Spice Island Grill (10 N Sierra Madre)

Al set up a dinner evening at the Spice Island Grill, a new Jamaican place downtown Colorado Springs. Spice Island Grill is in a building that used to be a Mexican restaurant and you can still feel the southwestern influence – you really don’t get a “Jamaica-mon” feeling – but hey – ambiance isn’t everything.  Let’s see how the food is!

Mike and I were just a few minutes early so we went into the bar area to wait.  Well, not really a bar area – yes, it was in fact a bar – but was evidently being used as a bussed dishes drop-off, napkin-rolling table, oversized stereo location, and a “I’m not here to work; I’m just watching TV and taking up customer space” space. After we milled about for a few minutes and were only greeted by the napkin-rolling lady, (who was very friendly), we retreated back out the front desk area and asked for our table. Good decision.

Once at the table, Mike and I both got that evening’s drink special – rum punch – which was actually quite good.  And, since we were a little hungry, we got a sampler appetizer plate – pick any three, so we got fried plantains, fish balls (insert your own joke here), and the spicy shrimp.  The fried plantains were excellent – just like the ones my old Army WAC barracks neighbor cooked up in our shared kitchen. The fish balls were kinda like hush puppies but better – different dough and lots of fish flakes – I liked them.  The spicy shrimp was spiced on the shell – so when you peeled off the shell – there went the spices.  Then, they became ordinary shrimp – and didn’t taste very spicy. 

Once our dinner companions joined us, we ordered dinner.  I requested the Jamaican tilapia with mashed potatoes and Mike asked for the goat curry with one of the house side-dish specialties – mac & cheese.  The wait for our dinners was quite lengthy – especially when we saw our server outside on his cell phone, apparently unconcerned that we needed water and another round of drinks, not to mention our food. 

But, our food finally came – and we all dug in.  My tilapia was very spicy – bordering on too hot.  In fact, for most folks, I’m sure it would have been too hot.  The mashed potatoes were actually a combo mashed and chunks and were good.  Mike said while his goat was okay, there were too many bones – big bones – (and that complaint mirrored another review about their goat dish) and just not enough meat.  The mac & cheese was okay, too – but nothing all that special. 

During the meal, I ordered the mango rum drink and while it was mango-y, it was also water-y. And I do wish it had been more rum-y. 

We found service to be very lackadaisical – yet there seemed to be about one employee per table milling about the small dining room.  I’m really not sure what all those people did, ‘cause we only saw the hostess (who refused to take drink orders and said she’d find our waiter) and our waiter (who either dashed by and we couldn’t catch his attention or was outside on his phone) actually do any “work.”  Hmmmm.

 After we finished up our meals and asked for our checks, we realized we had not indicated separate checks. When we asked our waiter to split up the bill (just between Mike and I and another couple) – the answer was basically no – but he did give us a very confusing and hard to read receipt which was impossible to decipher and indicated we could figure it out ourselves – so we ended up doing some quick calculations. Not great customer service on that point.

So – Spice Island Grill – Do Again?  Naa.  Mi no go deh.  (Unless I get a really bad hankering for fried plantains and fish balls!)