My experience at Jimmy Hays was really choppy and honestly not what I would expect from an…read moreupscale-casual steakhouse. This place came highly recommended by my friends, but after the experience I had, and as much as I wanted to give this place four or five stars, I cannot honestly say that this experience was a top tier one.
Let me first say that the food was SPECTACULAR - if I were to rate this experience on food alone, I would give five stars:
-Shrimp cocktail was jumbo and cocktail sauce was zesty - three bites per shrimp!
-Fried Zucchini was a unique wavy potato chip-style presentation where the breading was in perfect ratio to the zucchini.
-Duck was the star of the meal - generous portion, tender, flavorful, crispy skin with moist meat, Sweet potatoes, onions, and carrots cooked perfectly, raspberry sauce the perfect balance to the naturally salty duck.
-Porterhouse also cooked perfectly and sliced nicely for sharing, though the meat could have used a bit more seasoning but was otherwise excellent. Onion rings were crispy and light and needed no dipping sauce.
-Brussels Sprouts were delicious and roasted to perfection.
-Mashed Potatoes had a nice blend of cream, garlic, and seasoning, and had a nice buttery texture.
-Mac and Cheese was gooey, unctuous, and had solid flavor.
Unfortunately, that is where the compliments mostly end for this particular visit, because the guest experience brought this meal down from four or five stars to two stars total. What follows is NOT an intention to point fingers, but an honest list of areas where the team dropped the ball and could use this feedback constructively to be better in tune to the needs of their guests:
-When I arrived before my party, there were two individuals at the host stand - neither of them greeted me, asked me if I had a reservation, or how many were in my party.
-There is no ambient music in the entire venue - something about a steakhouse makes me think of nice relaxing music in the background where you know it's there but you can still have a conversation with your fellow guests (or bartender).
-While waiting for the rest of my party, I watched a guest be served a steak without a steak knife - the guest had to ask for one. Huge service issue for any steakhouse.
-When our party was sat in the dining room, we were sat without dinner menus. We had to wait over five minutes for menus to be brought to us and for our server to introduce himself.
-We had to wait another 15 minutes before we saw him again, heard about the specials, and our orders were taken.-We had to wait 25 minutes from the moment we sat down before a breadbasket was brought to us - in it, one of the four rolls was stale and unable to be cut in half.
-Our appetizers came out extremely quickly, one minute after bread (six minutes after our orders were taken), so at least this was a nice change of pace in the service. But they came so quickly that they beat our server to the table, and were sitting on the serving tray adjacent to us for three minutes before he came back to serve us or have a backwaiter present the dishes to us so we could serve ourselves.
-A member of my party ordered a soda - it took over 10 minutes for the soda to reach the table.
-Our entrees arrived at the table before our table was marked for the next course - we had no plates and no steak knives. The food was then taken back out of the room, and several minutes later, we received our plates and steak knives before the food returned; also, after appetizers were finished but before the food arrived, the table was cleared of app plates, app knives, bread plates, and bread knives - one of the members of my party had his fork taken away and not replaced - he did not receive a replacement until after the entrees were served and after he asked our server for a new fork; this was the second time in an hour I saw a guest not have the utensils needed in order to eat a steak dinner.
-No managers came around to touch tables and check in on guests - not just our table, but every table in our dining room during the two hours we were present. We did see someone who might have resembled a manager who was at the host stand as we were leaving.
The server himself was affable, this is not a knock on him alone as a server - He clearly made eyes at the support staff when things were not going right. But overall the service and guest experience missed the mark completely on this meal, and the overall experience was saved by amazing food.
This steakhouse has lots of history on Long Island yet is set in their ways in certain aspects of how they present themselves and what type of clientele for whom they are marketing themselves. I also know that the Long Island market is a challenging one when trying to exceed the needs of guests. Having said that, this place has some areas of improvement which are very easily attained if attention to detail in guest experience and service are adhered to.