McAlister's Deli — Restaurant in Alexandria

I wish I could give this place zero stars. We visited yesterday from out of town and didn't know the area well so we tried this Mcalister's deli because we love the one in Monroe. The lady running the register was not friendly AT ALL and rude. Apparently, yall were out of potatoes and coke but I understand that. But she said "We're out pick something else." And I told her twice I didn't want croutons on my salad and the second time I told her after looking on my receipt she said "I heard you the first time." And 5 minutes later she's bringing me a salad covered in croutons which I can't have. I told her again that I asked for no croutons and she takes the salad and just walks off and brings it back a couple minutes later covered in cheese where you can tell they just picked the big croutons off because you can still see bits and pieces of the croutons. If I were allergic to gluten this would be an even bigger problem then her attitude. And also, another man came up asking for no lettuce on his wrap and the cook in the back pulled his ear bud out of his ear wearing gloves to hear what she was saying to him...put his ear bud back in with the same gloved hand and continued working. That's disgusting. This place...

Came in two hours before closing to place a single order for DINE IN. Was directed by the sales associate to sit in the back section of the restaurant (odd). One other diner present. No one in line. Ordered a jalapeño turkey crunch; was given a COLD mushy sandwich with turkey and what appeared (and tasted like ham) with NO crunch- def NOT what I ordered. The chicken tortilla soup was just cheese sauce without any detectable chicken pieces. All of my food was served in a bag as a to go order and freezing. I checked the receipt- DINE IN. Didn’t finish the food; it was just gross. I love McAlister’s and eat at their locations pretty regularly and can honestly say this was a total mess. Sadly, this is the second time in a row at THIS location in the last two months that I’ve had a sub par experience with gross food and have watched the quality here steadily decline in the last year. I don’t know what is going on at this location, but I won’t be returning here (Alexandria, LA) and will recommend removing them from our catering list...

Best French dip I've ever had

Update for my last visit.

I recently held out on going to this location for a couple of months due to terrible service and poor food quality. My mainstay is the French Dip which I found couldn't be beat by any other offerings in town. But for a good 3-4 months the service and quality had dropped drastically. My French Dip no longer held up to my expectations as I would get old Au jus and the bread was always stale. As I said me and my SO began to go less and even the nachos fell short as I would get stale chips and soggy veggies. After a brake from them we recently went back on 1/1/2021 and to my surprise the service and food was not only what it once was but even better. Everything from the attitudes of staff to the entire presentation of the food and taste has been boosted to a level that far surpassed my expectations. I heard a new GM had taken over and I can say with absolute certainty that he is doing an amazing job turning this...