Lock 15 Brewing Company

Very nice outdoor patio

A relaxing respite for us — our second lunch here — when we drive up from Cincinnati to have my crossbow serviced at Ten Point Hunters Outlet Pro Shop in Mogadore.

The inside is attractive, but we’ve only walked through it to access the restrooms. The covered patio is our hangout here, its gentle breeze, pretty woods-and-flower-bordered setting, where our dog is welcome, is most enjoyable, even on a hot day.

The food is quite good, the beer is average to above, and the service has both times been excellent.

The music — soft rock — is unobtrusive in the background. And the immediate access to the river walk along the Little Cuyahoga is quite convenient.

 

 

 

This location is uniquely focused on a restaurant dining experience moreso than beer and brewing, but they do still have a full taplist of all house brewed originals. It's a very nicely built out space with a perfectly long, wooden bar and a wide open view of the kitchen. The seating varies from small to large tables, as well as a fairly large outdoor patio when the weather is nice.

Since food takes priority here, at least from their point of view, it is indeed worth ordering. It's not mind blowing, but is refreshingly on point as far as quality. I reluctantly ordered ceviche, cognizant of how thoroughly most restaurants in this area have been fucking it up, since it recently became trendy to try one's hand at the dish in Akron. To my surprise, it was freshly prepared and just perfectly tender without being overly 'cooked' by the acid (i.e. not sitting for hours/days). The beet bao buns I got weren't dry and the shrimp tacos were pretty delicious.

The beers were all of a nice quality, not stunning but serviceable. The stout was the most enjoyable for me, and the NE IPA was pretty drinkable. The porter as well.

I had an interesting service experience here the first time I stopped in, shortly after they opened. Their kitchen closed early despite having a very strong emphasis on their chef-driven food, even over their beer. While I'm giving them a pass on that, I still think they have service issues, or at least management issues, as they had a single bartender manning the bar on a busy Saturday afternoon, taking care of all the orders for 100+ customers for all the servers, plus serving the bar patrons and waiting on the high tops around the bar. She herself was rocking it hardcore, but that's a situation they need to try harder to avoid.

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In 2023, the service issues unfortunately continue to diminish the customer experience. Their servers, whether young or old, simply aren't suited for the job. They've consistently shown that they are unable to remember or write down orders, which too frequently results in incorrect or even missing orders. They don't even check in on their tables enough to address these issues promptly, which is particularly egregious when it's not even very busy. This all boils down to inadequate management and training, so I'm reducing my original 3.78 score.