The Saltwater Grill, 2401 Cimmaron, is located right on the curve coming off Airline. I give you this because a couple of people in our party had trouble finding it. We went there with a party of almost 20 people. They were expecting us and we found them setting up the tables as the first of us arrived. There was plenty of room for us to wait for our table, but we didn't have to wait long.
The best thing I can say about the place is that our waitperson was very attentive and worked hard to keep everyone happy. Notice that I say waitperson, singular, she had no help whatsoever. I cannot say that she was cheerful, but I can't imagine that I would have been either waiting on a group of nearly twenty all by myself. She worked hard. She earned every penny of the gratuity and deserved more. We were doing separate checks and you can rest assured that Rob and I did add to the gratuity.
Atmosphere. I didn't really notice much decor. The restaurant is in a strip center, so most of the place is open windows and we were seated next to the kitchen and didn't have much of a view of the place. I did notice some planters separating the waiting area from the section where we were seated. The room was noisy where we were at, but that may have had a lot to do with our location in the place, though there did not seem to be any acoustical adjustments to lower noise.
We were greeted at the table with homemade potato chips. These were great! Be careful when they arrive at your table. One, they're hot, and two, they're addictive. I was afraid I would have no appetite before I ordered, much less before the food actually arrived. Rob and I were looking at the same dish so we decided to share and add an appetizer. We ordered Crabcakes (you should know by now that I have trouble passing up crabcakes) as our appetizer. They were more like crab pancakes. The best thing I can say about them is that they were not greasy. They were about half filler. Though the flavor was decent, I like more crab in my cakes. Not impressed.
The dish we ordered was the Shimp and Fish plate. This came with four large shrimp and some fish filets, all fried. The shrimp was not bad, maybe a little overdone, but okay. The fish was tough. Yes, tough. We had fried okra and french fries as our sides and they were fine. This is the kind of food that you can get in any mediocre restaurant in any town of nearly any state. I guess for the price it was okay, but that's the best I can say. Now, before I close I have to tell you that most of the others in our party thought it was really good, and the place was packed. So, maybe we're just picky, but for a city on the bay, off of the Gulf of Mexico, I expect better from a place calling itself Saltwater Grill.
I really don't like writing reviews like this, but we really cannot recommend the Saltwater Grill -- not when there are so many other really good seafood restaurants in the area.
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