AJ's Steakhouse — Restaurant in Altoona

The night started off well for my mom's bday dinner. The appetizers we fantastic and wait staff was friendly. The steaks took quite a while to get to our table and when they were, they were all over cooked, besides one. Mine was well done when ordered medium rare plus, my brothers was almost burnt when he ordered his medium, as was my dad's, and sister in laws. That's all fine and not worthy of a 1 star review at that point. I understand a chef can mess up on how to prepare a steak, even in a prime Steakhouse. The problem was how the manager and the wait staff handled this. My family was too friendly to say anything, however I mentioned mine immediately. I had not taken a bite of food to this point, as I'm not one to eat a steak and complain. I show the waiter the steak and he said, yes sir, it is over cooked, let me have the plate and I'll have another one made for you. I told him I didn't want my plate taken as I would have to wait without any food while the rest of the family was eating. I wasn't going for a comped meal, I just wanted the correct temperature of a $40 steak! Because the cooks goofed it up, I wanted to start to eat what was there and that should be fine. If this happened at 801 or Flemings, they would let you eat while they hot railed another steak. That was the first thing that bothered me. When they finally brought the new steak, it was still slightly over cooked and the manager even said the same thing. I said no big deal, this is great, you guys made me a new steak. Then the waiter came back out and at that point there were only the outside 1/3 of the old steak left and it was grey and burnt. My wife asked if we could take the meat home and give it to the dog. He said no because it was a correction. I want to be certain to explain that we were not there to get a free steak. We eat at many restaurants and never complain and always tip very well. AJ's simply lacked class and trust in their client. If you are a prime steak house, customer service needs to be number one. Our bill was almost $400 and nothing was comped or reduced. I'm fine w it not being reduced, I'm just stating how big of a fuss they made over a client spending $400. The straw that broke the camels back in this long review was the manager on duty. She handled the steaks semi ok, but not completely. She knew other steaks were over cooked and she didn't do anything other than make a joke about it. But the final straw was her dealing with roses that were placed on the table. My sister in law was smelling a rose at the table when the manager came up and rudely said "please leave the roses in the vases as we reuse those." Well, we weren't taking the $2 flower, she was simply smelling it. Even if we were, and we were not, let the client take a $2 rose, it's a prime Steakhouse for God's sake. So she made an assumption that we needed a rose badly enough that smelling it would turn into stealing it. What a disaster experience, we will never eat at AJ's again, especially when there are many other great prime steakhouses or restaurants for that matter....

I visited Aj’s Steakhouse located inside Prairie Meadows Casino, Racetrack, and Hotel for the first time last Friday night with my parents. Walking into Prairie Meadows on a weekend night is a very exciting atmosphere due to the large number of people and the gaming floor being just up the escalators from the main entrance. Like I said, this was my first time going to Aj’s steakhouse and not just the casino, so I followed my parents along the side of the escalator towards the back of the building where Aj’s Steakhouse is located. As soon as we got to the entrance of the restaurant a host named Bailey welcomed us. She was very friendly and made my family and I feel very comfortable by making a few jokes with my parents. While we sat and looked over our menu, our waiter, named Trenton, came over and filled our classes with ice water. He was very friendly and asked us if we needed anything other than water to drink and had the different drinks back to us within a few minutes. I am 21 years old, and have never really eaten at a Steakhouse before, so I asked Trent what he recommended for a first timer. Trent himself was only 22 years old and he gave me his recommendation based off what he has tried so far at the Steakhouse. I took his advice and ordered the 6-ounce house Filet Mignon with mashed potatoes. The food only took about 20 minutes to get prepared for all three of us. During our wait, Trenton checked in on us a few times making sure we were doing okay on drinks. I do not eat steak often, but the Filet I ordered was amazing. My parents also really enjoyed their food. Our bill ended up being around $90 total with 3 meals and drinks, which my parents informed me, was normal for a steakhouse. We were at the restaurant for a total of 1.5 hours. That allowed my parents and I enough time to then walk around the casino and have some fun on our Friday night! Overall, I would rate this restaurant a 4 out of 5 stars. The only reason I would not give them 5 out of 5 is because I am a college student and I could not afford the price per meal if I was not with my parents, who bought the food for me. I would highly recommend this restaurant to anyone looking for a...

The place is immaculate. Been here 10 times plus...To start, the wait staff up front is amazing and quick and very polite before you get sat. Some of the waiters and waitresses are out-of-this-world great, you know who you are, however, some do lack some experience in paying attention and coming around more times than just ones every 15 mins (even while slow)... however all around great because of the seasoned rockstars they also have.

Getting into the true review, the main courses and food are absolutely incredible. The steakburgers are the biggest hidden gem in the Des Moines Metro. No joke. And the Mozz Sticks app is out of this world....However, NEVER get the steak fries with the burger ALWAYS get a salad. The steak fries are literally a potato cut into 4 sections and baked. I get you're trying to make something gaurmet, but truly dont. With a great burger you shouldn't try to mess up making the side which is much more of a potato than it is a fry. Try out some better quality crincle cut fries or some crispy battered fries, it would TRULY make the burgers shine more, because they are downgraded due to the poor attempt of the whole potato classified as a "steak fry". It's been this way for at least 6+ years of me dining there too. I'd love to come in someday and see that change 🙏.... Overall though this place is too notch and I do definitely...