Lola's Lakehouse

09/14/09

Excellent service

by Jeannine13

Last night my boyfriend and I ate at Lola's Lakehouse for the first time. We had driven out to Waconia from Bloomington to get away and explore a new area. I had ordered the Balsamic chicken sandwich, not realizing that it came with some type of goat cheese on it. I had tried goat cheese one other time and really did not like it. I was going to just pull the chicken off and it it plain, but my boyfriend knew that I was really disappointed. He called our server over and explained the situation, asking if I could order something else. The server was apologetic and let me order the fish and chips, which was the other item that I had been thinking about ordering. He was really nice about it and did not make me feel bad for wanting something else. My replacement order arrived within 10 minutes and the server checked back with me right away to see if I was happy with it. It was really good fish and I would definitely order it again. A short time later, the manager came over to check in with me. He informed me that he not only took the sandwich from my bill, but that he was not going to charge me for the replacement meal. They went above and beyond what I had expected, because I would have paid for one of the meals. We will definitely make the drive again to eat there again.

• Pros: They make sure that you leave happy
• Cons: small menu selection

09/17/08

Awesome Deck on the water.

by teddi67

Over the years I had heard great things about Nancy's. It is now called Lola's. Lola needs to talk to Nancy and figure out what Nancy was doing right with the food.and service. We were out just driving around and thought we would check out Waconia. I was looking for Nancy's and stumbled across Lola's. We were not really looking for anything other than apetizers and drinks. We were set in the bar area. The atmosphere was nice, but one of teh large doors was open and it was freezing. Beautiful views of the lake. We set for 5 mins waiting on a waitress to take our drink order. We finally got up and went to the bar for them. We were half way through our first drink before a waitress approached us. We decided on 3 apts and a bowl of their clam chowder. The chowder was a very thin soup with maybe 2 small potaoes in it. If there was clam in it, I did not bite into one. I love soup and clam chowder is on the top of my list. This tasted nothing like clam chowder. It was a cream with a hint of seafood taste. The calamari looked wonderful, but was tasteless with a very overpowering sauce. It was like eating hot wings with Bleu cheese. The lobster cake looked like a seafood salad. All I could taste was the sauce that it was mixed with it.. I think it might of had breading mixed in it, because i kept biting into somthing that I felt the whole thing should of been incased in. I prefer my cake like a cake with the sauce on the side, This was just drenched in this overbearing sauce. The artichoke dip was okay. I will be back for dinner, because I try to give every place a second chance. I will say that we did a good laugh. My husband ordered a Jameson whiskey. The waitress brought out 2 drinks. One with whiskey, one with Jameson's. It is pretty bad when the bartender does not know that Jameson's is a whiskey. Even funnier is that the waitress did not know either.

• Pros: Great Place to meet friends in the summer!
• Cons: Fancy place with no Stella on the menu! Hello!

05/14/07

Mother's Day brings poor marks for NL

by gorrna

I'll give Nancy's Landing the benefit of the doubt on typical nights because I've heard from close family members that it provides a good experience on the usual weeknight or weekend, but the Mother's Day 2007 experience we had was unacceptable.

I'll give a thumbs up to the food, it was the wait staff that disappointed me. The stress of the day was apparent in the behavior of the staff at times.

I've worked Mother's Day in a busy restaurant, but I know that it's unacceptable to let that stress make you appear annoyed with the customers normal requests or questions.

What took the cake was the two explicit attempts to get our party of five to wrap up our dinner and get out. We were in the restaurant for just over an hour when the effort to get us out began. I could understand if other families were waiting to be seated, but they weren't. The restaurant was never completely full while we were there. And it's not as if there weren't other tables our size available.

Our bill was given to us about 50 minutes into the night. At the one-hour mark, the waitress asked if we were ready to pay yet, even though we hadn't put the bill binder anywhere near the edge of the table or placed a credit card in it. About 15 minutes later, she told us the restaurant was expecting more guests and that it was "trying to move everyone along."

I enjoyed eating the beef, but not being treated like cattle.

Maybe some people think a 90-minute dinner is long enough, but when you're waiting in lines each time you attempt to get your salad, then your entree, and then a dessert, the minutes add up.

It felt like a restaurant unaware that it takes more than decent food and less-than-average treatment of its customers to be considered noteworthy.

• Pros: Food is above average for a small-town restaurant
• Cons: Parking lot is small and muddy in spring. Limited seating capacity. Ambience inside is poor, but those who like outdoor seating would appreciate the patio on the water.