Irish Eyes -- Milton

It was the Saturday of Memorial Day weekend ... all of the restaurants in the region are going to be ready for the crowds, right? Irish Eyes has been in the area for a long time now, with locations in Rehoboth Beach and Lewes. The Milton location has been open for a year or so now, and we decided to pop in for a (theoretically) quick lunch. It turns out that Milton was having their horseshoe crab festival, and parking was a bit sparse. We made our way into the restaurant, and surprisingly the restaurant was only half full. It took a long time to get seated, which should have been our first warning sign of things to come. We ordered the conch fritter appetizer to share, and we each ordered sandwiches. The server asked if we wanted the conch fritters with our sandwiches, or as appetizers. We said that we were pretty hungry, so we would go with whatever would get us our food the quickest. She said that she would put the whole order in together, so as to not delay the sandwiches. Wow ... if that was Irish Eyes version of NOT delaying something, I can't imagine what the slow service is like. We waited, and we waited ... and did I mention that we waited? After filling our iced tea glasses for the umpteenth time, the server asked if we needed anything. Ummm ... how about some food? I'll take to the manager, she politely stated. I don't want to tell Irish Eyes how to do their business, but it shouldn't take intervention from the manager to get food produced in the kitchen. The food eventually made it to our table; unfortunately, I can't say that it was worth the wait. The conch fritters were okay, in a "dump some frozen food in a deep fryer" way. My chicken teriyaki sandwich was inedible. The surface of the skinless, boneless breast had hardened to crunchy crust. I literally tore the sandwich apart to make sure that a foreign object hadn't accidentally made it's way to my food. The rest of the chicken was completely dried out.

By the time we paid our bill, people had wandered over from the Horseshoe Crab festival and the restaurant was starting to fill up. Based on the slow service we received when the restaurant was half full, I expect that those people are still waiting for their food.