Middletown Pancake House Family Restaurant

Not sure what the critical reviews are over, I’ve lived in this area for the last 18 months or so, and have probably been here 10 times with my girlfriend and other friends. The food is clearly better than most diners in the area, and the service is good as well. The owner seems like a sweet older woman too.
It’s not breakfast at the Four Seasons, but I’m amazed how people will complain about a good place like this.

The service is terrible and the food isn’t much better.
We came at 11:30am on a Saturday. The waitress was inattentive and yet would hover creepily at times. Food took a long time to come out and was definitely NOT worth the wait. We ordered two dishes with pancakes/​waffles and for some reason there was no syrup brought out with them (this is the pancake House?). The elderly waitress wandered off and eventually came back with syrup. I was worried that she got lost.
One order was chicken and waffles. The waffle was pretty generic. The chicken strips smelled bad and tasted like grocery store frozen strips.
Next order was «The Traveler». Below average sausage links with a pathetic looking scrambled egg. The pancakes actually did taste good, but nothing special here either.
Cowboy burger was decent. French fries were of a frozen variety.
Omelette platter featured an average omelet, odd looking breakfast potatoes, and toast that resembled cardboard.
The turkey sausage wrap was unappealing and almost inedible. More than half of the wrap was left on the plate stating «I’m not eating this».
When it was time to get the check and leave this abomination, our waitress was once again MIA.
With so many other places to eat in the area, skip this place and go elsewhere.

The service was so slow and poor — but you can’t even get mad because the staff was made up of mostly adorable senior citizens who remind you of TV grandparents!
Overpriced for food that’s mediocre, at best.
Entire restaurant and restrooms are in need of a Deep Cleaning!

If I could leave fewer than 1 star, I would. The service was bad (they never refilled my coffee, got my wife’s order wrong, and took forever to check on us after our food came), the quality of ingredients was poor, and they were overpriced. In addition, they charge extra for everything. Kids meals come with a beverage, but if your child orders a hot tea, they charge an additional 2.10. I Do NOT recommend this place. Any place that can’t have a brand name condiment to me says they can’t afford to buy a better quality food, or they’re too cheap but are still charging for higher quality foods.

Great food and great environment.
Every meal I have had here is awesome. Coffee is bottomless and taste great. I asked for some flavored coffees once and was not disappointed.
The owner is a friendly woman, and kind to all that enter. The servers are kind and food comes out quickly. They have specials that changes and special menus on holidays so there is always something new everytime I come. I would highly recommend coming with family and friends.

Long wait for food deliver cold and incorrect it was sent back and reheated in the microwave and put back on the table not the same Middletown pancake house from years ago

Decent family restaurant but nothing truly memorable. Staff was friendly and good place if you have little kids. Solid pancakes but I’ve had worse and better.

Stars are mainly for the service.
My pancakes were cold. The toast tasted like it was cooked with the bacon grease. The bacon tasted like it was microwaved.
Place is nice and service is good, but the food I can’t say the same about. Sorry.

Best place around! I’ve been going here for years, so I know what I’m talking about.
Their pancakes are out of this world, never got better pancakes from anywhere. Their quesadillas are great too. Awesome little place and for the price, you can’t beat it.

I’ve only been here for breakfast but been here multiple times and it’s always real good. Pancakes are awesome, bacon crispy, waiters are on top of it. Thumbs up for breakfast for sure.

I’ve been here twice and yet to have the pancakes, but everything I’ve tried is great. I had the grilled chicken wrap with string beans, very good. I had the steak and avocado salad with broccoli also very good… The service is really good and friendly… Just be prepared to wait a little on Sunday for breakfast…

great service great food really enjoy this establishment

Very good pancakes and over all breakfast food is decent.
I would go there a lot more often if they would use placemats.
When you get served you won’t even get a side plate for your toast which makes the placemat issue even worse.
The silverware falls off your plate on to the table top, I just find that’s a turnoff.
Think of all the food that has been wiped off that table top… you can get 1000 place mats for under 20 $. C’mon!!!
I have asked for a side plate and they have gotten me one, so maybe I’m being to critical.

So I read the reviews and decided to try this place while in town for work and boy am I glad I did. First off, the service was impeccable from the time I arrived until the time I left. My server was courteous, attentive, and I was really impressed.
When you walk in the place is pretty modest. It’s not the least bit fancy and it’s got homey charm. Is it the Ritz? No. But it’s a mom and pop down home little joint. It’s clean and looks like your grandmothers living room.
I ordered the potato pancakes and they were scrumptious. Not like the deli. These aren’t deep fried or crispy. But light and delicious, a departure from any potato pancake I’ve tried. With delicious sour cream (or applesauce) and a small helping of bacon. I personally would serve them with both applesauce and sour cream but that’s a personal preference. That’s about my only complaint. My food was hot and delicious served up immediately. It was fairly empty when I arrived, but dinner for me is earlier than most. Even so this place is absolutely worth your time. It’s family run and owned and that is obvious in their attention to the little details. Enjoy Unilocalers! :)

It was good.
From what i remember — it was like a classy IHOP — the place was clean, food was better and the waitress was funny.

Breakfast rocked here! I was sorry I found it on the last day of my week in town, would definately have eaten here more than once!

I have never had a better pancake than here. Don’t know about the person complaining about them being dry… that’s never happened to me! Love their «traveller» meal, and always get a side order of home fries. Service is always good, prices are about the same as other similar diners type eateries. In fact, as soon as my wife gets home, I’m taking her there for brunch… yum!!!
Just a side note, I’ve never ordered anything other than breakfast items from there… why would I?

ONLY ORDER BREAKFAST ITEMS HERE. This is important. They have great potato pancakes, and specialize in the breakfast stuff, and you WILL be disappointed if you order regular items. The rest of it is throw-​frozen-​stuff-​in-​grease variety, and overpriced. Also, every time I’ve gone here except once, the service has been heinous. As in, cold food and very slow service. I think there is some strangeness in the kitchen. For example, the last time I went, and this is a BIG BIG restaurant, there was just me, and one other polite table of four that arrived a little while after I came. So what I’m saying is, the staff was not under duress. I ordered and the food was taking forever. It turned out this was because they were letting it sit to become cold. After the cold appys came out, I started to pay attention to the workings. The waitress kind of loitered about in a spaced-​out fashion, and then gradually went to the kitchen to check things out. There was no bell or indicator to let any of the waitresses know that food was beginning its journey to coldness.
One of the other times I went, I ordered (yes I’m an imbecile) shrimp scampi of some sort. The nice waitress went to the kitchen with that request plus whatever else I ordered, and came back to inform me that shrimp scampi was not made at this time of day. (I think it was around 4:30 pm.) There is no indicator on the menu that different items are available at different times of the day. So I picked something else. She the came out to tell me that some part of THAT order was unavailable. This activity of «ask and be rejected» went on about four times, until she came out with a negotiation that I couldn’t have the most recent request, but I could have free dessert. And I’m telling you, I was not asking for weird things, just what was on the menu. Finally after more delays and aggravation I just decided to leave, without ordering dessert, and when I went to pay, the woman at the front desk yelled at THE WAITRESS, because she didn’t like the way the check was written up. This poor girl was a saint throughout all the nuttiness from the kitchen, and this front desk bitch chewed her out. Ok I’m on a roll here, I’ll tell two more stories. One other time I went, it was the wee hours of the morning, around 2:00am it must have been, but at any rate, very late. I sat down, and I’m waiting waiting waiting while I see the waitress bent over some counter messing around with money. Finally she acknowledges me, and says she’ll be with me in a while, she just wants to finish dealing with this money. Gentle reader I submit, why not take my order real quick so it can be started cooking, and then continue ignoring me until the food can be placed in the special spot to get cold? So I say, «I see you are busy, I’ll come another day.» Now to me, this is kind of a wake-​up call, and one should start to do the job one is being paid to do. But no, she truly was possessed to keep messing with the money, so I left. And one other time I went, and this is not the fault of the restaurant, but there was this woman and her mother, plus a little son and two daughters. These two horrible, horrible women berated that sweet little boy for absolutely no reason for the whole meal. He was just sitting there quietly, and they went on and on yelling at him, and finally got dessert for everyone but him. I wanted to get up and tell them they should be ashamed of themselves, but I was afraid they’d take it out even more on him later. If anyone has ideas about what to do when you’re in a restaurant and you see mental child abuse like this, please let me know. I’ve seen it once before, on an older child. This father looked violent so in his case I was pretty sure he’d really be worse later on. Anyway I’m off track now, and will just state that I’m going to post a picture of the four tiny shrimp I got at this restaurant the last time I went. I was still hankering literally years later to have the shrimp scampi I was denied on that earlier visit, so I ordered it at $ 8.99. I’m not sure the chef knows the pricing on the menu. I think $ 8.99 is high for four very small shrimp. Note how they look next to the fork.