On Fine Dining Experiences
Last week Matt drove to Texarkana to run an errand for Camp, and at a whopping 10 hours from our home, he was going to have to be gone overnight. I wasn't ready to spend a night alone just yet, so I tagged along. I'll spare you the boring details of our long drive, but we did have some interesting food experiences...
Once we arrived in Texarkana it was almost 8 PM and it was dark and rainy. We checked into the hotel and asked about the closest place to get some food, to which the answer was "there's a Denny's right across the street." She was hard to understand because her Southern drawl was so thick, but we figured it out. Knowing that we couldn't spend a lot of money on food and we were tired, we took the desk lady up on her suggestion and headed over to Denny's.
I think before that night I had only ever eaten at a Denny's once before, and it was in college. The only other experience I have had with Denny's was watching Tim Allen and his son eat there after burning the Christmas turkey in "The Santa Clause". So obviously I wasn't ready for what we were walking into.
As we walk in, we are seated by a nice man who allows us to pick any place in the restaurant. Turns out, the table we chose was right by the kitchen and right by the counter that all the staff stand behind. And oh my goodness! Never have I ever heard or seen such unprofessionalism, even if it IS a Denny's! Matt ordered a peppermint hot chocolate, which was simply hot chocolate mix with 2 candy canes in it. The girl that brought it out said "I promise I didn't make this" and then later looks in the mug and says "Ugh! I REALLY didn't make this!" The look of disgust on her face was so reassuring.
The whole time we sat there we listened to our waitress gripe to another coworker (supposedly a manager) about everything under the sun and talk about how they were neglecting customers...on purpose ("Please tell me they weren't a secret shopper!!" "I think they were...I'm pretty sure."). At times they were even shouting these things across the restaurant to each other. The food was sub par (all I ordered was chicken noodle soup - how do you screw that up?!) and the service was terrible. And the floor was sticky, which is gross. Needless to say, I was relieved to get out of there!
On our way back to Camp the following day, we stopped at a McDonald's for dinner - again, because there were no other options. And do you know what we discovered? McDonald's now has computer games at their booths! As if the little kids who are eating the unhealthy, greasy, fatty Frankenstein food need to play any more computer games! Sure, there was still a play place, but I didn't see any kids jumping up and running in there if they could play on the computer instead! On the positive side of things, they sanitized the computer screens (they were touch screens) whenever no one was sitting at the booth - that surprised Matt and I, but in a good way.
But really, I still didn't enjoy the food at McDonald's, even though I ordered chicken selects products. It was still super greasy, there were strings and wads of fat in my chicken, and after picking at it, I eventually gave up and just ate fries (the irony!).
And really, it's good to be back and eating home cooked meals again. Even the Sysco food down at camp is a million times better than the food we had on our trip (but then again, our camp food is better than most ;) )!
Once we arrived in Texarkana it was almost 8 PM and it was dark and rainy. We checked into the hotel and asked about the closest place to get some food, to which the answer was "there's a Denny's right across the street." She was hard to understand because her Southern drawl was so thick, but we figured it out. Knowing that we couldn't spend a lot of money on food and we were tired, we took the desk lady up on her suggestion and headed over to Denny's.
I think before that night I had only ever eaten at a Denny's once before, and it was in college. The only other experience I have had with Denny's was watching Tim Allen and his son eat there after burning the Christmas turkey in "The Santa Clause". So obviously I wasn't ready for what we were walking into.
As we walk in, we are seated by a nice man who allows us to pick any place in the restaurant. Turns out, the table we chose was right by the kitchen and right by the counter that all the staff stand behind. And oh my goodness! Never have I ever heard or seen such unprofessionalism, even if it IS a Denny's! Matt ordered a peppermint hot chocolate, which was simply hot chocolate mix with 2 candy canes in it. The girl that brought it out said "I promise I didn't make this" and then later looks in the mug and says "Ugh! I REALLY didn't make this!" The look of disgust on her face was so reassuring.
The whole time we sat there we listened to our waitress gripe to another coworker (supposedly a manager) about everything under the sun and talk about how they were neglecting customers...on purpose ("Please tell me they weren't a secret shopper!!" "I think they were...I'm pretty sure."). At times they were even shouting these things across the restaurant to each other. The food was sub par (all I ordered was chicken noodle soup - how do you screw that up?!) and the service was terrible. And the floor was sticky, which is gross. Needless to say, I was relieved to get out of there!
On our way back to Camp the following day, we stopped at a McDonald's for dinner - again, because there were no other options. And do you know what we discovered? McDonald's now has computer games at their booths! As if the little kids who are eating the unhealthy, greasy, fatty Frankenstein food need to play any more computer games! Sure, there was still a play place, but I didn't see any kids jumping up and running in there if they could play on the computer instead! On the positive side of things, they sanitized the computer screens (they were touch screens) whenever no one was sitting at the booth - that surprised Matt and I, but in a good way.
But really, I still didn't enjoy the food at McDonald's, even though I ordered chicken selects products. It was still super greasy, there were strings and wads of fat in my chicken, and after picking at it, I eventually gave up and just ate fries (the irony!).
And really, it's good to be back and eating home cooked meals again. Even the Sysco food down at camp is a million times better than the food we had on our trip (but then again, our camp food is better than most ;) )!
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