Worst restaurant experience you've ever had?

[GoOKC1991]

It can be wrong food, long wait, never getting your food, etc.

For me it was at Red Robin in Indianapolis, we waited almost an hour to get seated, and then when we were seated, we waited 30 minutes, waiters and waitress wouldn't answer us, so we got up and left.

[RadicalModerate]

They actually have "waiters" and "waitresses" at "Red Robin"?
(never mind. obviously they don't. but it's a "burger place" so . . .)

[MWCGuy]

They actually have "waiters" and "waitresses" at "Red Robin"?
(never mind. obviously they don't. but it's a "burger place" so . . .)

Red Robin does have waitstaff (At least the last time I went anyway.) They are causal dining like Chili's or Fridays. Like most casual dining restaurants you can walk in and get a to go order at the bar.

[Roger S]

Pretty much any time I've eaten at Chili's.... I'm pretty sure it's just conincidence because if they served everyone like they have me. They would be out of business. For some reason I become invisible to wait staff when I enter one though.

[MadMonk]

I had a bad experience at Olive Garden once. It was during lunch, and after we sat down (four of us), our drink orders were taken and promptly delivered, but then nothing for the next 15 minutes, no salad/breadsticks, etc., just no contact with our waitress at all. We even flagged down a different waiter and asked him to get our waitress for us. She never came back. For all I know she quit and walked out. We finally got up to leave and I grabbed a manager on the way out and explained why we were leaving and asked how much we owe for the drinks (just sodas and tea). He basically gave me a half-hearted sorry and said no charge. I've been to this particular OG before and a few times since and everything has been fine except for that one weird experience.

[Jesseda]

This happened about 10 years ago, I took my then 6 year old niece who was visiting from California to bricktown to ride the boat and eat at zios, while at zios just finishing our good lunch there was two young male employees having a conversation right by my table and they got loud about who they "tag teamed the other night" and they went into details about what waitress they will tag next. I had to get the manager over who then pulled these guys in the back I guess to the office. I was disgusted and my little niece thank gawd didn't really know what the heck they were talking about. That was probably the worst restaurant experience I ever had.

[catch22]

Waffle House in Moore...

Waitress begins her cleaning for her shift in the middle of my meal: by getting buckets of water and tossing water all over the dining room floor and allowing it to splash up and create a huge mess. Was truly disgusted...

[ctchandler]

Opening month at the Texas Roadhouse, Memorial and Penn. I didn't receive my steak until my wife was done eating. They were both medium rare filets. I told the manager and he really didn't seem to care. I told him to put my meal in a carryout container and we left. Emailed the company and they sent me a $50 certificate, so understanding that new places do have problems, we decided to go back, ordered and didn't get our appetizer till after we had finished our meal. In a nice way I told him he could keep his appetizer thinking he would take it off of the bill, but he didn't. Well, revenge ten years later, my friend from London wanted to eat there when she was visiting so reluctantly I took her. And Wow, everything was perfect except the bill. My friend paid and I asked her how much it was and something wasn't right, it was a little more than half of what it should have been. I looked at the check and they only listed one filet and baked potato, but they did have her drink and my beer. For the first time in my life, I didn't feel obligated to go back and correct a mistake, I figured it was pay back time for my first two screwed up dinners.
C. T.

[OKCisOK4me]

I've never had any issues at a restaurant. I'm an easy going guy I guess...

[Plutonic Panda]

Denny's in Edmond off of Second Street right next to IHOP. I was with my friend and his mom right after we saw the new Tron that came out a few years back. She was super nice at first and something happened, she lost her wagon or something. She asked if I would like something to drink and I asked if they had pulp free orange juice and she said yes. She brought me the juice back and it had pulp in it, so I didn't say anything and took small sips to make it appear I was drinking it. It didn't work and she asked why I wasn't drinking it and I told her why. So she grabbed the juice in a really aggressive manor and half of it spilled on my friends mom and she threw the glass in the kitchen and screamed at the top of her lungs "How about I go to my house and grind up gold for you, would you drink that!!!!".

I will never be going that Denny's again.

[ctchandler]

OKCisOK4me,
Just curious, what does easy going have to do with what happened to me? I'm about as easy going as they come but when they don't prepare/serve what I paid for, that doesn't have anything to do with my personality.
C. T.

I've never had any issues at a restaurant. I'm an easy going guy I guess...

[Bellaboo]

OKCisOK4me,
Just curious, what does easy going have to do with what happened to me? I'm about as easy going as they come but when they don't prepare/serve what I paid for, that doesn't have anything to do with my personality.
C. T.

I can vouch for this ^^^, CT is about as good as an individual as there is.....and easy going at that. Worked around him a good 15 - 18 years or so.....

[ou48A]

Guymon, 1986 at a small chain steak house. It was just like a scene that you would expect to see on a movie like Vacation.

When asked if there French fries were frozen our waitresses said how else would they come. When I said sometimes restaurants cut them fresh, she said “like we have time”.
So we put in our order and while the cooks were preparing the meal she sat down at a table right next to us to peal carrots using 5 gallon buckets...She was smoking a cigarette while doing this and letting her ashes fall into the good carrot bucket. By now my wife was fuming. We revived our meal which wasn't anything great. I revived the bill and I got up and paid at the register.. When I returned to the table my wife didn't want to leave any tip but I insisted that we leave something so she didn't think we had forgot to tip her. So I left a nickle below a full glass of water that I had turned upside down on the table.... LOL.

As we left we saw several stray cats going though their garbage.....

[Dustin]

Planet Hollywood - Orlando. The service was horrible, the tables/chairs/memorabilia was all disgusting and not clean, and the food was just god awful.

No wonder most of them have already closed down.

[Ginkasa]

We were at the Warren's balcony a few years ago. We went on a Sunday for a 7:00 show, dinner and a movie. Our plan was to split an entree at the beginning, and then get a dessert near the latter part of the movie. The management made an announcement however that the bar and kitchen would be closing at 8:00, less than halfway through the movie itself. I thought this was a little disappointing since, IMO, the food service is part of the value of the higher ticket prices, but whatever. We decided to just get the dessert right after the entree.

We ordered the food as the previews started and we waited. And waited. And waited. At 7:45ish I thought they had forgotten about us and got up to find someone. I went to the bar and asked about my food. They found my food sitting in a to go box and plastic bag. They claimed the waiter entered the order as to go.

I took the food back to my seat and felt self conscious as I pulled it out of the noisy plastic bag. They had placed wax paper on top of the pasta we ordered, so the sauce and cheese was stuck and dripping off of it as we took the wax off. It was a mess. When the waiter later brought the bill he blamed it on the kitchen staff. I was not offered any concession with the bill. I looked for a manager, but there was no one in the balcony area, so I went downstairs to the guest services area. I asked for a manager, but when one came he told me I'd have to speak to a balcony manager and sent me back upstairs.

I trudged back up and found someone who happened to be the GM. He offered me to see another balcony movie for free sometime, but I had to call him to set it up. I would have preferred a pass or coupon or refund or something, but I didn't say anything about it.

And that's about it. I've had some waiters forget about me, but those aren't as fun to tell.

[OKCisOK4me]

OKCisOK4me,
Just curious, what does easy going have to do with what happened to me? I'm about as easy going as they come but when they don't prepare/serve what I paid for, that doesn't have anything to do with my personality.
C. T.

I wasn't using you as an example.

[ctchandler]

OKCisOK4me,
I knew that, I just wanted to know how being a "nice guy" could have helped. I think that sometimes nice guys come in last and I seldom complain about anything but when they kick sand in my face, I do take offense.
C. T.

[Roger S]

We were at the Warren's balcony a few years ago.

Two of the three times we were in the balcony we had issues with the service..... The reason we have been three times is because we were comped free passes the first two times due to the service issues. The third time was apparently the charm.

[GoOKC1991]

Denny's in Edmond off of Second Street right next to IHOP. I was with my friend and his mom right after we saw the new Tron that came out a few years back. She was super nice at first and something happened, she lost her wagon or something. She asked if I would like something to drink and I asked if they had pulp free orange juice and she said yes. She brought me the juice back and it had pulp in it, so I didn't say anything and took small sips to make it appear I was drinking it. It didn't work and she asked why I wasn't drinking it and I told her why. So she grabbed the juice in a really aggressive manor and half of it spilled on my friends mom and she threw the glass in the kitchen and screamed at the top of her lungs "How about I go to my house and grind up gold for you, would you drink that!!!!".

I will never be going that Denny's again.

Been there three times, had awful service each time, same with the one on May (Which closed and is now S&B)

I will not be going to any Denny's, at least around here, again.

[GoOKC1991]

Opening month at the Texas Roadhouse, Memorial and Penn. I didn't receive my steak until my wife was done eating. They were both medium rare filets. I told the manager and he really didn't seem to care. I told him to put my meal in a carryout container and we left. Emailed the company and they sent me a $50 certificate, so understanding that new places do have problems, we decided to go back, ordered and didn't get our appetizer till after we had finished our meal. In a nice way I told him he could keep his appetizer thinking he would take it off of the bill, but he didn't. Well, revenge ten years later, my friend from London wanted to eat there when she was visiting so reluctantly I took her. And Wow, everything was perfect except the bill. My friend paid and I asked her how much it was and something wasn't right, it was a little more than half of what it should have been. I looked at the check and they only listed one filet and baked potato, but they did have her drink and my beer. For the first time in my life, I didn't feel obligated to go back and correct a mistake, I figured it was pay back time for my first two screwed up dinners.
C. T.

Been there many times and still go....only problem I've ever had was before we got seated, the waitress was texting and finished and sent the message (probably three minutes long). After we were seated, we told the manager who was clearly not happy...don't know if he ever did anything but I haven't see that waitress since (been back about 8 times since).

[Jeepnokc]

Ruth's Chris in Vegas....large party in which they put us in back room. Approx 20 of us and only gave us one waiter with a couple of assistants that couldn't take orders. Waited so long for him to come back to take drink orders that several of us gave up and went to bar to get our own drinks. Walked by the next empty private room and he is in there smoking a cigarette. Food was very average and not what you would expect from this level of a restaurant. Went to another Ruth's Chris in another city with friends and wasn't much better so I swore of them. Most people complain about chains but the good high end ones like Capital Grill, Mortons, Del Frisco, McCormick and Schmidts, etc are consistently good no matter where you are at. We still try local places like Gibson's in Chicago (excellent) and Bern's in Tampa (supposedly largest wine list/collection in US and hand cut to order steaks) but sometimes when travelling...you want something you know and trust. Our local places like Red and the Ranch are just as good. (I left out Mickey Mantles as the last time I ate there, the steak quality was poor)

[kevinpate]

Some places have far better reputations than they deserve, and folks keep the myth alive. It's a foodie version of an old tale where folks just won't be the one to diss something ...
I suppose one could call it The Emperor's Entree syndrome.

[ljbab728]

Enigma Grill at the Crowne Plaza Hotel on NW Expressway. I took my car to the car wash at 63rd and May to have the carpet shampooed. I had a $25.00 gift certificate for that place and decided to walk there for lunch while I waited for the car. When I walked in there were a few other people who were ordering and being served. I sat down and waited, and waited, and waited a little more. The waitress walked by many times (although she never came close to me). I thought maybe I was invisible. I tried to catch her eye and raised my hands several times but nothing worked. After about 20 minutes I just got up and walked out because I thought it was silly to have to get up and catch her because I wanted to eat. I didn't really see anyone there to talk to at the hotel that wasn't very busy so I just sent them an email about it later. I never heard back from them at all and Hooters got my money that day.

[Plutonic Panda]

guymon, 1986 at a small chain steak house. It was just like a scene that you would expect to see on a movie like vacation.

When asked if there french fries were frozen our waitresses said how else would they come. When i said sometimes restaurants cut them fresh, she said “like we have time”.
So we put in our order and while the cooks were preparing the meal she sat down at a table right next to us to peal carrots using 5 gallon buckets...she was smoking a cigarette while doing this and letting her ashes fall into the good carrot bucket. By now my wife was fuming. We revived our meal which wasn't anything great. I revived the bill and i got up and paid at the register.. When i returned to the table my wife didn't want to leave any tip but i insisted that we leave something so she didn't think we had forgot to tip her. so i left a nickle below a full glass of water that i had turned upside down on the table.... Lol.

as we left we saw several stray cats going though their garbage.....

nice!!!!!!

[Prunepicker]

Two occasions that immediately come to mind.

The Hereford House in Kansas City. The Strip Steak was incredibly tough.
The manager tried to tell me that Strip Steaks, the large part of a
Porterhouse, aren't known for their tenderness. That was news to me
because I've never had a tough Strip Steak. We didn't get a refund but
he lowered the price on the bill.

The salad was simple, like the cafes of old, and House dressing was
fantastic.

Next is the Texas Road House on S.W. 3rd. Awful service, screwed up
the order and it took forever to get our food. After 30 minutes I went
into the kitchen to get our waitress. She had completely forgot about us.
Unlike my experience in North Carolina, this was totally unacceptable. I
won't go back unless some is paying.

When I filed a complaint it was dismissed with the usual and disgusting
pop culture, "sorry, tee hee."