Laddie Lake Pub

Being the glutton for punishment that I am I went back. Originally for just a few drinks with a friend however after a good conversation at the bar we decided to get some appetizers as they were on special. While the first couple were passable the last one was their Hercules Bites of which I was informed by the bartender that they were not steak but prime rib bites. They were microwaved. Microwaved beef has an unmistakable taste. Granted I may have brought some of this on myself by ordering at last call for the kitchen but this is still no excuse for the punishment that was inflicted upon me. They just should have said they out of them. It’s literally one of the worst things I have ever eaten. The only reason I took a bite of the second one was that I couldn’t believe how bad the first one was. My friend wisely declined. There is no excuse for microwaving meat in a restaurant kitchen. Real restaurant kitchens don’t even have a microwave. I wouldn’t eat here again for free.

I recently wondered when I would encounter my first one star restaurant. Whoa boy… I’ve found it here. This place used to be known as Nicklows. I had dined here when it was still Nicklows, and had a great meal. This was years ago. We were passing through on our way home, and I remembered the cozy looking patio overlooking the water, so we decided to stop in. Where do I start with this place…
I used the restroom immediately, and noticed a dried booger smeared on the wall just above the urinal. Hindsight, run for the car.
My wife and I sat on the patio, which seemed cozy at first, until you started noticing how unkept it was. The place was fairly empty, but near half the patio tables were full of dirty dishes. The patio rail had far too much bird poop on it for my taste. I understand that birds poop, and we chose to dine outdoors, but clean it up from time to time for God’s sake, you are serving food here. There was this strange dirty concrete patio area on ground level, just below the dining patio (see pic). It was almost as if someone lived below the restaurant. It had plenty of cigarette butts thrown about.
We ordered water to drink, my wife’s with a lemon. My wife’s water came with no lemon, and in a not so clean glass.
We ordered our food. Our salads came first. They were just below average. The lettuce was moderately wilted and mildly brown on the edges.
The chicken wings were over cooked, and the wings and dummies were not separated well; there were cracked and jagged bones in them. No extra napkins came with the wings, no plates to eat them on other than the serving dish. The wings were fairly spicy. I was out of water after 2 wings. The waitress passed by once or twice, but never noticed my empty glass.
There was a long wait before our meals came. Salad plates, wing plate, and now both of our empty drink glasses sat at our table until the food came.
When our food came, we had our empty water glasses slid right to the edge of the table, begging to be refilled. Our food was dropped off, and we were asked if we needed anything else. We asked for water and napkins. Our meals were finished before receiving either. Our entrees tasted okay. The plating was pretty boring. I am a firm believer in getting what you pay for, and this place did not back up their price with anything I saw.
This place was horrible, terrible, awful, dirty, gross, and the food was overpriced even if we had received good service. I was tempted to go back into the bathroom for a picture of the booger, but had had enough at this point.

The décor is beige on tan on brown, which is rather boring. It felt like sitting in a cardboard box — a very comfortable and climate-​controlled box, but it all just felt very blah, which also describes the food. The baked potato was mush and the walleye was tasteless. While the prices on the menu are pretty typical for the area, the fact that I was charged for each refill of my soft drink was really weird, not to mention really expensive since they don’t note anywhere that, unlike the vast majority of restaurants, there’s no free refills.

We were very sorry to learn that Jimmy is no longer there. We did not see Connie but were told he is still there. We did see Tony but he never did come over to talk to us. It’s just not the same~We had the Happy Hour food and it was great. We miss the former employees.

Stopped in for happy hour. Decent wine selection, but only 8 beers on tap, only 2 crafts. Alexei is a great bartender– very good service, very personable and efficient. Had the chicken kebabs and pita plate from the happy hour menu. Kebab were perfectly grilled and tasty; white rice that came with it was average. Pita plate was very good, fresh tasting hummus, with good spices. Will go back for lunch/​dinner to try full menu.

We went there for breakfast this Sunday. I ordered my eggs over easy, and they were sitting in a pool of raw whites. The hash browns were light yellow, no crunch or sear to them. The pancakes were good. My husband ordered a side of the corned beef hash. This was made with frozen hash browns tossed with lunch meat sliced corned beef. Again, no crunch, no sear. And since the quality of the pre-​frozen hash browns they use are not good (the same could be said about the lunch meat corned beef), this dish was a complete train wreck. My husband also ordered the country fried steak, and that was good. We won’t go back for breakfast, but we still plan on stopping in for dinner. I hope our experience is much better then.

First of all, the restaurant really looks good and not cluttered with lights, plants, etc.
It goes on down from there. We ordered the house wine and immediately sent it back for a more palatable and notable brand.
Sunfish was so enticing on the menu it had to be tried. It was cooked too long and kinda dry and didn’t meet expectations. We also ordered the Gyro plate that we used to get when it was Nicklows. This plate was meat only with a choice of potatoes. We ordered their cheesy hash browns, which used to come in it’s own cooked — for –you dish, but this was out of a casserole or large pan of mush. The old restaurant served a Gyro dinner with spanikopita (sp) and chicken for less money! This was pretty boring with a boring presentation. Another person in our party ordered a hamburger that was overcooked.
Hope they can improve over time.

I drive past this place every day so when I saw it had reopened, I checked them out online. I was happy to find out it was associated with the old Shorewood in Fridley because I had loved their Chicken in Phyllo and their cheesy hashbrowns. I bought a $ 40 Groupon and took my parents there today for what we thought would be a great meal. Unfortunately, that’s not what happened. We waited quite awhile before a waitress came by. She finally did and apologized for the delay. Her reason for the delay didn’t make much sense, but she apologized and that was all that mattered. We all ordered the Chicken in Phyllo. After a fairly short wait, we received our salads/​soup, which were quite good.
Not long after that, a man at another table got up and made a scene about his little boy’s chicken which was raw. He was understandably upset and told the manager if his boy got sick, they’d definitely be hearing from them. Next thing you know, our waitress came back to our table and informed us that they were completely out of the chicken we had ordered. Really? Not buying it. If you have a problem with the chicken that you’re serving, just be honest about it – don’t lie and tell us you’re suddenly out of it. We’re not stupid; we saw what just happened. And you weren’t out of it 10 minutes earlier when you put our order in.
We reluctantly changed our orders. My dad got the fish & chips and my mom and I got the steaks (medium), which were $ 12 more than the chicken we had wanted. We didn’t want something that expensive but nothing else looked appealing to us. When we got our food, I found out immediately that the cheesy hashbrowns I had loved at the Shorewood were NOT what they were serving here. These were simply okay, nothing special. When my mom and I cut into our steaks, they were raw. After sending them back to the kitchen, we watched my dad eat his fish, which he said wasn’t very good. When we finally got our steaks back, they looked nothing like the steaks we originally had. They were obviously new steaks but they were all cut into random pieces — weird! They were charred on the outside (yuck) but they were finally medium inside. At this point, I was pretty grossed out and unhappy about the whole meal. I had high hopes for this place but nothing was going right.
We were more than a little surprised when the bill came and we received no discount other than the $ 40 Groupon. They knew we were not happy with our dining experience but offered nothing more than a few «I’m sorry’s». We didn’t get to order what we wanted, when we did order something else it was raw, and when that food was recooked, it still wasn’t good… and we waited way too long for all of it. But apparently that’s the kind of service they offer and they see no problem with it. We ended up paying $ 35 (even after the $ 40 Groupon) for crap food and lousy service. Unacceptable. We will NOT be back. There are a lot of restaurants out there that are actually good — Laddie Lake Pub is not one of them.

Where is Gordon Ramsay when you need him? This place obviously does. From the eyelash (with mascara) in my wife’s salad to waiting for over 40 minutes for a simple order of 2 Gyro sandwiches, this place is nothing to rave about. This is midday Sunday at about ½ occupancy.
Very disappointing. At the time of this posting we have been seated 45 minutes and still do not have our food. The eyelash in the salad was met with a indifferent response and a tepid bowl of bland chili. We are leaving without dining

My wife and I ate there for an early Valentine’s Day dinner on Thursday. The food, service and noise level were all exceptional. The Nicklow family is a big part of the restaurant and it shows.

It is the perfect setting for an evening drink and meal in Spring Lake. It has great food with a variety of drinks. I generally go there to hangout with my friends, and must say, it has grown on me. I like going there often (twice or thrice) a week. I would recommend this place to everyone! You can go to the place to get dinner with your family too.
I highly recommend it! :)