1 STAR experience at a 5 STAR potential ends with a 3 STAR....with explaining
We made reservations for 5:30PM about an hour before the rush. This place gets really crowded being this is a second and new location. The original spot in the South area and was featured on Diner's Drive-In's and Dives. We had a party of 13 but 6 were children and teens who love everything.
Most of the kinks are definitely procedure based which is in relation to large parties. Training will fix this and I am a very easy customer. The chef/cook was definitely out of his element.
We looked them up before deciding on which restaurant. We went because they feature grass fed burgers and 14 craft beers on tap. Both of these we love and if you feature basically burgers....they should be easy, right?
My wife and I with our two sons arrived at 5:10. Early but we looked inside and they were basically empty at that time. We were greeted by what we found out later was the manager of the night. Nice guy had us seated at our table and the waitress just left after seating us. My wife and I looked at each other thinking should would be coming back to ask if we would like drinks or anything until the rest of our party arrived. WRONG....after 10 minutes we flagged her down and asked if we could get something to drink.
She apologized and said no problem, what would we like? I said, "What do you have and what beers do you have on tap?" She then realized we never got menus or their beer list. Maybe this is just me but I would be handing every single adult the 14 craft beer list because this is major income potential for any restaurant.
We order two beers and 2 sodas for the boys. We told her that we were 4 couples and separate bills would be easier for her. She said they do not do separate bills. I said okay "we will figure it out" but then in the same breath, she said since we ordered drinks first we would be on a separate bill. Isn't that the same thing :).
20 minutes later after everyone else arrived we got our first 2 beers and 2 sodas. Mind you, the place was still practically empty. No big deal. Within about 10 minutes they took our orders of 3 macaroni and cheese dishes for the little ones, 1 salad, 1 chicken sandwich and 6 of the same burger. 4 medium rare and 2 medium well.
They brought out 2 burgers and 1 macaroni and cheese plate and the salad in a decent ticket time. We were waiting on 4 burgers and a chicken sandwich. We waited thinking the rest would be following in a minute. WRONG again. 15-20 minutes later a little more came out. The night goes on and on. Wrong burgers, missing burgers, they had to come back to our table literally 15 times asking what we were missing.
2 burgers were forgotten for 2 hours as they brought out honestly a hundred to other people seated after. The place was packed but it is a shame to think of the money lost not turning over our tables.
At 7:45 the last burger came out. It was cooked wrong. We were fine with it at this point but the manager tried saying, "Our beef is grass fed beef and we do not cook them medium well." First off, the why take an order this way then? Also, 2 of our MEDIUM RARE ordered burgers we ate were cooked MEDIUM WELL.
Let me finish by saying he was bending over backwards to make this night better for our party which we APPRECIATE COMPLETELY. He handled the situation like a manager should. Especially since all the mistakes they were making in the back were not caught by the expeditor and our waitress was catching them as she tried to serve us. I felt horrible for her.
I do not want to say exactly what he did for us because I do not want others to try and take advantage. Nice people, nice place, great concept, great location, we will try them again, they just need to work out procedure and grilling flaws. Everything is easily fixable and I love the style of the restaurant. Good burgers and good beers are the type of places my wife and I eat at many times a month.
THIS REVIEW WILL HAVE AN UPDATE......to be continued......Enjoy (small party advised) until further notice read more