Stonefish has closed!! According to Federal Realty a new restaurant will be opening within 60 days and they have already signed a new lease. They said the restaurant’s name will be public in 1 to 2 weeks.

My wife and I ate at Bobby’s Crabcakes Friday night and it was delicious! I highly recommend it.

So I was thrilled to read Cindy CG’s report on Town Center businesses. I forwarded it to my wife and we decided to try Stonefish Grill this evening. Now I know it is unfair to harsh a restaurant on the first weekend, but first impressions do matter, and they really blew it.

Let me start positive – we were thrilled by the dollar draft beers. Good opening gimic as gimics go. And the bar staff are friendly, energetic, and fun people who did a good job of promoting the live music offerings (every Thursday and Sunday) and the current act.

The big big negative was the service. The 18?? year old who eventually stumbled to our table didn’t seem to have ever eaten in a restaurant, much less worked in one. We had to ask for everything, from water to pepper to our entrees. We never did receive bread. My wife ordered Rockfish with a Pecan Crust. I ordered the BBQ Salmon. When the entrees arrived before the salads we ordered, he seemed perplexed that we sent them back. Then we received entree size salads instead of the small sizes that we added to the entrees (and were initially charged for the large). The Rockfish was not pecan crusted, when we sent it back the same plate came back with an unfortunate sauce drizzled on top. She liked it better before the sauce. Oh- for that matter, I think these were the same entrees that were presented 10 minutes earlier (before the salad).

The food wasn’t bad – but didn’t compare to Bonefish in the Kentlands.

I love town center, I love Peroni beer on tap, and I love live music so I’ll be back to try Stonefish again. But not for a month or three. Meanwhile I really wish I had tried the Peruvian place. Free valet parking and people coming out were pretty happy.