Olive Garden Italian Restaurant — Restaurant in Albuquerque

Only giving the atmosphere a 1 star because I promise, as a 27 year old gen z, who has just become a new mother, the older generation is hands down the reason why younger people do not feel welcome in these spaces. It seriously blows my mind how judgemental people born before 1980 can be. No wonder the world is plagued with so much trauma.

That being said, with the rest of my 5 star review, I want to express my sincerest gratitude to Olive Garden and it's staff for making a new mother feel welcome to have a nice dinner with her sister on her last night in town. I will not mention my server's name, because I don't want any anti-breastfeeders to come and accost her, but she knows who she is. And I hope management gives her special recognition for what she did.

Upon receiving requests from other guests (older guests) to ask me to stop feeding my child, even though I was feeding my 4 month old discreetly under a blanket. My waitress responded by getting me a refill of my tea (before I finished my first, she knew I needed the hydration) and kindly handed it to me before breaking the news to the anti-baby feeding table that she was informed by the manager that there was in fact nothing they could do to stop me from feeding my baby.

My sister and I had to leave quickly anyway to grab other food requests on the way home, but my server made sure to offer me extra breadsticks, Alfredo dipping sauce and another refill AND a handful of Andie's mints on the way out. I hope they dont think I left because of the offended tables, we truly were just stopping in for a quick dinner so that I could get out of the house for once and my sister could enjoy her last night. I left her a 25% tip, even though I wish I could have given her more, just for making me feel like I was welcome and wanted. And I hope the table who complained about me treated her just as well for making her seriously go through the trouble of asking if she could stop a mother from feeding her child.

I have been told by every one of my elders to never feel bad for feeding my baby (my family doesnt not originate from America and breastfeeding is really only tabboo in this lala land). Breastfeeding is a privilege and I understand how much of a blessing it is to be able to feed my child this way, because not every woman gets to do so. So for the women who do breastfeed and the women who are unable, I choose to embrace it fully because to I don't want to take advantage of the opportunity to help my child's immune system in a world that seems to keep generating new viruses.

Maybe the younger generations wouldn't feel so apprehensive about having children if people would quit hating mothers and children so much. (Cough cough, I'm referring to you, gen X and above). Seriously, it's sad. Even when you do the respectful thing and cover up to feed your child, people are still so childish and see the female anatomy as an object to crucify instead of just minding their own business. For some reason people all of a sudden want to use their imagination on what's happening underneath a blanket.

Shout out to Olive Garden in Albuquerque. You guys are the future. Thank you for making the restaurant a safe place for me and my family. I was able to feel like a somewhat normal person for one night. Also the food...

By now, I think most people understand the concept of OG. My adult daughter, wife and I went for an early dinner mid-week. I guess it was right at shift change, so we had to wait to be seated in a near empty restaurant. Ok, no problem, I get it. But when other people started being seated before us, I started to get frustrated. Once we were seated, we were totally forgot about for about 15 minutes or so. We watched other people, who arrived after us get waited on. My frustration started to grow.Only after my wife asked the hostess where our server was. Finally, our apologetic server arrived and took our drink order: three waters and a coke. She strongly urged us to use the digital table kiosk to order any appetizers. She claimed it would be the faster route. And she was right, as our appetizers arrived before our drinks. We asked for a side of ranch, which must have been a highly unusual and difficult request, because had my wife not gotten up from the table to find our server, it would have never shown up. Ok, odd, but understandable. Our server took our meal order; the standard soup, salad, and breadsticks. We probably should have used the table kiosk because we waited for our salad and bread for a ridiculously long time. So long in fact, we watched another table eat their meal, pay, and leave.

Finally! Our salad and yesterday's stale bread arrived. Our server laughed off the fact that they were short on bread and would bring us fresh bread shortly, which she did. We asked for our souls and they arrived promptly. But then we were forgotten about again. I wanted a second bowl of soup, which I never got around to ask for because my wife and daughter were finished with their meal. We were going to share a dessert, but by the time the server returned, our frustration had peaked and we were just ready to leave. She brought us the check and again strongly urged us to pay through the table kiosk. Ok, fine. But our actual confusion came from not knowing who we should tip; the server or the table kiosk.

I have never been a fan of OG, and this experience only solidified my already jaded option of the place. I don't blame the server. She was probably over worked and under appreciated by the...

Upon walking into the restaurant all I can smell is the sewer it smells like someone took a dump in a pee right there in the middle of the floor it smells so bad I ask the hostess why it smelled like that she said she doesn't smell anything there's no way you don't smell that I know I have a sensitive nose but still there's no way that they could smell that they should have never opened up this restaurant when it smells like this not only that when she sent me down the first time it had a different terrible smell I don't know what the hell that was so I asked to be moved somewhere else and then I sat down where I didn't smell anything and then something smelled bad like 10 minutes into me sitting there I don't know what the heck happened and then it went away so I don't know if it was a person or what but the restaurant smells like a literal porta potty it smells so bad I probably should have just left but I didn't I went ahead and ate cuz I haven't eaten anything all day but a bowl of cereal and I was starving so I got my food I started eating the salad and the bread and my breadsticks were spongy then I asked for different breadsticks and they brought me those which were better and then my pasta came and I started eating my pasta and my chicken the chicken was dry and the pasta was hard I kept biting into balls of hard stuff and it's not supposed to be anything hard in an alfredo noodles and sauce I don't understand what that was about the server was acting like he didn't really want to serve me I don't know what the problem was maybe he's going through something I don't know I would rather have a server that serves with a smile I told him about the pasta being hard and the chicken being dry and I still had to pay for my salad and drink I don't mind paying for my food cuz that's what I came there for but if something goes wrong with my entree and the salad comes with that I don't see how you charge and somebody for a salad but it's all good I won't be back to...