Not Your Average Joe’s

I love coming to this place. The food is always good, the atmosphere is nice, the drinks are delicious. Sometimes on a weekend the wait is a bit too long, like 30 – 45 minutes, but overall a great place to be! I like to get together with friends and family here. Parking is easy right behind the building.

May be decent but don’t order takeout. When I arrived at the time they said the order would be ready they told me it would be another 15 minutes. Clearly they has forgotten about it. When the order arrived it looked like barf on a plate. Clearly they didn’t care. Have seen other reviews who had problems with take out service.

I have been to Not Your Average Joe’s at this location once with my wife.
She enjoyed the food served here, the environment and food selections were all good. I love their bread and garlic sauce.
Recommend it to folks around the area :)

I give Robyn, the daytime and one night bartender a top rating. My friend and I go there at least three times a week when Robyn is there. If the food is not quite as you want it, Robyn makes sure that the chef corrects it. Robyn is terrific.

What’s not to like?! Great food, friendly staff, and most important, they have THE BEST bartender in the world — ROBYN (not there on Mondays)! I go there at least once a week for lunch with work friends, and the reason why we come back is because of Robyn! Food is great, but her service is irreplaceable!

This is clearly my best neighborhood lunch and power lunch hangout. Robin, the bar tender extraordinaire, keeps it all together and knows all the regulars by first name. Including the ex, their children, allergies, and food habits. She makes it a home for all of us working and living in the area. And the food is a great price value ratio with varied alternatives from health to comfort.
Love the place. Be sure to have the bar lunch, or sport day, experience.

Robin took amazing care of us. Very friendly and personable. I highly recommend coming here. Thank you

Hello,
I wanted to take a moment on this beautiful Friday to recognize an amazing service provider. Our sales team went in to have our first experience at Not Your Average Joe’s in Arlington. We were met with a friendly smile from Our server Robin. She asked each of us for our names and addressed us by name each time she came to the table. It was obvious to all of us that she is passionate about service and loves what she does! What a great person to have working for you. The food and drinks were awesome — as they always are, but there’s good food everywhere. Good people like Robin are why we will always come back! Thanks for having us, and thank you to Robin who inspires all of us to love what we do! — Forrester’s Sales Team

Not Your Average Joes is awesome! The food is so standard at every location so you can expect that. The bread and oil they serve before your meal is amazing.
However, this branch takes the cake because of one person. ROBYN!!! She is amazing. She is the kind of person that you want to hang out with. She is so friendly and so nice. I want to always come back and sit at the bar.
I love you Robyn! Thank you for everything!

The food at Joe’s is fresh and the server staff go out of their way to make sure you get what you want. Contrary to other restaurants like it, Joe’s cook staff will make something differently if needed and your server and the manager will check if your needs were met. Robin, the bartender and server in the bar section is outstanding. She gets to know you and is always amazingly helpful and funny. It’s great coming in for lunch and being greeted by name. She’s the reason my mother and I eat there once a week.

If I could give Robyn more then 5 stars I would. She is awesome. She’s friendly. And we love coming to see her. But also the food is very tasteful. Especially when Robyn orders it. She cares about people and she talks with them like you know her personal friend ship. Robyn shows great attitude at her job. Even if someone forgot a tip. She’s no matter what a machine that keeps on going.
And she is a very good comedian. Also. Another good reason. Robyn has ALOT of regulars. When she’s not working. I get bummed because she’s not there she makes me feel happy and comfortable coming to NYAJ. The other waiters/​waitresses are in my opinion… Ok. I see some times most of them count up there money right after the people leave. But with Robyn. She does it at the very end of the day .
Also Robyn is such a hard worker! Which we need at Not your average joes! Honestly Robyn brings in most of the people. Also most importantly. If she messes up on the order (Rarely does because she’s that good!) she’s very considerate and apologizes not like some other people like a robot.
Keep Robyn. Forever and always. Please !!
(My phone is weird so if you get it again sorry)

Robin at the bar was great
Joes is very luck to have such a out going
Friendly person and the lunch was great

I love Not Your Average Joes basically all because of Robyn! She is the most upbeat, energetic and friendly bartender I’ve ever met. She makes sure that our bread and oil plates are never empty!
The food is also very good, I usually go with the goat cheese salad or whatever is on the seasonal menu. Robyn always has a great recommendation for me.

This is our favorite place in town. I recently visited. The service was excellent as usual.
The salmon was cooked to perfection.

This dining experience was much better than my previous visit. The hostess asked if we had a reservation when we arrived. There was a short 10 minute wait on a Thursday for a table. It was busy but not crowded. If you’re hurried or have a large party, make a reservation just in case. Our server, Mostafa, greeted us and took drink orders. He was present and not intrusive during our meal. He was much more pleasant than our server for the prior visit. My margarita with sugar rim was good and a it was an awesome serving. My dining partner had a beer. We ordered steak tips with mashed potatoes and mashed cauliflower & the southwest burger. The steak tips entrée was filling. There was one steak tip that was a little too pink to be medium well. Otherwise I was pleased. The burger was equally good including part of it much too pink to be considered well done as requested. Overall, I am glad I came back. I intend to check out the pizza and more margaritas on my next visit.

Just left the bar, where my wife Rachael and I had dinner tonight. The place was slammed and I was worried that we would be forgotten or served slowly. Thankfully Robin was behind the bar tonight! She was so funny, efficient and made the end of a stressful day all that much better. We will be back thanks to Robin!

This is one of our go to places where we like to sit at the bar, have tini’s and tasty food. It’s a nice family or large group restaurant as we have done that as well.
We love the bread and oil/​cheese mixture they offer with drinks… we either go for that or dessert… it’s a hard choice sometimes!
Their seasonal menu changes and always offers something fresh, new and nicely presented. I had the Grilled Chicken Caprese dinner. It was a lemon and herb marinated grilled chicken with a salad of tomatoes, arugula, fresh mozzarella and shaved romano, with a light lemon vinaigrette. Perfect on a hot summer evening.
My husband was craving a burger — indulged and had the Sweet Blue Burger with blue cheese, country bacon, caramelized onions and arugula with hand-​cut fries
and organic greens. Not a morsel was left!
I have to add my favorite meal there is the Rosemary Skewered Scallops (local from
New Bedford), pan seared and served over a succotash of Israeli couscous, grilled corn, bacon and tomatoes with an orange-​chipotle glaze. I could eat this every time we visit and never tire of it!
The wait and bar staff are all very friendly, efficient and know the dishes well to advise you. Plenty of parking in the back lot or on street.
They are consistently a good local choice — we’ve never had a meal we didn’t enjoy~

Daughter– Hey, I just wanted to give a shoutout to chef Tom for outstanding service for vegans. The last two times we’ve been here chef Tom has come out and said «What d’you feel like?», making the VEGAN family very happy. So far we have been served an amazing pasta dish with a curried couscous Tom calls «Vegan Caviar» and a side order of vegan caviar with «champagne» (cut grapes and raisins in a champagne vinegar) on two separate occasions.
Dad– Vegan’s can enjoy the signature complimentary bread by asking for the oil dip without the Parmesan cheese. I have also had good luck with various flat breads and pizzas — just nix the cheese and substitute caramelized onions; I also like to add grilled or sauteed portobello mushrooms instead of meaty toppings. The bottom line from a vegan perspective: if you are OK about being in a place that also caters to carnivores, they certainly make you feel welcome.

ATTN VEGANS: GOOD NEWS AHEAD… My sister and I are vegans and we were impressed when our server Sam went back to the kitchen to get help in interpreting ingredients on the menu.
We were doubly impressed when line cook, Tom came to our table to explain the dishes that were vegan and how to order dishes to make them vegan.
We were the floored when he finally said, «What are you in the mood for? I’ll whip up a nice pasta dish for yas– fresh veggies and, you like spicy?» Etc…
He came back with a beautiful curried cous cous veggie pasta combo that was a real treat. Oh, he brought out a long plate ful of grilled red onions, peppers, asparagus and tomato.
For sides we ordered the lettuce chicken wraps with no chicken and the veggie spring rolls (Tom’s suggestion.)
If you’re wondering, «Yeah, but what’d that special treatment cost?»
My sister had 2 Sam Adams, I had bottomless tea all for $ 71 and change.

Three of us stopped in for lunch today, hoping for some tasty selections. When we left we all agreed, they should remove the word «Not» from their name — the experience was average at best.
The good: the décor has improved 100% since the old days when this spot was Garron’s Restaurant, I really like the layout and the ‘clean’ look to this place. Also our waitress was pleasant and the host was very nice too.
The bad: most of our food was bland. Bland, as in ‘average’, with no salt used during cooking, and very little flavor. I ordered the mustard encrusted chicken with maple glazed brussel sprouts and mashed potatoes. I tasted absolutely *no* mustard on the chicken at all, and no maple on the sprouts. The mashed potatoes were OK, the best part of the meal, but still just OK. I also had a cup of the chowder, which I’d give 3 out of 5 stars on its own.
My lady had the weirdest tasting Caesar salad I’ve ever tasted, it seemed to have tons of lemon juice in it? I can’t put my finger on it, but at any rate, it was not good. She did however like her Caribbean buffalo chicken tenders.
Dad had the meatloaf, didn’t finish it, didn’t want to talk about it. His only comment was that he liked his raspberry lime rickey.
I think if someone brought the kitchen some salt the food would bump up a star, but even then someone would have to make them use mustard on the mustard chicken, and maple on the maple sprouts.
I find the name of the restaurant ironic, because average was exactly how I’d describe it… I wonder how they’ve survived in the restaurant hotbed Arlington has turned into?
***Update***
I was contacted by the manager, who very generously and professionally offered me a gift card, which I received in the mail 2 days later. I’ll give them another try next time in town, maybe the kitchen had a bad day…