Palmer River Clam Shack & Dairy

We recently stopped here to check this place out. We had a fish and chip platter + a whole clam platter. The fish was ok with a huge amount of soft, greasy, tasteless fries. There were maybe 10 or 12 clams tops on another greasy, soft pile of fries. The clams were either overcooked, or cooked in dirty oil… probably both! Want good fish + chips? Go to Walt’s Roast Beef in E.Providence. The fish + chips there are bigger, better, WAY less money, and… you don’t have to fight flies to eat them! Really… light years better fish, this place should be embarrassed. Want really good seafood? Drive to Kimball’s in Lancaster MA and see what seafood is supposed to taste like. These owners should be embarrassed. Sure, go and enjoy their food, and I hope and pray you have as many arms and hands as that Indian Goddess Durga, cuz’ you are going to need WAY more than 2 hands to swat the flies away. I would give this place no stars, but I kind of liked the crushed shell parking lot and they had a lot of HP parking spaces! Do you see how some reviews are really high and talk about how delicious everything is? No place is 4 or 5 stars once in a while and then really bad, those are either fake reviews, or people who never had seafood before… EVER!!! Not recommended…

A very great food experience and atmosphere. Ordering was a breeze and the nice young lady at the counter answered all our questions.
We ordered small lobster rolls, small scallop roll, hot pepper calamari, spicy stuffies, and lobster bisque.
Of all the items, the stuffie was not spectacular but it tasted good. The rolls were great, and the calamari was in garlic butter — and with the peppers — dynamite. All fresh seafood!
The lobster bisque was an excellent focus on light cream, sherry and fresh lobster meat.
If in the area, stop by for a relaxing and great food experience.

I’m not sure why but the quality of the clam cakes here has gone downhill fast. They used to be smaller and had plenty of clams for such small clam cakes. Now the clam cakes are significantly bigger but it seems like they just added a lot more batter and there aren’t many clams per cake. I was very disappointed. Their clam chowder is still great and the clam strips were great! The stuffies are not very good… I was very dissatisfied with my visit today…

The place is visually appealing and extremely clean. I have been here several times and have enjoyed the clam chowder. The white and clear chowder were both very good, thin, but had good flavor and plenty of clams. The clam cakes were delicious with a strong clam flavor and a reasonable amount of clam pieces. Unfortunately the fried scallops and fried clams were terrible. Both were soggy and very bland. I also sampled a spicy stuffed quahog which was tastless. Other than the chowder and clam cakes I was extremely disappointed with this clam shack. There are so many others that are so much better that I can’t recommend this place.

Very good. I had my first clam cakes here. Wasn’t what I expected, but they were delicious. Also got clam chowder. I’m super picky with clam chowder and can say this places passes the test. Nice little seating area. And they are very busy. A little slow putting out the foof. But that’s my only complaint.

I have nothing bad to say about my visit here tonight. The ordering process is clearly displayed. At the order window, the most polite young lady took our order. She was a breath of fresh air from what I typically run into in food service. We were given an adorable shell with our pickup number. There was ample seating by the order windows and plenty more tables under a canopy tent in the rear by the river. The entire establishment was clean and decorated quaintly. There were colorful Adirondack chairs by the river to enjoy the view while you ate, or just to relax. A patron was there with her own bottle of wine which she told me she was ok’d to bring by one of the owners. Food arrived timely and was cooked to perfection. What was odd was that the air smelled fresh, unlike some clam shacks I’ve dined at. All around, great experience.

I found it over priced, greasy, my clam cake didn’t have clams and my whole belly clams wee small. Find somewhere else.

Had Not been happy with the before, but I thought i’d give them 1 more try. I stopped for lunch. wanted a cup of chowder, a few clam cakes and stuffie. they have that for 2 but not for one. she suggested I order for 2 and save it for tomorrow. they not flexible.. she did not know how many clam cakes in a half order… went to Amaral ’ s in Warren and got what I wanted.

They have the best tasting lobster rolls around hands down! Their lobster is so fresh! Their clam cakes I thought were delicious though on the smaller side had plenty of clam pieces. I also got the red chowder this was the one part that wasn’t as good. I thought it needed some more flavor. The prices are also a bit high too. The service I thought was good. The owners came out and chatted with everyone asking how food was. They brought out a chair for baby’s seat too! All in all great experience. We will be back.

HORRRRRRRRIBLLLE! The worst place I have ever been to. A HUGE ripoff and the ignorant chick who claims to be the owner needs to learn how to treat customers before someone gives her the smack across her face that she deserves. HOW RUDE!!! I was thrilled when I heard that this place burned down. They should have taken the hint and stayed closed. THESE PEOPLE ARE REPULSIVE AND THE FOOD IS DISGUSTING. Go somewhere else, anywhere else but here!!!

Had an awesome meal here!!!
Garlic butter calamari with sliced spicy peppers was amazing! The calamari was tender and breading was crispy! The scallops were cooked perfectly & was soft as butter! the full belly clams were also cooked perfectly! the fries were hot and crispy! the house-​made tartar sauce was great! The staff was helpful and accommodating! the owner came out and talked us and asked how everything was! She even gave us a free sample of the Clam boil stew & NE clam chowder! which were both great! We will definitely be back!

Stopped buy here on Saturday, they had reopened the day before and we’re very busy! Our ticket was taking a especially long time my wife asked about it, turned out they had lost our ticket! When they found out they were very apologetic! They brought out for us some watermelon and clam cakes on the house while we waited! The clam cakes there are a bit different then most and are excellent! They had the order out to us in a couple minutes. they brought it out back to the picnic table we were sitting. Really mistakes happen it’s how you make up for those mistakes that says how good your service is, and they did a great job! The seafood was great we ordered a seafood platter and it was smaller then most seafood platters in the area, however it was also a lot cheaper so over all the value was good! We will be back! This place is worth the stop just so you can try the clam cake! It’s smaller and lighter then most in the area like bite sized I really enjoyed them!!!

UPDATE: Food is still awful. Highly recommend saving your money and going someplace else. Everything is cold, soggy and tastless… If your lucky enough for it to be that good. The service is also extremely slow. If the food is cold and soggy it means it was ready a while ago, why wasn’t it served hot? Finally the fish is not fesh. Are you kidding? Do you know how easy it is to get fresh fish in this area? That’s just lazy and embarrassing.
ALSO, my first review was very similar (1 star). A few weeks later the owner of the clam shack makes a Unilocal account and sends me an incredibly rude and aggressive message saying I know nothing about their business and I am a terrible person (will post screenshot) NOT ONLY IS THEIR FOOD AWFUL, THEIR SERVICE AND ATTITUDE TOWARD THEIR CUSTOMERS IS DISGUSTING! All she needed to do was apologize for my bad experience and invite me to come back so they can change my mind. But instead… well you can see for yourself.
My advice: Avoid at all costs!

Well I hade high hopes. My wife and I each had a white chowder and we split an order of clam cakes. Like everyone has realized the chowder is subpar. It has a very watery consistency, it’s more of soup than a chowder and it was extremely bland. I had to salt and pepper the hell of it.
The clam cakes were also very bland. and barely had any clams in them at all. I literally took the last three apart with my bare hands and found 2 total pieces of clams in them, meaning one didn’t even have any clams in it at all.
With Blount, Kent’s and Chad’s Chowder House all in the area being superior and cheaper, this place needs to step up their game.
I’ll give them another try in a few months hopefully they improve

Excellent lobster bisque ! Alot of lobster pieces. The Red clam chowder is not red at all and the clam cakes are fluffy and light like a dough boy, but not a lot of clams.

My boyfriend and I were randomly driving down Fall River Ave and saw the jam packed parking lot at Palmer River Clam Shack, he whipped around so we could try it, «this place has gotta be good!»
It didn’t disappoint. For one, the atmostphere was great. Right on the river, colorful Adirondack chairs, and plenty of picnic tables under a big tent with Christmas-​style lights.
I ordered a small lobster roll, which they serve two ways, with mayo or with melted butter — I went with the melted butter. OH MY LANTA! It was out of this world. I was able to get it with watermelon instead of French fries, which was great. Cole slaw was also pretty good — I’m picky with that one.
Boyfriend ordered the Clams Casino — they were outstanding. We even took home an order to have for lunch the next day and they reheated great. He also ordered onion rings and said they were awesome.
My only gripe was with the clam chowder, which seems like a pretty common one. They serve it three ways, white (New England), red, and clear. We went with the white (never had the other two, ever), and neither of us was crazy about it. Thin broth, undercooked potatoes, not much clam — instead of offering THREE flavors, they should stick to one and perfect it.

I had dinner tonight outside in front of the building. I paid $ 27 for a three entrée combo, a small white chowder and a large soda. I did not like the chowder. It had separated. It wasn’t creamy, and although it had plenty of clams, it wasn’t flavorful at all. I ate half of it. The combo was fish, clam strips, and scallops for $ 20. The scallops were worth $ 20 by themselves. You’ll note in my pic that the plate is half scallops! The fish was soft. A tail, mostly the dark bloodline and skin. The clam strips were thick as French fries. Nice. I wish there were more! I got my food fresh from the kitchen and it was greasy and the batter was soft. My French fries were sitting in grease. I’m holding my belly with one hand a groanin’ while I’m typing with the other. Too much grease in one sitting!
The place is jammed with customers all day long. Half the building is also an ice cream parlor. It has all the buzz right now. My first outing wasn’t great. We’ll be back.

We had been waiting for a chance to try out this new clam shack. The new building and grounds look great and we had high hopes.
We finally made it there today and were quite disappointed. For a brand new building they should at least have a public restroom. They were not very busy but the food took quite some time to arrive. They apologized for the long wait and gave us an extra order of clamcakes for our trouble.
I had ordered the chowder and clam cakes. The chowder was barely warm. The clamcakes didn’t have a lot of flavor and were a bit spongy. My wife ordered the fish nuggets and fries. Her first nugget had a long hair fried into the batter. Un-​good! The fries were cold.
I understand they have only been open a couple of weeks, but this is not a good start. There are too many other quality options to choose from.

The food wasn’t horrible but it wasn’t great either. Tasteless clam cakes and really small. Fried shrimp and scallops were ok but you don’t get many. Large lobster roll with a little too much mayo but decent amount of meat. Roll was falling apart with no lettuce to kind of hold it together. We spent $ 50 and were basically being forced to inhale our food so they could shut down the place and stack the chairs. It was a little bizarre and while they said you could take your time, they really wanted you to get the f out.

For as great of a location as this place has their food is awful. Not even the nice scenery could salvage the meal we had.
As it was Thursday we tried the deal — 2 chowders, 2 stuffies, 2 clams casino and clam cakes. The best part of this meal was the oyster crackers. The chowder was obviously cooked to high and had separated (we both had the white). The“clam cakes” had no clams — well two of them had one piece each and one of them wasn’t even cooked all the way through. The stuffies were bland (we had the spicy ones). Actually everything was bland. Somebody needs to get those cooks some salt and pepper. The stuffies were also burned on the top. So gross. I hesitate to even call the other things clam casino. They were clams with this super greasy bread crumb stuff. It almost was like they flashed fried them.
I highly recommend taking them of the menu immediately– they really are that awful.
The whole belly clam platter again lacked seasoning and consisted of a bunch of clam crumbles a few actual whole bellies and fries. The fries were good.
We thought we would at least walk down to the water behind the building to salvage our terrible lunch — it is a nice backdrop. But we were greeted by a huge dead fish floating in the water.
Pretty much sums it up!