, and the overly salty santa ana potatoes, which were just four thin slices of potato cooked with a thin layer of Parm on top. The Walleye was good and cooked just right. Good thin dusting of crumbs, fried but not greasy: good job. So we each had a bit of that. Whoever cooked that walleye should be given a promotion for doing the one thing that was right out of that kitchen. The cod had suffered, though, by being put in a very thick coating of heavy dough, and fried until it was so crunchy it was hard to eat. The fish had disappeared in that hard flavorless coating. These were very strange small slices of cod hiding in that dough. I did call and speak with the manager. I wanted her to know what was going on in that kitchen. She offered to replace the fries, and provide the missing coleslaw, but my husband and I had already decided we'd never be back, and couldn't imagine what they'd do differently. This was like food from an outback diner where they see 3 customers a week and reheat old food they stashed in the freezer. No, we didn't want to see what they could do to coleslaw, and wouldn't touch their version of fries even though we'd already paid for both and didn't get either coleslaw or edible fries. The only upside is that the RIver Rat food was, overall, so bad that neither of us ate much, so we broke into the cherry pie I made this morning with fresh-made icecream. And that made up for the awful experience at RIver Rat. Wish we'd just forgot about ordering out in the first place, and and stuck with dessert for dinner.

Food and service went downhill. My wife and I used to love this place, we won't be back. Our waitress looked and acted annoyed towards us, my wife's food tasted like they dumped a pound of salt on it, and she never came back to check on us. I'm still waiting for the beer I ordered. No bueno...stay away!!