Spencer's At The Waterfront

Bring your Coleman portable camp stove to warm your food up or better yet cook your food. Steak was cold and veggies raw. Caesar salad is better if you buy at a grocery store or make your own. If you are into Luke warm expensive steak and tasteless salad this is the right place for you.

Go for the ambiance and a drink only!

Heard a lot of good things about his place leading up to our visit on Wed Aug 14th 2013. It is true that it's located on a beautiful area of waterfront in Burlington, the views are tranquil and ethereal, and the restaurant is good-looking and impressive. However, none of this applies to the food. Our salad was way too oiled down with olive oil, our foie gras underdone and slimy, and our oxtail gnocchi absolutely tasteless. Our server was gracious in getting us another order of foie gras which was done correctly, even though we didn't request it. The house-made chocolate mousse cake with toffee ice cream was the only redeeming edible in this establishment. Spencer's was definitely NOT worth the drive from Toronto to Burlington for just the ambiance and dessert. We even told the manager who asked how our meal was about our unsatisfied palate's and he was non-plussed enough to offer no remedies. Talk about a lack of customer service! Kudo's to our server for his great attitude, but Spencer's is a place best left to the local's who want to waste their money on the fancy environment with cafeteria type food.

What a disappointment

This restaurant was recommended to us so we took our parents there for a special occasion - incredibly noisy and hard to have a conversation. Menu looked great online but the pizza was the worst I have ever had. Terrible presentation on plate and it was soggy right through to the crust with the eggpant and other vegetables piled on. Almost inedible. Our parents both had the cod and said it was very salty - hugely disappointing evening for a dinner that was overpriced. Prefer to go to Niagara and frequent the restaurants and wineries that are far superior to Spencer's. Will never return.

One disappointment after another

I've been to Spencers a few times over the past couple of years and for the most part enjoyed the food and experience. I'm not sure what's happened recently but the restaurant has definitely gone downhill. The service was abysmal. I met my guest and had just had a seat when the waitress comes over to ask for my drink order. I hadn't even had a chance to open the drinks menu. I told her I needed some time and she disappeared - for 25 minutes! I finally got my drink ordered and it took another 30 min before our food order was taken. We actually had to flag her down to ask her if we could order. The new fall/winter menu is entirely uninspiring and both myself and my guest found it very difficult to find anything that was appealing enough to order for our meal. We finally settled on pizza - which was a mistake. The thin crust was so thin on my Margarita pizza it was burned on the bottom and the edges were so tough you couldn't cut or bite through them. Reading other reviews it seems its the same complaints each time. Hopefully management reads these reviews and makes some changes. Its unfortunate as its a lovely restaurant and could be so much better! For the price of the place I expect better.

Great Beer on Tap

On the weekend I dropped by because I learned that they had Lugtread Lagered Ale on tap. The hostess said that they were serving Sunday brunch and that sitting at the bar was awkward. However, soon, a waiter brought in a bar stool and soon I was sipping my fave beer on tap. It was a sunny day so the view was great, bartender friendly and as a bonus there was a keyboard player singing a whole host of great songs. I will definitely go back for beer...only place in town that serves Lugtread Ale. (I did not eat, but I had to click a food rating to save my review !)