Al's Garden

Or Olive Garden for the rest of us. My kids used to call it Al's or something pretty close, and they love it, fresh bread sticks, cheese, drinks. As for Jess and me, not so much any more. Let me just recount two of the past 3 visits we had to the Garden.

I will start with today, because the other one was quite surprising and very funny.

There is a new location that we hadn't been to since it opened and so we thought that we would give it a shot. First off, there was a strange odor when we walked in, warning sign number one I guess, it wasn't terribly strong but every now and then it would waft by. Smelled a bit like bad milk or cheese, but we stayed anyways. Our server was a young man, he looked a little lost shall we say, but this location hasn't been opened too long so we'll give him the benefit of the doubt. So we order our drinks just fine, they are delivered and a little later so are some bread sticks, but no soup yet. So we hand out the bread and it is gone in just a couple of minutes. Server comes back offers to bring more bread sticks, no mention of the soup. Then our pasta is delivered by a second server. We mention that we hadn't got the soup yet and would like that first so that we don't have both items in front of us getting cold or anything.

So eventually we get the soup, it was good and hot. Also some fresh bread sticks had arrived also. We are doing alright. We had finished the soup so the server comes back and asks if we are done, we say yes he can take the bowls, then I think he asked we wanted more, we assumed he meant more bread because it was gone, so we say yes. In a bit he arrives with more soup. We ask if we could get our pasta instead. After a few moments our pasta arrives, we had ordered the whole wheat linguine with Alfredo, but instead have regular linguine with alfredo. Jess likes to order the sauce on the side but when she mixes the sauce and pasta it is not hot. Mine was already mixed and was hot. So eventually Jess asks a different server, because ours hasn't come back for the obligatory two minute quality check which is pretty standard in restaurants. The girl gets Jess some hot alfredo sauce, but by that time her pasta has cooled quite a bit. Another associate, one who helps deliver the food actually asks how it is, we explain that we had ordered the whole wheat pasta, but no big deal, and that the sauce that Jess first got was cold and all that, he offers to bring us whole wheat pasta and hot alfredo sauce and fresh bread, but it never shows up. We had been there for quite some time with all the corrections and mix ups, other guests had come and gone, so Jess asks to speak to the manager, we are just wanting to bring this to their attention, that's all.

The manager comes over and Jess explains that we had had several mix ups and had been there for quite while, etc. etc. He just says don't worry about the check, I'll take care of it and bring you some desserts. Not what we were looking for but, hey, having been a restaurant manager in the past, I understand he was just doing what he thought would satisfy his guests. Three large pieces of assorted cheesecake show up, we really were more interested in just getting out of there and going about our day, but we tried each of the desserts, our kids licked the whipped cream off one piece. Finally our server shows up and apologizes, we say don't worry about it, and finally leave. By the way, we did leave a decent tip, we felt we should since we didn't have to pay for any of the food.

On to the more entertaining of the visits, which was at a different location (obviously) on my birthday. Our server on this evening was an older lady, who was from Spain and said that she had worked for Olive Garden for 20 years or something like that. She has a lot of pride in her workplace, and really went to great lengths to impress us with the selections on the menu and everything else about Olive Garden. Really no problems for most of the night, I think that she forgot to bring an extra water that we had ordered or something like that, but like I said no big deal. I ordered the chicken alfredo against my better judgement because it seems you never know how good the chicken is going to be. It turns out to be probably the worst I had ever had, extremely tough and chewy. I tried a few pieces to make sure it wasn't just a one off, but each piece I tried was no good. So I pick out the chicken and eat the pasta only, just fine. I ask the server if she would not charge me for the chicken as it was not any good tonight, and she was shocked!!! In her words in 20 years no one had ever complained that their chicken was not good, but she would not charge me. She repeated the 20 year thing a couple of times. So we get our check, no problem, she had not charged us. Then, when she brings back the receipt and some to go boxes which we had not requested, she starts filling the to go boxes for us. She asks me if I want to take the chicken, my answer "No thank you. It wasn't good and I don't want it." She says let me try it, and then she takes my used fork and stabs a bit of chicken and eats it. As she is chewing she waves her hands and says "Oh this is wonderful, wonderful chicken. There is no problem with this chicken." Jess was trying not to laugh as the server did this, because I hadn't realized it was my used fork, but she had. Then she says, you take this chicken home, you can make it better for yourself and make some hash browns? What is she talking about? So then she scoops the nasty chicken into the box with the fork she had just used. Unbelievable. Jess and I just stared at each other, we couldn't believe what had just happened, it was very unreal. We had a good laugh that evening. We also took the to go boxes in fear that if we didn't, Julia would chase us out to our car with the boxes babbling on about hash browns.

So, no more Al's Garden for us. Too bad for the kids.