Beefmaster Steakhouse — Local services in Ballinger

If I could give this place zero stars, I would!!! My wife and I, who are long-time great friends of the Kings(owners), ate here last Friday evening. We have eaten here for 20+ years, and have always enjoyed doing so. We have always been treated like family. Last Friday evening though was the worst dining experience we have ever had!!! The food was delicious as always, but the staff treated us horribly!!! They have had a terrible attitude towards us for some weeks now. We like to eat here after each in-town football game. Eating here afterwards is part of the fun of attending these games. We are also from out-of-town, so we can only get here every so often. We used to look forward to eating here. Not any more!!! The people here have a very strange problem with how many napkins you use. They actually hid them from us, so we could only have so many. They also complained to one another about how many napkins we were using!!! Again, very strange!!! They also do not like us using the restroom before we leave as we have an hour long drive home. They have very small restrooms which are very uncomfortable to use. They have two larger restrooms in the back which are much more comfortable to use. They literally and bodily stood in our way of using those. Also, even after a football game, we still arrive here at least an hour before they close, and they seem to always be out of food, especially on the buffet. They usually aren't too nice about preparing more food for you even while they are still open for that full hour. We have even heard other out-of-town guests complain about this issue. All-in-all, they just show an extremely terrible attitude towards their customers. Again, this attitude has been shown towards us during this entire football season, and especially last Friday evening. After so many years of dining here, we have decided to never eat here again. We find this to be a very sad decision we must make, but we choose to never be treated this horribly again, just simply trying to enjoy a nice meal after a fun evening of high school football. We will, unfortunately, just have to eat somewhere else. They told us to beware of their restroom cleaning policies and indicated that we would never be able to use the restrooms of our choice. Well, now I feel that all customers should beware of these peoples attitudes and that they will all gang up on you and make your dining experience a very unpleasant one. If you truly want a better dining experience than this, then I would definitely eat...

My wife and I drove from Abilene for dinner at this place. A large contingent (about ten) of oilfield workers were there at the same time. The waitresses were serving alcohol fast and furious to this group. Even though the restaurant was slowly filling up with customers including small children, the oilfield workers dropped f-bombs and mf-bombs loudly and freely. NO ONE from the restaurant asked them to stop the outrageous cursing or to leave. Servers went about their business, and the bartender looked the other way. We all know why, don’t we? BIG ticket for those cretins. Things like this can usually be traced to money. A customer finally chided them for their language - and did receive an ‘apology’ - but one guy made it clear that he was ‘spoiling for a fight’. Never a word from management. That was the most disappointing part of the whole situation. Now - to the food. We ordered hamburger steaks with baked potatoes, and the dinner included the salad bar. We ordered fried clams for an appetizer. The clams were cooked perfectly and were served with some uneventful ketchup-based dipping sauce. The salad bar greens were about 90% arugula - very little romaine or iceberg. Otherwise, about what you’d expect in a small town cafe. The hamburger steaks were juicy, but bland. They were topped with onions that tasted more boiled than grilled. Overall, a cooked piece of burger with no soul. The baked potato was nicely loaded - except for a minimal amount of butter - which made the thing mostly inedible. Texas toast was okay. Decent service, but could not get our check - waited an extra ten minutes trying to get our server’s attention. Prices were commensurate with the quality of the meal - but, this place cooked with little spice and care for the overall taste of its food. Please: if you’re a parent with small children, I’d think twice about seating them in this place. Money is king here - not a positive dining environment for the customers. A bunch of loud-mouthed beer-swillers and steak-orderers get top billing. No way our tab was going to match theirs ... and management made it clear who had priority. I do NOT...

Ate here many times a week for 15 years. Service, cleanliness, and food quality have all gone downhill in a hurry since 2022. Lunch, dinner, buffet or on-menu, there are ongoing issues here.

50/50 shot you'll get decent service that actually seems like they want to be there, but the ones who have been around a while are good and attentive to detail, even if it seems they're wearing thin.

Keeping a good staff is difficult but there shouldn't be any excuse for frequently dirty plates, bowls, & spoons at the buffet. Or servers walking over "clean" silverware left on the ground all night. Or literal ants joining you at the table for your meals.

It's mediocre food cooked correctly half of the time. Mostly at a fair price by today's standards, that's still a positive here.

Would not recommend stopping here if driving through town unless you're dying for a steak & can't wait another 30 minutes to more options.

The overserved guys at the booth over causing a disturbance then management's gall to charge me $12 for a plate of salad were the final nail in the coffin for me at this place. I sincerely hope attention to detail from the top-down returns here & it gets back to being more than just "the only...