Reef Restaurant

I heard great things from my friends about this restaurant so we went tonight. I was able to make a reservation easily for a Sunday early dinner. It was kid friendly and my son loved the lentil soup, baked feta cheese, and risotto. It was spacious and we enjoyed the décor/​ambience. It was romantic so we felt like we were doing an early Valentine’s celebration. My husband enjoyed his glasses of wine and fish. We’ll definitely go back again.

You can’t go wrong with this place. The Mac and cheese lobster and oysters are delicious. Nice ambiance and friendly staff. We will be back for sure.

Came in for brunch with the boyfriend. The place is really pretty decorated in a beach style. The brunch menu is really good. It’s $ 20.00 per person including two alcoholic or non alcoholic beverages. For an additional $ 10.00 you can get unlimited alcoholic beverages: Mimosas, Bellini’s, Bloody Mary’s. The service was great! Definitely going back.

If you are looking for fun atmosphere with delicious cocktails in Forest Hills, there’s no better place in the neighborhood than this cozy friendly place. The bartender is my favorite! She works hard to satisfy every subtle taste of each visitor! Highly recommend to stop at Reef for a fun evening of cocktails, pleasant romantic dinner, or social brunch with your friends!!!

I’ve come here multiple times and it’s because I really enjoy the food. I like the appetizer with the different dips. I always get the linguini with salmon because the salmon is cooked well (not dry) and doesn’t have that fishy flavor which I don’t like. My friends have ordered the fish, steak, pastas and all enjoyed their dishes. The reason why I gave this place 3 stars because the service sucks. The waitresses are nice but they are very understaffed and rarely check in with us.

I wish I could give a star to the food if our waiter would ask if I decided on my entrée. Didn’t happen. It was’t easy to find fresh oysters in Forest Hills on Tuesday late night. They didn’t disappoint in Reef (3 stars to bluepoints). We got really hungry waiting for them for an hr thought. Menu was taken away before I tried to order fish. Had to steal pasta from my friend. I’d go to Keuka or Grill next time. The only thing that my friends were visiting me from Moscow and I wanted to show something exciting in my hood.

One of the best in Forest Hills! Amazing food and ever hanging menu ! Great wines and infused vodkas with great mixologist Sasha behind the bar. Staff very professional and eager to make your experience as pleasant as possible ! Worth every penny!
Best place to host any party or event. Great for dates, children friendly, outdoor sitting and great for large brunch groups. Love love love this place !

This restaurant is nothing less than a hidden gem. I think it’s relatively new, and I am lucky to have stumbled on it. My friend lives upstairs from it, and recommended it. To summarize, I’ve been there twice. Both times, the servers were very gracious and generous. Their bread is unbelievable (even at 11 PM!) — comes served warm and with complimentary hummus. I’d swear it’s baked fresh on premise. I could not stop eating it. They have outdoor seating, and I was lucky to get a table outside on a nice evening.
But it only gets better. I had the tuna, which they somehow do uniquely. I’ve not had it like at Reef, and may have been the best I’ve had. My friend had octopus and calamari, which I don’t eat, but it looked great and he said it was the best he’d had.
For dessert, I had the tiramisu was was very good, though a different style than my preferred style. The cappuccino was perfect.
Whoever designed the menu, and sources the seafood obviously is a perfectionist and takes great pride in their place. Very impressed. Because I rarely look at the prices of things until the check comes, it was also a pleasant surprise with the bill was about 25% less than I was expecting, based on how much food we got, the quality, the service, location, and the experience. Can’t wait to go back.

11 something at night and me and the hubs suddenly decide we want a date night. We end up here and luckily got a table outside. Yay! The waitress was very friendly and tried to be as attentive as possible, despite the fact she was the only one working the tables inside the restaurant and outside of it. They start you off with bread and this tasty hummus. Along with that I ordered the fish soup and he ordered some hamburger sliders. My fish soup was light and a bit too watery for my tastes. It also had a piece of a bread that ended up all soggy, making it hard to eat. I decided to go for the lobster linguini for my entrée. Lobster was exactly that… no seasoning of any kind. Linguini was dry as hell and lacked any hint of garlic or spices… just a bit of oil at the bottom.
The prices were nothing to sneeze at either. 100 bucks for so so food. No more compulsive late night drive arounds.

The 2 stars are for the food. Yum!
Stars taken away for the poor service. Hope that you’re not dehydrated when ordering a drink. Waiting for the waitress will put your life in danger. Charged $ 2.50 for the one and only glass of seltzer water. At that price, I am forced to say it was the most delicious glass of water ever.
I hoped the delicious meal would out weigh the bad service, but no.
The upside is that I can return when there is a different shift.

We have had some really good food at Reef including their fish soup and their outdoor space is very pleasant. That being said we have also been very disappointed in ordering their weeknd brunch salad.
We have ordered this salad a number of times over the last several months, including earlier today and none of the salads included all of the ingredients listed in their menu.
We didn’t make any substitutions but not once was the salad delivered to our table the salad described in their menu, and neither were all the salads consistent with each other.
The food and service has been very inconsistent and won’t be one of our best choices
Each time we point this out to our server and or manger, and although they were pleasant and ended up fixing it it resulted with our party not receiving their food at the same time, and there was no mention of even providing us with a glass of wine for our inconvenience.

My girlfriend and I went to Reef with high expectations and unfortunately were sorely disappointed.
The evening seemed promising; the space was nice and the staff was friendly and accommodating. The appitizers were mediocre at best. Her salad was drowned in dressing and my baked clams were a bit bland. The main courses were where things truly went awry. My swordfish was ok at best; it was not evenly cooked with some parts being tough and others being mushy. Her lobster linguine was an unmitigated disaster. The lobster tail was covered in a membrane and was tough to the point of being inedible. The pink sauce was a goopy and bland ocean surrounding poorly cooked pasta. Granted they did not charge us for this gastronomic insult, but our evening was surely not what it might have been.

Came here for a friend’s bridal shower and I must admit that the space is quaint and nice. It’s probably one of the newer establishments in Forest Hills. We had the downstairs space all to ourselves – not too big and not too small, it was the perfect size for 20 – 30 guests. I appreciated the subtle sea theme throughout their decorations. One downside is that the only bathrooms are downstairs so we constantly had diners enter through our party. Also, they placed our table directly in front the bathroom which turned me off for brunch.
Their BRUNCH MENU seemed pretty STANDARD (eggs benedict, crab cakes, pancakes, etc) but the FOOD WAS SUBPAR. I got the EGGS BENEDICT and it came out LUKE WARM, close to cold. The Hollandaise SAUCE was PEE-​YELLOW and THICK and GLOOPY. There was nothing about my plate that was enticing.
The waiter messed up some orders and did not fulfill requests because of his mess ups which seemed unprofessional and lazy.
**Overall, would not come back because of low quality of food and subpar service.

Came here tonight for dinner. I have to say the food is definitely not fresh.
Baked Clams-​Fishy taste… not fresh
Grilled Calamari-​Greasy
3 Dips-​the eggplant dip came from a can
Meat and Cheese Platter-​just okay
Women’s Bthrm-​Dirty (that says a lot about how clean they really are)
Service-​our waitress must of been having a bad day because she was not happy. no smile​.no nothing. I put my dirty knife on the plate that was finished she took it off and put it back on my table. I said «hey it’s dirty that’s why I’m giving it to you»
I just don’t get it. the knife is DIRTY stained with food!!!
The hostess was a million times better. She had a smile the second we walked in and was a sweetheart throughout our meal. She did more then the waitress did.
Lastly I like the darkness in restaurants super romantic but it was way too dark even with our candle it didn’t help to see our food.
They need to get it together.

Great atmosphere and fresh seafood. The lobster tail and asparagus were succulent. Very nice customer service as well. Will come back.

Before a show at Forrest Hills Stadium, all of the bars and restaurants on Austin St are jam packed. Luckily, we came across Reef and were able to snag a few spots at the bar.
Reef had an effortlessly cool vibe and upon entering I was transported into a quaint little beach town. They nailed the nautical and rustic décor. Seagull statues? Check. Glass buckets of sangria and various other punches? Nailed it. Large open windows that gave the room a bright and airy feel? You bet. Reef– you really know the way into my heart.
This is the type of bar that you can’t order a beer at. You’ve got to get a light and refreshing cocktail. Of course, the one time I opt out of a mojito they end up looking delicious… errrr. Maybe next time. I was still very satisfied with my Hendriks and pomegranate drink. The 12 dollar price point felt a bit steep, but the drink felt strong and I was okay with it.
We split a plate of calamari as a light bite and it was some of the best calamari that I’ve ever had. Perfectly crispy and not too chewy, exactly as it should be.
All in all, Reef is a unique pick amongst the area’s many sports bars. If you are looking for a drink or a bite in Forrest Hills be sure not to overlook.

Sitting with head in hand, I glared intently at the unusually thick cuts of bread upon my table as I settled in for a quick midweek lunch. I’ve never seen bread cut to that gauge, it kept hold of my attention.
Spicy Grilled Calamari was not so tender as its out of the sea brethren, but rather good considering twas from a bag, that has become the standard industry wide — -for years.
The red chili sauce had a sweet peppery flavor in a vinaigrette lucidity. This sweet spice was highly elastic, useable for unusually thick bread dips or as a side dipping modifier to my Salmon Salad.
I’m weaning myself off sauce dumps and now, approaching adding liquid flavor with more sophistication and dignity.
The salad for my salmon was not an deviation from – nor amped up from– the house salad, actually, closer to a specialty salad. Pleasant lettuce holding the beets, walnuts and pomegranate, well spread throughout.
My initial visual impression of my entrée was not favorable as it arrived shredded, an unpleasant look for my take. If anyone’s shredding my salmon, its gonna be me.
But as I dug in, the impression I got was that shredding probably occurred prior to a marinade, and definately before the cooking process.
Listed below is the not so good portion of my lunch experience, my only dining experience.
–A lunch dish I initially hoped to order was unavailable.
–No soup of the day.
–The timing of firing the second course, too early a salad arrival.
–Beets were missing from my salad which was poorly stacked.
–The eyesores of a duct taped broken mirror and a water stained wall from a leak that occurred in the ceiling, both needed immediate repair in my opinion.
The owner appeared to be present, he was watering the plants.

We just had our 3^rd dinner at Reef and it was delicious! Tonight I had the Burrata, which was simple but sublime while mister enjoyed the Oysters. We both chose pasta as Entrees– I sucked down the Lobster Linguini in garlic & oil while he decimated the Orzo with Shrimp — YUM!
Mister washed everything down with a Stella and I sucked down a good glass of Pinot Grigio after a long day. I thought our entire meal enjoyable and will happily return, especially if Ela is our waitress. She is attentive, thoughtful and caring– a winning combination.

Finally decided to try this place out, my girlfriend and I arrived on a snowy Friday evening, the apparent first day of spring! Needless to say, I was expecting things to be normal at all!
The place has a great atmosphere and rather endearing paraphernalia hanging from the walls. We got seated down stairs next the back in a rather cozy spot. My girlfriend in the type to always ask the opinion of the server on what they prefer off the menu, so we usually end up getting to the server well. We started with the mozzarella and tomato which quite honestly was the best I have had since I was in ibiza last year. It was soft and fresh and had a gooey texture. Brilliant. She had the raw oysters, I’m not into raw foods of this type but she said with a satisfied sigh that it was spot on!
Before we entered the place I was complaining to her about how not many places around here have grilled calamari, not a fan of deep friend, anyways lo and behold, on their specials menu, there was a grilled calamari dish. It was amazing! The calamari was cooked perfectly, spicy and tender to the palate. I was very impressed! We will return and try some of their main courses, but all in all, a very happy and full man walked out of this establishment.
My only gripe is that they only serve beer in bottles, I have a weird thing about loving my draught beer, but if the food is that good then I can shelve my need and enjoy the experience as a whole. I look forward to returning!

I must say, this is the BEST service I have received at a restaurant in a very long time. Please keep in mind, I consider myself to be a foodie and eat out a lot to take advantage of New York City’s superb culinary establishments.
Definitely one of the better restaurants in Forest Hills, and the most aesthetically pleasing. My boyfriend and I admired the wood accents. I really liked the fish painting on the wall, and the large mirror really opens up the restaurant. Happy Hour is until 7pm everyday (this was great because we received glasses of wine to compliment the fish at an even better price!)
We ordered the fried calamari to start (tasty and crispy). I ordered the tuna steak, with mashed potatoes. I love the various options the restaurant provides for a side. Needless to say, it would have been great if my entrée came with a vegetable (even if it was a small side). In my opinion, not only would it compliment my entrée, it would make the entrée look more appealing as well. I could have ordered an extra side, but it is my strong belief that if the entrée is ordered with some sort of carb, a vegetable should be added.
I will most definitely be coming back. My boyfriend ordered the scallops (DELICIOUS!!!)