Neptune Oyster – The Longest Wait For Food

During Memorial Day weekend, my boyfriend, our two friends, and I did a weekend trip in Boston, MA. I did a search on restaurants in Boston on Yelp and Neptune Oyster was at the top of the list. I didn’t read any reviews, but I should have because nothing prepared me for what happened at Neptune Oyster.

Our friend told us Neptune Oyster has a 4.5 star rating on Yelp with over 3000+ reviews which is tremendous. We arrived on the street of Neptune Oyster at 3:30PM on a Saturday and made a reservation which we found out would be a 4 hour wait, so we had to return back at 7:30PM. After 2-4 hours of sight seeing, walking, and sitting at a cafe, we returned back to Neptune Oyster at 7:15PM and found out our wait time has extended to 8-8:30PM,so altogether nearly a 5 hour wait. We got a call around 8-8:15PM, but when we arrived we still had to wait for a seat.

The restaurant is very dark, dim, tight and small inside. The staff here are very friendly, knowledgeable and helpful. We started off with appetizers:

seafood dishes

The Fried Ipswich Clams came with a tartar sauce and was market price: $21.00 which isn’t expensive at all. The fried clams were fried to perfection, juicy and full of clam deliciousness inside. I liked the tartar sauce a lot because it was rich. We also had Razor Clams which I thought was excellent and delicious. My boyfriend and our friends also ordered oysters from the raw bar and I ordered a shrimp cocktail since I am not a fan of cooked or raw oysters at all.

soup

We got two bowls of the Wellfleet Clam Chowder, one bowl per couple. The clam chowder is a popular menu item, but honestly I thought it was alright. It’s definitely very filling because there’s a lot of cream and chunks of potatoes. There’s a good amount of clams in the chowder, but I just felt it was okay, not the best.

a seafood sandwich with fries and ketchup

Another popular menu item at Neptune Oyster is their Maine Lobster Roll  – toasted roll, available hot with butter or cold with mayo (available without roll). We both ordered it hot, but little did we know that it wasn’t the best route.

The lobster and roll were both submerged with so much butter that it was too overwhelming. However, the lobster was delicious and so were the fries. The butter did make my boyfriend feel slightly sick, so he wasn’t able to finish his half of the lobster roll.
All in all, I feel the five hour wait was definitely too much and an experience I never want to experience again at any restaurant. Was the five hour wait really, really worth it? I feel like it wasn’t because the food wasn’t five stars in my opinion, maybe 3.5. Would I return? No, because a five hour wait is crazy and it can definitely drive a person hangry. I’ve definitely had better seafood dishes before without having to wait so long.
What was the longest wait you’ve ever experienced at a restaurant? Was the wait worth it?

1 thought on “Neptune Oyster – The Longest Wait For Food

  1. Jessica, I can’t believe the wait you endured to go to this restaurant after all that waiting I expected that the food would be perfectly sublime. The longest wait I have ever had at a restaurant resulted in me and my family eventually leaving without ever eating. We were quickly seated at the restaurant and it was late so the restaurant was kinda empty but our waiters forgot about us after seating us with our menus. There were people who were seated after us who were getting their food while we were still waiting to make our order. My family decided we should just leave without eating and eat somewhere else but I was okay with staying and waiting. I feel like as a hospitality student and someone who has worked in this field despite how bad we are treated as guest in a restaurant we seem to give the benefit of the doubt because we’ve been in their shoes, we have been in the weeds and had to encourage patience with customers.

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