I've seen positive reviews for Secret Seafood, so I know it must be popular with some diners, but after our dinner last night I doubt we'll return.
Unfortunately there was light rain and heavy clouds when we arrived at 6:30, so no pretty sunset or tables by the railing overlooking the water. All the tables were occupied, so guests were all grouped under their metal overhang and rain curtains were down by some tables. There were several large tables of 10 and 14, so the noise level was terrible, despite the open setting. The noise was amplified by the metal roof and the large number of people, so it was very unpleasant. I'm guessing that echoing noise would bother me even if there were fewer guests. Some places just don't have good acoustics, although that's not usually an issue with open air places.
Ziggy and his servers were working hard and very personable, but they just weren't keeping up with the full restaurant. Don't know if a server hadn't shown up or they just underestimated how many they needed for that size crowd. We were a group of 4, so waited a long time for 2 glasses of wine, then longer for our large bottle of water (with 3 glasses) and a frozen drink. Despite asking twice, we never were able to get a 4th glass to share the water. No ketchup for fries when our food was served, and no one stopped by to check if our meals were ok, so we finally walked to an adjacent table that was done eating and borrowed theirs.
The food was the biggest issue. Two meals of shrimp creole were good and the appetizer platter ordered as a meal was OK...but didn't match at all a photo that showed some cold cooked seafood, like shrimp cocktail. The waitress did warn that it was all cooked food, but just odd to have a photo so far from the reality. And the final straw--our diner who had grilled mahi-mahi ended up with food poisoning. She's run restaurants and cooked in fine dining so suspected it was undercooked but thought the issue might be that odd firm texture that can occasionally run through a piece of fish. Our meal had already dragged on, and she didn't want to try to wave down one of the over-stretched servers to get it replaced. Unfortunately, she felt the negative impact of that decision when she got sick about midnight.
Too many good restaurants on the island that I'd rather enjoy.
My husband and I had enjoyed our experience there two years ago and recommended it to our friends who were going a month later. Our two friends were treated HORRIBLY and left before even being served. So, we are likely not going there again either. When we were there, there was 2 other tables in the restaurant with people and the service was really slow even then.
We went last year and it was the worst lobster I've ever had. We stopped in again this year but only for a cocktail and there were no other people in the place although it was around 5PM. Don't think we're going back next year like someone else stated, there are too many other good restaurants on the island.
That’s weird guys, we went there twice in the past two weeks and the food was awesome! As for service, I think every single restaurant owner that we talked to said the same thing- it’s near impossible to find a good servers! Most of the great servers used to come from France for the season but not any longer. Locals are not very keen on working hard, or working at all…. Handouts by the government demoralized people…
The good news of that they were busy the bad news is they were too busy to handle it and the food was not up to their standards. Staff is very hard to get chefs change every night in the restaurant business can be different Than the last. Miserable business, I wouldn’t want to be in it! But they generally have good reviews.
I don't expect every restaurant to be perfect every night, but I just don't want to waste one of my evenings on the island when there are so many better choices. Tonight's dinner was at Izi. All our meals were wonderful, service was friendly and attentive, the new owner is gracious and welcoming—and the price wasn't that much higher than Secret Seafood. It's rare for us to visit a restaurant twice during our 2 week stay, but we wanted to give our guest who'd gotten the food poisoning a great meal tonight.
We had dinner there last week. The food was okay. Nothing memorable but nothing to complain about. The problem was the service. It was pretty bad. I don’t know if they need more help or more training but we won’t be back.
Your friend is lucky she got only food poisoning. I went into anaphalatic shock tin the states when I had bad Mahi Mahi. Fortunately, the ER got it in time. I've been told not to eat any thick skinned fish, like this, swordfish, and tuna because if the fish comes into contact with a carcinogen it forces the mites that live in the skin down into the fish.
" forces the mites that live in the skin down into the fish." Cooking the fish thoroughly should kill and parasites in the flesh. Toxins would be a different story.
It's just a shame, they can't get all eight cylinders to fire on time!! One night it's the food, another night it's the service!!! For us, it was a little of both!!! Louise had a great lobster , my grouper looked like it was reheated. We were a party of six, others had tough steaks and skimpy at that!! Gotta say, drinks were GOOD and the staff was lovely, trying their best with another big table of ten!!! The location on a clear night is great, even the parking was fine. As other posters have said, there are just to many other places to take another shot at this place.
Oh man it’s a tough crowd on here, lol! Sure they have problems- but who doesn’t? Even the Tropicana is having problems with staff… As for food- the only reason why we were going there is their food! The whole grilled snapper, the mussels- are to die for! I would be going to the place like this to order steak. Burger- May be, but not the steak! Every restaurant has its own specialties. This one-too. As for service- again, at the place like this my expectation are not very high. Those are local kids working there. They are not professional waiters like we all used to see in a high end French restaurants. But even those are now far from what they have been…
Would or wouldn't. Big difference. If trained properly it shouldn't matter if it's new local help or seasoned help. All in the management, supervision and training.
In our experience, the servers were very personable and trying hard….but they just hadn’t staffed to handle the crowd, most of whom appeared to have reservations. We ate at more than a dozen restaurants this trip, and this was by far the shortest staffing I saw, so other places were finding workers. The poor wait staff looked frazzled despite their best efforts. And then when our guest got food poisoning! She said the next day that she had wanted to send the seafood back to get cooked more, but couldn't see how to get anyone's attention without standing up and waving her arms, and no one ever stopped by to ask if the meals were OK.
I would say most restaurants on sxm just don’t have what most people call trained staff. But if the food is good I don’t really care if the staff is less than proper service. So difficult to get staff on SXM.
Not that difficult if the standards are spelled out during the interview and hiring.to assure the hire knows whats expected and the restaurant owner is assured that person will deliver whats expected.
Look at Roma, Jax and Pineapple Pete as examples of staffing, training, and keeping staff.
They are hogging all the good people!
I will say that I have never had bad service at Pineapple Pete's and we have been going there forever. So, they have to be doing something right. Maybe Pierre should open a staff training shop! I've only been to Roma once and the service was on point as well
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