O'Charley's, Oh My

O'Charley's
1920 North Eastman Road 
Kingsport, TN 37664
(423) 246-8868

I got a $10 discount card in the mail today for O'Charley's restaurants.  The way it worked was $10 discount on any dine in or take out bill over $25 not including their "2 can dine for $15.99" special.  I hadn't eaten there in probably two years as none of us cared for the food or the attitude of the staff the last time.  Unfortunately, not a lot has changed after our visit this evening.

We were met inside by the hostess who seemed to get pretty upset when we asked for a table instead of a booth.  It was about 5:30PM and the place wasn't 1/4 full outside of a private birthday party in one of the side rooms.  She took us to the tables section of which none were occupied and proceeded to look around for a bit to decide where to seat us, which seemed strange.  She finally chose a table, plunked down our menus and walked away to get a dish cloth to clean the table off which already looked okay.  She wiped the table and just walked off.  No, "your server will be so and so", no, "have a good meal", nothing.  In a few minutes our server arrived and seemed pleasant enough but all through the meal continued to address me as "Buddy".  I was plenty old enough to be his dad and I wouldn't have been offended with "sir" or anything slightly more respectful than "Buddy".  To me that's almost as bad as some of these younger servers calling everyone at the table "you guys", especially if there are older females in the party.

We looked the menu over and after placing our order, we had to ask him for silverware while we waited after he brought out a basket of some large puffy rolls and sweet butter.  We all ordered water with lemon as our beverage and he brought out the glasses of water and a small bowl of lemon wedges.  That was the last time he mentioned our drinks and never once offered refills even when we were all empty by the end of the meal.  Hmm.

We ordered a spinach and artichoke dip appetizer, which came out in a few minutes.  Compared to Cheddar's, it was a lot smaller serving at the same price and my wife got a surprise in the second bite: a long, very wavy brown hair was hanging from her tortilla chip with dip!  The server was alerted and he called the manager and they offered to give us another serving, which we accepted.  At the time, the older lady manager was hardly cordial or apologetic until after the replacement arrived.  After our entrees arrived, she did come back and said they would remove it from the bill, which was okay by me as it wasn't that appetizing anyway. 

Our daughter had her wisdom teeth out a couple of days ago, so she ordered a chicken noodle soup and a side order of "smashed" potatoes.  I ordered a "Grande Sirloin", which was a smaller than expected seasoned steak which came on a bed of the smashed potatoes with some tiny fried onion rings. The plate, which wasn't large, looked pretty empty.  I had inquired about getting a side order of cole slaw with it and to my amazement, they don't offer coleslaw as a side even though they have fish and chips and burgers.  My wife ordered a chicken bleu cheese and bacon sandwich.  My steak was pretty good although I and my daughter couldn't help but notice that the smashed potatoes had chunks of potato in it that weren't quite done.  My daughter did like the chicken noodle soup but wasn't feeling well and had it packaged to go.  I tried a bite of my wife's chicken sandwich and while it tasted okay, the chicken was noticeably dry and overcooked.  The manager came back out and said we could have a dessert on the house and we decided to try a mini order of their apple cobbler ($1.99), which was quite tasty.  Still with empty glasses and no offer of a refill the server brought out the check and after laying the discount card along with my credit card on the bill, it took over ten minutes for him to come back with the ticket.  He did come by once during that time and said they were still trying to figure out the bill.  Hmm, I wonder what they'll do when they get buried with these discount cards over the weekend.

All and all, I'll have give them a 'C' grade on this visit.  If I'd had to pay full price for everything and they hadn't comped the spinach dip, I'd be more than a little unhappy with the general service, quality and quantity of their food.  They need to have Gordon Ramsay come through or something as they intentionally or not violate many of the things a good restaurant, chain or otherwise, should be about.  I guess I'll be going to Cheddar's next time I feel the urge to eat at a casual dining establishment.  They've rarely disappointed me over the years.