Marina Grille - Freehold

Had a few drinks dinner at the Marina Grille this evening. We didn 't have much to eat but I 'd like to share the experience as this place was always a go to location before the pandemic. This experience was less than inspiring. The ricotta toast lacked a fair amount of ricotta cheese. The cheese makes the appetizer. The cheese is not very hard to make inexpensive. Doing it right makes the appetizer pleasing. It was lackluster. The SOPPRESSATA HONEY pizza was sloppy smaller than in the past. There was too much honey on the pizza making the pizza slice limp unable to hold the cheese soppressata. The dough was good but the toppings suffered. Also when you request a Manhattan (not sweet) you minimize the amount of bitters sweet vermouth. Stirring the mixture in ice helps to reduce the sweetness. Dry vermouth should not be mixed in a Manhattan. These are simple and basic quality items. Needless to say our visit was disappointing.

We stopped here on a whim while driving back to south jersey. A friend who frequents the Spring Lake area recommended it to us. This is a nice spot for food and drinks on the water. We were able to quickly find a spot at the outside bar during a beautiful sunset! The bartender was good and attentive, and the food was tasty. We ordered the lobster bisque, shrimp Caesar, and nut encrusted mahi mahi with coconut milk ancho Chile sauce. We were both satisfied and quite full when we were finished!

Really solid night at Marina Grille. Me and my girlfriend ordered a bunch of apps and sat in the indoor area right by the bar. The Ahi Tuna Nachos were delicious and our favorite dish of the night. The oysters and shrimp cocktail were both very fresh. Our waitress Lara was tremendous, doing her best to make sure we had a pleasant evening. I did feel bad as it seemed their waiters/waitresses seemed understaffed in general and it seemed like they all had a lot of tables to cover. The main issue of the night was parking, however. We drove around the massive parking lot for 20 minutes before finding a spot to just put our car. Overall good experience outside of that minute detail. Marina is always a good spot to enjoy a beautiful night on the back deck area.

After a day at the beach, we decided to stop in and get something to eat. My family and I were pleasantly surprised. Nice family atmosphere, very spacious, very nice employees. We ordered the Crab Cakes to start off (very delicious), and our entrees fried shrimp, shrimp and pasta both very good that we ordered the shrimp and pasta to go. Even though it was a little pricey (but everything is right now) I would recommend stopping by.

A lovely spot on a large, attractive marina. The food, however, was awful. Our group sampled a variety of items. Oddly, only the ribs got an A grade. All else was mediocre. Service was slow but the servers were all quite pleasant.