Fathoms Bar and Grille - Fairhaven, MA

My husband had wanted to try Fathoms Bar and Grille, a restaurant located at 225 Pope’s Island Way, just off the Fairhaven Bridge and overlooking New Bedford Harbor, which we drove past a few days earlier when out doing some Christmas shopping.  Since we found ourselves in that general area again, we decided that tonight would be the perfect night to give it a try.  We arrived at Fathoms just before 6:45 p.m. and I immediately noted how loud it was inside.  When we gave the hostess our name we peeked around the restaurant and specifically asked if there was additional seating in a back room where it would be a bit quieter.  She told us that there would be a 15-20 minute wait if we wanted seating in the back.  Given the noise level in the restaurant, we opted to wait so we could enjoy some dinnertime conversation.

While we were waiting for our table, I looked around the restaurant and noticed that a large, rectangular bar occupied most of the space in the restaurant.  The bar was definitely a showpiece with a beautiful glass top painted with blue and orange streaks and illuminated with blue lighting. The dark blue painted walls, copper pressed tin ceiling and walnut furnishings completed the nautical décor at Fathom’s.

After waiting for 25 minutes, we were brought to our table.  While we were walking to the back of the restaurant where we were to be seated, I noticed that high top tables and large circular booths were available for dining on the outer perimeter of the restaurant. The back dining area where we were seated was not much more than a small alcove with only six tables and it was not much quieter than the main bar area. It did, however, allow conversation at a more reasonable level.

Upon being seated, we ordered drinks (Malibu & Diet Coke for me and a Long Island Iced Tea for my husband, $6 and $8 respectively) and began to review the menu as well as the long list of specials being offered.

The meals all seemed reasonably priced with a 16 ounce prime rib being offered for $19.50, lobster ravioli for $15.00, baked New Bedford scrod for $13.00, and a selection of pizza ranging in price from $5.50 to $7.00.  There were many seafood entrees on the menu and both my husband and I felt that, given the nature of the restaurant, we should order seafood. 



I started my meal with a cup of Lobster Bisque for $5.00 and ordered the Scallop and Scrod Casserole ($12.00) for my entrée.  My husband ordered a Stuffed Quahog ($3.00) and English Fish & Chips ($10.00).



Lobster Bisque

I was looking forward to trying the Lobster Bisque because it was described as “diced lobster meat simmered in a rich sherry cream” but once it arrived and I took my first bite I was very disappointed. The only way I can describe the taste is to reference it to the imitation cheese inside of pre-packaged cheese and crackers.  I was expecting creamy tasting bisque – not cheesy tasting bisque.  I searched around my bowl and could not locate a single morsel of lobster, either.  My husband tasted the bisque and completely agreed with my opinion.  At least my husband’s quahog was reasonably good (although it was exactly like the Whaler’s quahogs that you can buy at the grocery store).



Stuffed Quahog

While we were waiting for our entrees to arrive, I could not help but over hear the conversation at the table behind us. There was a woman that had barely touched her meal (she had ordered Crab Meat Stuffed Shrimp) and when the waitress asked her about it, she said that she didn’t like the meal at all. The waitress offered to replace the meal with a different entrée but the woman did not want a replacement (perhaps because the other three people that she was dining with had already completed their meals).  At the time, I thought it was odd that someone would just send an entire meal back and not ask for a replacement…until my own meal arrived.

Scallop and Scrod Casserole

The presentation of my meal was nice, with fresh sea scallops and native scrod, topped with garlic compound and seasoned bread crumbs, in a casserole dish and oven-baked red bliss potatoes and asparagus (the asparagus had an up-charge of $3 but the only other choices for a vegetable were coleslaw and butternut squash, neither of which I enjoy) added to my plate on the side.  However, the taste of my meal was not very good at all.  The seafood was fresh but the preparation needed improvement. The seasoned bread crumbs tasted like dry seasoned bread crumbs out of a can with no additional preparation involved.  I pushed all of the topping to the side and ate the three scallops and small piece of fish that was in my casserole dish.  I also ate only a few bites of my oven-baked potatoes and about half of my asparagus since these sides were not great, either. 



English Fish & Chips

My husband’s fish and chips included one large piece of fish on top of a plate of French fries and served with coleslaw.  I ate a few of his (seemingly once frozen) French fries and had a bite of his fish. His meal was better than mine and in fact, the most enjoyable part of my meal was the few fries that I ate from his plate (and the two drinks that I had throughout the evening).

Part of the reason that I could barely finish the side dishes on my plate was because of the conversation I was now hearing from the table beside us (not the table behind us with the bad-tasting shrimp, but the table beside us with the bad-tasting butter).  There was a woman at the table that had ordered surf and turf and asked for a dish of melted butter on the side (to dip her steak into). She had a few bites of her steak and was insisting to her friends that it tasted like gorgonzola cheese.  After a few bites, she finally figured out that it was the butter that was off-tasting.  She smelled the butter and commented to the waitress that it was rancid!  Luckily she had not poured the butter over the steak and she was able to salvage her meal when a new dish of butter was brought to her.  Between the woman who returned the shrimp, the awful tasting bread crumbs on my seafood and the rancid butter at the table beside us, I was not very interested in finishing up my food.

At Fathoms, the drinks were good and the waitress, Aubrey,  was friendly but I can’t say that I will be back there again for a meal since the food was far from delicious. We paid our bill, which totaled $55.31 including tax, left a tip for the waitress and left, admiring the impressive bar on our way out.