I just had the worst dining experience in my entire life.

[XNASA]

My brother and his buddy called earlier. They were downtown and wanted to see if I'd like to go to lunch. We tried a new place that they had walked past.

Nice open loft with a bar. White linen. I ordered a Tuna Salad on wheat toast with fries. My brother and buddy ordered a couple of mushroom burgers.

Only one other table was occupied.

An hour and 15 minutes later they brought out the burgers. Cold, grey, burgers with no condiments and cold fries. Then they brought my order. A chicken sandwich, which is sent back because it was wrong. 10 minutes later they bring me a tuna salad on untoasted wheat with chips. The chips were cold!!!

We got up, and walked out.

Chicagoans, this place is at 212 N. Canal. Don't ever eat there. Horrible service, and even worse food.

[Abelman]

1. The Hell?

How do you even do that type of thing? An hour and fifteen minutes? Did you check the kitchen, maybe there were chimps or something doing the cooking.

[XNASA]

2. I have no idea. All I can think was....

..they were completely unprepared for lunch and hadn't even fired up the kitchen until after we walked in.

MY brother said he glanced in the kitchen on the way out and that there were three guys standing around.

Luckily, I knew a place that has fast reliable lunch fare only a block away. We were eating in less than 10 minutes after we walked out.

[DS1]

11. It's happened to me, my father, and a co-worker at a newly opened

restaurant. It ended up taking so long we decided to fight back. We were seated within plain sight of the host(ess) area where people wait to get seated. We all leaned waaaay back in our seats, arms hanging loosely by our sides, heads dropped back as if we were asleep. Mouths wide open, dead to the world, the whole bit.

We got served PRETTY DAMN QUICK after that, and were even offered some free cake. We said we no thanks as we wanted to get home before dinner.

[Cyndee_Lou_Who]

3. Was that...

Shark Bar?

[XNASA]

4. It's the place that was Shark Bar.

I think it's something else now.

Funny thing. Years ago, when I worked for a sound equipment company, I actually help install a music/PA in there. It was a lease. They stopped paying so one day I went back with a couple of other guys for muscle and we ripped everything out, right in the middle of lunch.

That place is cursed.

[Jessica]

5. I usually try to defend people in food service, but ...

some people just suck. Stupid cold chips.

[XNASA]

6. They were completely clueless.

Honestly. Our server was wearing a shirt that I swear had been rolled up in a ball until he put it on. I've never seen a more wrinkled article of clothing in my life. Just one thing after another was nightmarish.

I actually lost my appetite. Seriously, it was that bad.

[RandomKoolzip]

13. Shit. Well, maybe if they got paid living wages, they'd give a shit about

wrinkled shirts and hopping when you all say "frog." As it stands, the only motivation they probably have to get anything done is getting their work THERE done so that they can then go to their SECOND job on time.

:eyes:

[Zuni]

17. maybe they have shitty jobs because they don't do any work?

people who don't do shit can't expect the best jobs, good grades etc etc.

Besides, waiting tables in a downtown resturaunt you can easily make 100-150$ a shift. I worked at resturaunts in Downtown Annapolis and Baltimore's Inner Harbor and it is not hard to make 100-150 a shift you are good, polite and quick.

[RandomKoolzip]

19. Maybe they have shitty jobs because they have talents that aren't

marketable. I know a lot of people in food service and retail who are brilliant, hardworking musicians, writers, artists, etc. But you can't survive being one of those, so you take a sustenence job to make it and find that since it hardly pays the bills, you have to take another. So then you find you're working 80 hours a week and your former talents have fallen by the wayside. By then, you take your relaxation when you can get it, even if it has to be standing completely still in a kitchen for twenty minutes.



People who are forced to work 2 or 3 jobs just to survive are not lazy.

[Jessica]

20. I agree & understand what you're saying ...

But, I just don't think it's an excuse to do your job poorly. Yes, we've all had bad days ... I had my share of them as a waitress. But when a restaurant is virtually empty, the service should'nt be crappy. I'm a firm believer that the customer is NOT always right & there are many factors that contribute to poor service (bad morning, busy shift, slow kitchen, crappy boss); however, people who hate their jobs shouldn't take it out on the customers. Just my opinion, of course.

[Zuni]

21. I did not say they were all lazy

but I do know people who have shitty jobs because they are underachievers and put no effort into their work, school, job training etc.

Not everyone who has a shitty job is there because of inherent unfairness of the system either. many of them make no effort to do their job well, or to get good grades.

[johnnie]

7. Maybe they don't take kindly to riff raff

Lol... Ok, kidding.
I'll make sure I don't go there when I am ever in Chicago.
How can they stay in business that way?

[XNASA]

12. I don't know. The lunch scene is very competitive here.

We were asking ourselves the same thing just after we walked out. The consensus was, "That place will be gone soon."

[tridim]

8. Having worked as a line cook, my guess..

Some line cooks are really bad at their job. When you get three bad line cooks working together, the effect multiplies. That's probably what happened. Either that, or the old staff was mass fired and the supervisor was working the kitchen (that's usually very bad news).

[Lydia Leftcoast]

25. Yes, I had an agonizingly slow experience at a pasta place in Minneapolis

Superficially, it looked like a place in Portland that could serve you up pasta and a salad in ten minutes. They had it down to a system, and the lunch crowd could get a reasonable, filling meal, in and out in 30 minutes.

I was trying to grab a bite before a concert, so I dropped into this superficially similar pasta place, and should have been warned when the waitress took the orders of three other tables that looked pretty settled in (they were drinking wine) before she got around to me 20 minutes later. I asked her what was quick, since I had a concert to go to in 40 minutes.

She gave her opinion. I ordered what she suggested, and then I sat there. And sat there.

My pasta arrived 15 minutes before the last minute I could leave and still catch the concert two blocks away.

Meanwhile, to my astonishment, a man walked in and was served immediately.

I complained about the slowness, and the waitress (one of two) just shrugged and said, "We're busy tonight."

I don't care how busy you are. You should acknowledge customers within a few minutes of their arrival, even if you can't get to them right away. You shouldn't let them ferment in wine for 15 minutes before asking for their food orders. You should have a system so that making penne with pesto and throwing together a green salad doesn't take 25 minutes, especially if the customers have warned you that they are trying to make a concert.

I could see the cooks from my table, and they obviously had no system. They seemd to reinvent each dish from scratch, and they cut up the lettuce and greens for each salad individually--as if it was a shock to them that people should order salad with their pasta. They had this, "Oh yeah, what do we do next?" air about them, as opposed to the precisely choreographed system at the Portland outfit.

I ended up having to run to the concert and made it in just as the doors closed. (Getting my check was another wait, and I actually had to put my coat on and head out the door before the waitress woke up--and that's what it looked like--and handed me my check.)

That was one badly managed restaurant. The employees' disorganization was obviously the result of no one being in charge, but

I should have left, but the only other place open within walking distance was McDonald's.

[Rabrrrrrr]

9. All you needed were some screaming kids, smokers, and

a few people talking loudly on cell phones to make it the perfect hell.

What a shitty experience you had! Unbelievable.

It's amazing, but every now again a restaurant really does manage to get everything wrong.

[Worst Username Ever]

10. Is it either called Club 212 or 212 On the River?

http://metromix.chicagotribune.com/dining/43541,0,229005.venue

http://centerstage.net/music/clubs/212.html

[XNASA]

14. That's the place. It's not on the river.

It's across the street from a parking lot that is separated from the river by a set of train tracks. It's easily 100 yards from the river.

Caribbean and Southern cuisine? That's got to be some kind of joke. I think I'll have to write a review. Thanks WUE.

[RandomKoolzip]

15. Sounds like they were unprepared for lunch.

They're probably a more dinner-oriented place. The Hopleaf served lunch for a baout a month last year, but all the food and the service came out exactly the way you described this joint. The truth is, we all ahd to do prep while serving our lunch menu at the same time, so we were often quite distracted; it was more of an irritant than anything else.

Then again, like I said above, you pay peanuts, you get monkeys. If you want better service, pay the servers better wages.

[XNASA]

16. That's what I suspect. They weren't ready for lunch.

But...it was the worst lunchtime experience I've ever had, that I can remember.

I've only walked out of one other restaraunt in my entire life before today.

:cry:

[BiggJawn]

18. So, would you say Sherman Kaplan would give it only a 9.5 out of 20?

An hour and 15 minutes?
X, you're about 45 minutes more patient than I would have been.

And shitty wages or not, that's no excuse. Permit me to offer as "exhibit A" that evil-to-the-hired-help place called Cracker Barrel...

[fudge stripe cookays]

22. Sounds like....

the meal that reprehensor had at the Bennigan's across from the Art Institute.

The worst fucking service I had ever had in the city of chicago. Ever. I don't know what the hell was wrong with these people. There were people there, but it wasn't packed.

The food was likewise unacceptable. We left the server a penny tip. I'm usually an EXTREMELY good tipper and a very laidback customer. It takes a lot to piss me off. When I get lousy service, they KNOW it.

FSC

[XNASA]

23. What's amazing to me is that, we were the only people in there.

There were 30 tables in this place, and only one up at the front and our had people sitting at them. 5 total customers.

And it took an hour and 15 minutes to get a couple of burgers and a tuna salad sandwich.

They could have gone to another restaurant, placed an order and brought the food to us in less time than they took to prepare it.

:shrug:

[MissB]

26. LOL!

That is one way of looking at it.

[Rabrrrrrr]

27. Maybe they're outsourcing to a Wendy's

but found a Wendy's in Oak Brook that was 10 cents cheaper....

[HEyHEY]

24. I just opened that place!

And you wanna shut me down