Boulder Tap House — Restaurant in Alexandria

This is a copy of an email I sent the manager after our awful experience. I got no reply. It adds to my disappointment in what could be a cute, small town restaurant.

My family visited your restaurant tonight. I was disappointed by a few things. The biggest, and most important one, was regarding an allergy in our family.

My sons, ages 3 and 5, are lactose intolerant. They won't go into anaphylactic shock, but after having lactose (most milk products), they will have bad tummies and GI issues for the next 24 hours.

We ordered them a build your own burger with cheddar cheese (no lactose) and a dry bun. When it came out, I didn't notice the cheese, but I noticed the bun was dry. So I assumed it was fine. When my husband saw the cheese, he noticed it was American, not cheddar. One of my sons had already downed his half of the burger. The other had eaten a few bites. I immediately went to our vehicle to get them medicine. I'm hopeful they will be fine and have no issues tonight or tomorrow. They're young and don't know how to verbalize their needs well.

The waitress did her best to address the concern, and eventually the key holder. They comped the meal, brought us a new burger (with a buttered bun), and then a third burger, without cheese and dry bun.

My concern with all of this is that the broil cook decided to change the cheese without telling the waitress or us. I understand it is Sunday night and you are out of a lot of items. But the cook should not decide to change an item on a person's food order. The cook doesn't know why a person ordered food a specific way and should not make changes.

If this has happened to my husband, who does have a serious food allergy that lands him in the hospital, I would be sending a very different email.

I share all this to say, please talk your cooks about the importance of talking with the server, and in turn the guest, if there needs to be a change in an order.

Yes, we should have double checked the food when we received it. Yes, the server should have checked. But the first responsibility is with the cook who decided to change the order.

Thanks for reading my email and taking the time to address this issue. I'm not looking for money back or anything. Please do address this situation...

I was in town for work and saw that The Boulder Tap House was pretty close to my hotel and decided to give them a shot. When I walked in I was greeted promptly by the host. I made my way straight to the bar, seeing I was by myself it kinda would have been depressing to sit at a table alone... Upon reaching the rail, I was greeted by Jason. He was very friendly, and prompt with service. I ordered 2 Bells Hopslam Ale (which is a limited release brew). The establishment has plenty of tv's to entertain you while you wait for your food. The bar stools were pretty comfy and it didn't seem like I was there for hours. Nice atmosphere and friendly staff.

I first ordered the dry rub cool ranch boneless wing (8pc) and honestly I don't think I've had better wings with a dry rub. I loved the cool ranch so much that I wanted them for lunch tomorrow at work so I had Jason box them up and put in an order for some Parmesan garlic wings(8pc) to go. The garlic wings were just as good, I'm so glad that I stopped by for dinner. I will probably try and stop here on my way out of town to try the ribeye steak, tequila lime, and carnitas tacos. They all sounded so good but I could only eat so much in one sitting. This place is worth checking out, they have a great happy hour, great food, and great service. Thank you Boulder Tap House, and mostly Jason for being a kind bartender while I visited town. My experience was fantastic, I will be sure to stop back whenever...

Stopped by with a friend and my husband. Husband ordered the defibrillator. Apparently they ran out of regular sized buns so they gave him a SMALL bun for the largest burger they had. It would have been great if they had asked to replace it with another regular size bun, which shouldn't have been any issue. Also, I order a mix drink. It seemed off, like there was no liquor in it. I decided to be polite and not complain about that, and just ordered the liquor from that drink on the rocks, but apparently they were out of it--no wonder i couldn't taste it in the mixer!! Very disappointed that they tried to sneak that past me. I ordered local gin for a reason.

We didn't get any sort of discount either for the issues we had. Not even my drink discounted, a five dollar drink which should have been no problem to comp.

This seems to be a bar for young people to get wasted and stare at the 20+giant TVs. I did not enjoy the multiple TVs, either-if I wanted a sports bar I would go to one.

The waitress was friendly and mostly attentive. She humored us by chatting for a minute after we asked a question.

I'll probably go here again, as the food was pretty tasty and fairly fresh, but I will be wary. I don't like paying for something...