Ignite Bar & Grille

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OPEN NOW - Closes at 11:30pm

I had planned a very special birthday celebration for my daughter and soon to be daughter-in-law. With their boyfriends and my husband, we planned a night at the Nutcracker ballet with dinner first! We had heard Ignite was really good so tried to make reservations a week in advance. I was told by their staff they don't take reservations, but if I called 15 miinutes before arrival they would prepare a table for 6 for us. On our way to Manchester we called exactly 15 minutes ahead of time. My daughter used her cell phone and had it on speaker phone mode. She asked to leave our name for a table for 6 and was told rudely, "we don't take names". She explained we had called a week earlier and had been told by an Ignite staff member that they did do this. After quite a few minutes of back and forth the employee finally took our name "Ben" table for 6! We got there right on time, even though we had to walk quite a distance in freezing weather (in dress clothes too). We were glad to see a table for 6 all prepared The hostess, a 30ish woman, asked us "how many" we told her we had called ahead, the name was "Ben" table for 6. She said she was sorry but they didn't take names AND that table was reserved!! We told her she must be mistaken as we did call in and were told we would have a table ready. She said "you are all WRONG". She said we never called, we disagreed and she went out back, returning with a new story "oh yeah you did call and left the name "Ben" but for 4 not 6! We all explained that all 6 of us heard the call and we would like to stay. There were two tables for 4 that were empty, yet this woman would not accommodate us! She sent us out into the cold with no other restaurant available for our party! Luckily, I called Fratello's, explained our mess and they took us in, rushed our orders, drinks, etc. even providing birthday cake for the girls and got us to our show on time! None of us will ever go to Ignite again, period. Unless you like to gamble, make reservations somewhere else or go hungry!

I have to say that after living in Manchester, NH for over 20 years, this has been the worst place I have ever been. The guy that owns this place doesn't even work, he sits at the bar and hits on every young girl that walks through the door and makes his daughter slave away by doing all the cooking and all the drink making. He also will not cut anyone off when they have had too much, he is clearly out for money. Not only is the whole staff out of their mind, the food is awful. I got chicken tenders that were totally burnt, I asked to get a new order and they came out exactly the same. Now onto drinks, I don't remember exactly what I ordered but it was one of their signature martinis, lets just say if I got fruit punch it would have been exactly the same but for $5.00 less. Needless to say, I will never go there again and hope that you will take this into consideration when choosing a restaurant.