Empire Tavern

I would give them zero stars if I could. Absolutely no customer service. Their drinks are weak at best. When I asked the bartender if he could fix the drink he responded if you wanted a strong drink you should order a double. Totally unprofessional. Just a bunch of hood rats behind the counter. Do not waste your time and money on this horrific place. To top things the food comes out cold as well as the coffee. They won’t heat it up for you either. STAY AWAY you’ll thank me later.

This place is the turd encrusted cherry that tops the ass-​sundae that is Laguardia. Don’t even waste your time with it, go buy a snickers and a bottle of water from a shop instead.

Good wine list, mediocre service, and stale pastries. That was my experience here in a nutshell.
Not sure if it’s the iPad system but generally speaking it seems like the mode of operation at Laguardia is there’s no need to check on customers once they’ve pre-​paid and pre-​tipped using the iPad service.

If finding a bug in your salad is good, then this place is fantastic! Not to mention lipstick on the wine glass, and the manager inappropriately touching and flirting with the waitresses.
I feel like this place gets dirtier each time, how they haven’t been shut down by department of health is beyond me.
It’s even better when I ask an employee a question, and they just walk on by. It’s disgusting what goes on here.

Use a buggy iPad screen to order a coffee. Wait 20 minutes. Ask for coffee anyway. Technology does not always equal progress.

If $ 4 plastic bagels are your thing, then this is the place for you!

I ordered the apple pie and coffee and my friend ordered chicken nuggets, fries and a coke. Our drinks came at the same time. The coffee was blah and tasted like coffee from a gas station. The cup that her coke was in looked filthy. Then her chicken nuggets came like 10 mins before my pie came. So I thought my pie would be hot and fresh. The pie came right out the refrigerator. So I was like why did it take so long for pie that was cold. The pie was good but would have been better if it was at least warmed. This was definitely not worth more than $ 20. I wouldn’t eat here again.

Considering this eatery is in an airport (LGA) it was ok. The iPad ordering system worked well for me, but I guess it does not for everyone. I had a tight connection so I was counting on the 15 minutes delivery to the table promise. The food arrived a few minutes later but the staff was attentive and were aware of my boarding time. They made every effort to please. My waitress even brought me a to go box just in case, thankfully I was able to finish my lunch and board on time. My watercress avocado whole-​grain bread sandwich with beefsteak tomato and garlic aioli was pretty good.

Hard to imagine a worse arrangement than this one.
iPad table top ordering system that seems to feed orders into space rather than to a person.
After I placed my first order I waited 25 minutes to be told that they didn’t have the item any more.
After I placed a replacement order it took another 25 minutes. Obviously the technology should be speeding response not slowing it. The delay is a real problem in an airport waiting lounge. Unfortunately for me my plane was delayed more than my dinner but only by a little.
Pricing was outrageous but would have been worth it if they could have provided even a small modicum of service.
When I used the iPad provided complaint form they timed out on me and I was not able to leave the comments. Twice!

Great food enjoyed it while i waited for my flight. And the ipad was a great touch

IPad ordering is ineffective.
Staff is dull, listless and wholly disinterested in providing any service at all.
Slow, long wait time (in an airport!)
Food is mediocre at best, generally a crap-​shoot (as mentioned in other reviews.)
So, if you find iPads endearing, don’t mind a complete lack of service, have plenty of time to spare and have low expectations regarding the quality of food you eat, go ahead: roll the dice in LGA Terminal C.
(Oh, and, don’t forget — you’ll be overpaying for everything!)
Good luck!

Utterly mediocre with generally lazy waitstaff. My server (who got his tip before the service on the iPad payment system) was repeatedly unmoved by the empty water glass next to my plate as he walked past my table.
Food was average — what you would expect at an airport. it’s a shame the service wasn’t better because the potential here is pretty good with the setup the way it is.

If you’ve read the reviews, you might conclude that Empire Tavern is a total crapshoot. You’d be right of course. But this is LGA, so everything about your day is likely to be a crapshoot. In my experience, the food is slightly more reliable than the airlines … so credit where due, I guess.
The food is totally unremarkable, as you’d expect, and high prices are a given at any airport vendor. But I do like the technology. iPad ordering always works perfectly for me, and food always arrives within 15 minutes, as promised.
Bottom line: the ones who say Empire Tavern is «the worst airport food ever» are probably the same ones who don’t know to put their keys on the conveyor belt when going through security.

Ordered wine and a pretzel at 4:36 pm. It’s 5:20 pm and I still dont have my order. While everyone around me that sat later that ordered food received their orders.
5:40 They comped the bill. All is right at Empire Tavern.

Empire Taverns should be in every airport terminal effective immediately. Each table offers a plethora of outlets to charge all of your gadgets, comfy seating, and iPads which is what you use to order food and drinks with photos provided. Each seat as an assigned iPad and offers free Internet browsing.
I’m not the type to arrive at the airport 2 hours prior but I would if I knew this is what was in store for me. Shit, I may even start going to airports as a my destination.

Decent food, wretched service, so slow you’ll miss your flight, idiotic technology. This so called restaurant is a failed experiment on human subjects.

Just when you thought you could escape the high cost of service by replacing human beings with modern technology, Empire Tavern comes along to prove you wrong. Turns out we need human beings after all, and not just human being customers, but flesh&blood waitstaff as well, trained in presentation and attention to detail.
Like all of you fellow prisoners, I wanted a meal while waiting for my connector. Empire Tavern has this to offer: anything that is more than a snack or side starts at $ 20.
Goodnight.
How about a drink, yo?
Beers are easily $ 10 for watery domestic garbage, and $ 12+ for something simple like a whiskey sour.
The Empire is cruel! Ok, so let’s pretend you’re rich, and you don’t base your restaurant ratings on cost. Let’s run through my order real quick.
You decide to indulge on:
1 croissant ($ 4 for those of you keeping track, poor saps)
1 decaf coffee ($ 3.25, more expensive than Starbucks? lol)
You receive:
An apology and a 20min wait (your coffee was left on the counter and turned cold)
No sugar, no spoon
A withered croissant suffering a mid-​life crisis, with no jelly or butter on the side (though the photo representation depicted just that)
You ask for jelly.
You get jelly, but no knife or spreading utensil.
You ask for a knife.
You get some dingy plastic thing and a sigh.
That’ll be $ 9.20.
Augh! I know it’s not about the money. But it is. You are their captive audience, and they treat you as such, like a captive. Turn over your wallet and (culinary) dignity to the Empire, since you’re probably already accustomed to that via the TSA.
So, have a nice flight, chumps; I hope you’re all fat, unhappy, and broke. While I enjoyed this brief trip into the future where every table is outfitted with an iPad or four for your menu and order placement, prices are beyond ridiculous, both on principle and on quality of product and service.

I once had an idea for a startup that revolved around mobile payment and delivery from ones own seat. The only thing we never figured out was how to make location tracking accurate enough in the restaurant to disambiguate customers sitting next to each other.
Turns out there is a simple solution in this fascinating tech driven bar. Not only are there iPads on every bar seat and table at this restaurant, the iPad station even extends to the gates. It’s hard to tell where one ends and the other begins, but it means you can order from practically anywhere in terminal c. Also tabled seats are better than typical airport seating, with ample room for a laptop and an outlet per seat.
Typical of airports, all prices are 50 percent marked up. I had the corn and shrimp beignet, which is more beignet than corn or shrimp.
Well executed.

This place is convenient and that is where it ends. The food is over priced, the service slow and the tables were not cleaned. The selection is poor and did I mention the price?
The only reason I’d go back is if I were hungry because it is that convenient

For some reason, Unilocal is really obsessed with me completing reviews for all of the airport eateries I’ve been to. They’re the first places to come up in my suggestions box all the time. I don’t really get it, but I’ve decided to review them all so they stop popping up.
I sat here while my plane was delayed, and ordered a glass of cranberry juice off of the iPad mostly because I was amused that I could do such a thing, and have the receipt emailed to me. It was nice to charge my phone and computer while sipping on what turned out to be an almost $ 4 glass of juice (they added an 18% gratuity to my very labor-​intensive order), and watch as pictures of pre-​made food scrolled past on the iPad.
And that’s about it. Grab something from somewhere else, or make spending the money worth it and get yourself some alcohol.