Hoppers

Reviews 4

JA

James Zaksek

This will be a fairly honest review. I will break it down on how my experience was in terms of the staff, food, and beer categories. First of all, the staff was mediocre at best. I couldnt believe that after telling the hostess I was sitting at the bar, it took the bartender over ten minutes to notice me. After I was finally approached, I asked her what sort of beers they had, she kind of just pointed at the list calling me hon and such being friendly; however, she didnt really seem to know what to recommend. As I was sitting there, I noticed she was talking a lot to another staff member who was obviously off shift, but she was paying no attention to the other patrons at all. I considered it very rude as I noticed there was a gentleman that wanted to leave, yet this bartender was being inconsiderate and wanted to talk to her friend instead. She also screwed up pouring a whole pitcher of the stout beer they had and I noticed she threw out a lot of good beer, showing her inexperience in pouring taps. When I was finally approached again, I asked for a menu which I thought would be offered to me immediately, but it was not. She was really friendly and I gave her the amount of tip I would give normally, however, she needs to really work on her bar tending and service skills if she wants to be successful. She also very loudly exclaimed that it was almost closing time and cheered saying, "Im sorry, Im not kicking you out yet." Not very considerate. 2/5 The food was super disappointing. I wasnt feeling very hungry so I grabbed the deal of the soup and salad. The soup of the day was Minestrone and I ordered a Caesar salad. The soup was awful and this is mainly part of the reason the score is so low. It was lukewarm at best and had nothing special about it. The ceaesar salad was great and had artichokes and noodles in it, which was very inventive I thought. The caesar was the only great thing about my entire experience. 1/5 The beers. Oh. When I go into a brewery, I want to be dazzled and filled with wonder at some beers I have never tried before. Honestly, they werent that way. I had the Pilsner, which was okay. It was decent and it tasted all right, however, I feel they were having issues with keeping the beer cold so that was one reason I didnt like it. After I finished that, I ordered the Honey Wheat, which...for me, wheat beers are perfect for the summer season. This one was not the case. The after taste was so bad, it had me feel like I was drinking the popcorn jelly bean flavor. Absolutely no honey and no taste of wheat at all. Very disappointing. 2/5 Overall: I probably wont go back. I thought it would be a great experience in a new city that Ive never been to and I was very disappointed. It was real unfortunate seeing as how crowded it was on a Sunday. Oh well.

MI

Mike Price

Let me start by saying that Im not a big french fry guy... but I do appreciate some good garlic fries. Out of curiosity on my trip to Hoppers this week I asked if they had garlic fries to go with my Reuben, which they gratefully did. What got set in front of me was a pile of extra crispy fries (could have held their own by themself), covered in melted cheese (white cheese, maybe parmesan and mozzarella?), some parsley or other green topping I didnt pay attention to, and about 6-7 cloves of roasted garlic that were loosely chopped into maybe thirds. As a garlic lover, it was a little mountain of heaven. I think I had one cheesy bite with a whole clove and a half of perfectly roasted garlic. Hands down the best garlic fries I have ever had. My sandwich was fantastic, but was admittedly set to the side while being overshadowed by the amazing garlic fries I couldnt get my face out of. The service was actually pretty solid. Our waitress did a fantastic job in every category I keep a mental checklist of. She seemed a bit too friendly (fake friendly?) for my tastes, but she was great at her job and our table was well cared for. All that said, 5-8 years ago Hoppers was one of our favorites. We frequented it weekly, and recommended it to everyone. Over that last several years, though, we really had some struggles here. Service was slipping, and the food was really off its mark consistently for a long time. This was our first trip back in a while, and man, everything was spot on. Dont know if they did some housecleaning in management and revised their menu, but they are back toward the top of my list again. Excited to get back and try those fries again.

CH

Chad Larkin

Concession: We had a large party (8), with 4 kids and I annoyingly eat vegan. A wednesday night. Short wait, not bad. Bread and butter was great. Their nitro stout was great too. Drinks came and we were missing a straw, so we requested one, it took forever to get one and had to ask multiple times. Kinda long wait on food, but not the worst. Food came, a kids pizza came as pepperoni instead of the ordered plain cheese. They took it back to make another. It apparently fell on floor after coming out of oven, so took twice as long to make. Everyone had food except 1 hungry child. Also, one person never got their bowl of soup until all the food came out and we had to ask for it again. Requested ketchup for chicken fingers, which again took forever to get, and was nearly empty when we got it, and chicken was cold by then. Had to steal another bottle from a neighboring unbussed table. My "steamed asparagus, no salt, no oil" came out glistening in oil, obviously sauteed. My veggie burger and another sandwich were missing the ordered mushrooms, onions and peppers (which are menu add-ons). Once I got them and assembled my V burger, it was delicious. Manager apologized and did reduce some cost of bill. Half of our party comes here weekly and never had issues like this. Maybe they were just having a bad night. To top off this mess, the sprinklers were on when we left between front door and parking lot, getting us wet.

A

A Private User

Hoppers has been a mainstay of the Fort Union restaurant scene for many years. The food is okay, not great but okay (Hoppers is a pub, not haute cuisine). But consistently the service is awful. I do not know if it is because my wife and I are in our mid-fifties and therefore generally older than the waitstaff and most other clients. On Tuesday (4/21) we were there for nearly 2 hours to just have a quick dinner. Our first round of beer came in a prompt enough manner, but at that point they must have turned on some sort of invisibility curtain on us, because we did not get any service or attention for 35 minutes. Thats a long time to eat bread. The order was placed, took another half-hour to arrive. We then order two more beers, and were done with our meals before these showed up. The really sad part is, this is exactly the same type of service we had last time we were there some months ago, and some months before THAT. So this was not a one-time deal. Again, nothing wrong with the food, the beer is excellent, but only go if you have LOTS of time to waste.