Cookies Grill — Restaurant in Chilliwack

We had a very disappointing experience at this restaurant. We arrived at 10:30 AM with our group of 3 adults and 3 kids, all under 5 years old. When we put down our name, we requested highchairs. The front server informed us that the wait would be around 40-50 minutes, and we agreed to wait in the car. After about 40 minutes, we received a text message saying our table was ready.

We returned to the restaurant, and the front server initially said the big table would be ready after it was cleaned. A few minutes later, we saw the manager (Bonnie) talking to the front server. Although we couldn't hear their conversation, the front server came back to inform us that the manager decided to give the table to another group that didn't need highchairs. The reason given was that the area didn't fit highchairs.

This explanation made no sense, as it was the largest table in the biggest area of the restaurant. To make matters worse, I saw highchairs being used at a table of the same size in the same area when I came in. As a result, we were put back on the waiting list and had to wait another 40 minutes for two side-by-side tables to become available. By the time we were seated, it was already noon.

We ordered our food right away to avoid further delays because our babies were crying from hunger. We ordered 5 sets of meals, but 2 sets came out missing sausages or toast. The restaurant was very unorganized and clearly not accommodating to families with young children. Lack of consideration for families are unacceptable.

To top it off, I ended up giving only a 10% tip, much less than I usually leave for even average service.

If you have kids, I would strongly advise against going to this restaurant.

Hello Colleen and Colin,

Thank you for your response. While I appreciate your apology, blaming this on "training issues" is not acceptable. This same excuse was used nine months ago, indicating a persistent problem. This is clearly a management failure. The manager, Bonnie, made the poor decision to give our seats to other guests who arrived after us and passed this flawed approach to the newer staff, creating confusion and perpetuating a cycle of bad service.

For your information, we traveled from far away and don't visit your restaurant often (thankfully). I've already detailed the entire situation in my review, so there's no need for a phone call. I hope you take real steps to address these management issues and prevent such experiences for other customers in the...

This is a bit of a conflicted review for me because I usually enjoy Cookies Grill but we had an absolutely terrible experience this past weekend. My son graduated highschool and wanted to do brunch with his family, specifically chicken and waffles from Cookies. 16 total, many from out of town so we made a reservation a week in advance and received confirmation that they could accommodate. An hour before our reservation we called again to confirm as we know how busy Cookies can get on weekends. We were told they would be all set for us and our group and we were on their reservation board. The first of our guests arrived before us and were told by staff that they don't do reservations on weekends and their was no table available to accommodate our group. When we arrived we spoke to the host who acknowledged that they had a reservation for us and that they had confirmed it an hour prior but they hadn't prepared for our group and would not be able to accommodate. The host seemed more concerned about finding out who the staff member who took our reservation was than resolving the fact that we had 16 people standing in their doorway. Long story short we were told we could wait and take tables as they came available but would not be seated together and the wait would likely be an hour. The host was decent enough to provide my son with a $25 gift certificate to use at another time and they seemed happy we decided to leave. We found a different very accommodating restaurant who came through for us to save the celebration (thanks Cultivate Cafe). I still cannot understand why they would take this reservation then confirm it when they clearly had no intention of honoring it. "No" is an acceptable answer and we could have made other arrangements and avoided this...

A Horrible Pot Roast & Pancake Lunch at Cookies Grill

My wife and I were at Cookies Grill for lunch today. My wife had Pot Roast and I had three Pancakes and two Eggs. The young server was nice and polite. When the Pot Roast placed on the table first time, there were only two pieces of roast, two potatoes, a few carrots and a fragment of celery in the bowl. The two pieces of roast were extremely tough. My wife tried to cut them up with a table knife but they were so tough that she could not cut the roast into pieces. We called the waiter over. It took him aback and he agreed that the roast was tough to cut and hard to eat. He took the roast back to the kitchen and asked for advice. A minute later, the waiter came back with a suggestion from the chef that the kitchen would cut the two pieces of tough roast into small pieces with a kitchen knife and fork. When the Pot Roast was placed onto the table second time, the pieces of roast were still very tough to eat and the carrots were not cooked well enough. I tried my pancakes. They were overcooked. The pancakes had a layer of bottom skin which was tough to cut through. Again, we showed the pancake issues to the waiter and were told that this was the second such complaint today. We asked the waiter to make the chef aware that though the Pot Roast was cut into pieces but it definitely required more time to cook as the carrots were not cooked well and the pancakes were inedible.

The lunch was very disappointing though we received 50% off the bill as the pancakes were sent back and not reordered. We tipped the waiter well despite the food being extremely poor. The waiter provided excellent service to the best of his ability.

It was sad to tell that my wife had stomach discomfort and pain when she...