H2O's Waterside Grill

Just a couple of miles down the road from where @mrsbozz and I live is a tavern called O's. It's in a building that used to be called the Sportsmen's Tavern (not very unique I know), but was purchased several years ago by a guy with a last name that starts with the letter "O", and thus it got its name.

Although not very creative, I would venture to guess there are probably hundreds of places across the country called The Sportsmen's Tavern, but far fewer that are called O's. It has become one of our favorite places to eat on the rare occasion that we eat out.

They have made it a family business, you will often see the owner, his wife, or one of his daughters in the place working or hanging out behind the bar. They made it a point to hire people who had zero experience working in restaurants so they could train them the way they wanted without any bad habits getting in the way.

The food is pretty much always on point, I think I've only ever had one meal from there that wasn't quite up to par in the handful of years they have been open.

So when an old Hooter's restaurant down by the river a town over went up for sale, the owners of O's decided to expand their empire and buy it. They put a ton of money into remodelling the building and they had a contest to see what the name of the new place was going to be.

Given the fact that the old place was called "O's", and this place was right by the water on the Saginaw River, some clever person came up with H2O's and a legend was born. They have been open for a while now, but this was my first chance to visit the new restaurant.

While they brought over some of the favorite menu items from the old place, other items are unique to H2O's. The one complaint I have heard is that the prices seem to be a bit higher at this location. That's kind of just the world we live in now though.

We met up with a good friend of ours and her kids for lunch on a Saturday. It wasn't that busy when we got there a little before noon, but by the time we left, the place was starting to fill up. They don't currently have the docks ready to go yet, but since it is winter now anyway, that doesn't really matter.

It's been at least 20 years since I was last in this building, and that was back when it was a Hooters. While the kitchen appears to be in the same location (makes sense), they have since closed it off. That white wall with all the TV's on it used to be a bar area and you could see the kitchen just beyond the wall.

Instead, they have now moved the bar over to the back right corner in the photo above.

As you can see, they also installed some roll up door so they can open things up in the Summertime.

They recently had a holiday competition where people could paint on the windows and then people would judge the paintings. I don't think this one was the winner, but it was right behind us and I felt that it turned out pretty cool.

@mrsbozz and I decided to get an appetizer to share. We went with the southwest chicken egg rolls and like a moron I forgot to take a photo until after they were pretty much gone. This was the last half of an egg roll that was left when I remembered to take a shot.

They were really good. I've seen these before in other places and I was expecting these to taste pretty much like every other one I have had. They did and they didn't. It was definitely elevated a bit and they had a lot more flavor than I was expecting.

Our friend got the Georgia Ruben which is also on the menu at their other location. It's basically a Ruben, but instead of beef and sauerkraut, you get turkey and coleslaw. It's a great sandwich. My wife and I make them quite regularly ourselves at home.

I got a sandwich called the Cuban Ruben. It was basically like a Cubano sandwich, but in a Ruben form and it had pickled cabbage on it instead of cole slaw or sauerkraut.

While it was a good sandwich, I don't think I would get it again. The flavors just didn't work the way I had thought they would. That isn't to say that all of the individual components weren't great, I just don't know if they went together to my liking.

I ate half the sandwich and I took the other half home. The next morning for breakfast I pulled the pork, salami, and ham off the other half of the sandwich and heated it up in a frying pan to have with my eggs for breakfast. It worked out perfectly!

@mrsbozz got the club sandwich. This is her dad's favorite menu item here. He gets it pretty much every time he comes. I think part of the reason he likes it so much is because instead of using traditional bread they use a flatbread that is lighter and pillowy. I had a bite of it and it was quite delicious.

Our friends son got boneless wings and fries. I tried one of the wings and they were actually quite good. The ratio of sauce to "wing" was spot on. Looking back at the photo now, I do find the random lettuce on the plate kind of humorous. I realize they did it to add some color and for presentation, but it still made me laugh.

Our friends daughter got the chicken carbonara. It looked really great, and @mrsbozz said it was interesting, but I didn't have any of it. She seemed to think it was pretty good and finished most of it before out time was up. In fact, @mrsbozz and I were the only ones that had food left over to take home.

This looked pretty delicious to me. It's rare that I get pasta when I go out to eat, but I might make the exception here!

As I was leaving, I took a couple photos of the channel next to the restaurant that leads to one of the nearby marinas. If you look really closely at the second photo you can see the Double Tree hotel on the other side of the river in the distance.

If you are ever in the Bay City, MI area, I highly recommend you head to the end of Midland Street and check out H2O's Waterside Grill. Especially if you can get a table in the summer. The ambiance on the river is pretty amazing.

Sports Talk Social - @bozz.sports

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All pictures/screenshots taken by myself or @mrsbozz unless otherwise sourced