P.F. Chang's — Restaurant in Arlington

So we went out to have a dine-in lunch after a lengthy break and were looking forward to the whole restaurant dining experience. I have eaten at the DC branch of PF Chang so was looking forward to an enjoyable experience.

Unfortunately that was not in cards. 🥲

The restaurant was almost empty (even though we went at around 1pm). I did see quite a few take out bags so I am guessing their main business is still from clients ordering takeout. We were given a table and waited almost 10 minutes and were actually getting ready to leave when a waiter strolled over. He showed us a bar code on a wine menu card on the table that needed to be scanned to get their online menu. We asked for water (seriously, no water so far) and he nodded and strolled away. Of course he did not come back, leaving us to wallow in our thirst!

So, 20 minutes in, with no food and water, being parched and famished by now, we quickly made our menu selections. We decided on two dishes. Mapo tofu and Chang’s lettuce wraps (lettuce stuffed with tofu pieces).

We waited and waited and waited and signaled and gestured and finally the waiter strolled over, having completely neglected our request for water. Being fairly steamed by now (pun intended) I asked for our water, which he gave. What he did not give was a semblance of an apology. Anyway, we ordered and were prepared for another long wait. The food however came apparently quickly (not really but frankly he had us trained pretty well now).

So I have been eating Mapo tofu for over 20 years now and also cook it at home so I was quite certain that what was served was no way Mapo tofu. It was basically braised, firm tofu served on a bed of broccoli. Mapo tofu is super soft, silken tofu prepared with fermented black beans, Doubanjiang (chilli bean paste), Sichuan peppers and spring onions. My conversation with the waiter went as follows

Me: We ordered Mapo tofu Waiter: Yes Me: This is not Mapo tofu Waiter: Yes it is Me: Are you sure? Waiter: Yes Me: I am pretty sure that this is not Mapo tofu Waiter: Yes it is

Feeling like we are in a rut and more than famished by now I accepted defeat and ate my “mapo” tofu. The dish was sweet and not very satisfying to my palate, though the sheer number of broccoli florets were somewhat filling.

Well I am not sure if PF Chang runs a franchise (because the food and service at their DC branch is much better) or this is post COVID or I got a bad waiter.

But I for one am not willing to go back and verify.

——- Update 8/24/2021 ——-

Someone from PF Chang promptly contacted me and took the details of the incident. I am quite impressed by their commitment to customer satisfaction and quite convinced that this experience is an one off. They also sent me a sincere apology note. Nicely done! Based on that, I have changed my rating to 3-stars.

Am also looking forward to my...

I've been in pf chng many times. First of all server brought our meal while chewing some food . Well, what think is he either ate from the plate he was bringing to serve or I don't know that's so rude . I have nothing to say I did not expect to see this in this restaurant. After twenty minutes waiting for food and finishing our appetizer , server comes and tell us we don't have white rice. Why the heck such a restaurant doesn't have white rice and why the heck we should know after waiting twenty minutes and server brings the food without white rice and without telling us. We would have cancelled the order if we know there's no white rice with the meal. So we were so mad and with a horrible mood this food thing caused us , are half of the food and we left our jackets on table and chair and we went to smoke a cigarette and we told front desk and the server that we are coming back in few minutes to have our drink and finish our meal. Guess what! We came back and they took the food like stupid. We left our bag and jacket and we told two person that don't take the food. I can't describe the madness . I am so pissed off with service. This one was in February. First they said oh for apology we'll give you a free meal . And they made us sit wait and wait and after 20 minutes making us wait for the food to take at home , they came and said we apologize we trashed your food and we can't give you another meal. Then why the heck you don't tell us earlier we leave this hell earlier. We lost our appetite for real. I just felt I wanna vomit in the middle of this hell . I never had any experience even close to this in my entire life. So finally , they gave us a little paper free appetizer for next visit. OK. Now I wanna tell you the rest of this story. I WOULD LIKE TO UPDATE MY EXPERIENCE: Again on April 25th , me and my friend decided to go to this restaurant. We had our meal. It was OK . At the end I gave the free appetizer paper card to our server and asked her to take this order home. Also, we had some left over shrimp and we asked for box. She gave us two box, which it supposed to be one appetizer and the other one supposed to be our left over shrimp. I came home I open the box and I see it is only brown rice and the other is shrimp . Even though we ordered appetizer and she took the paper she didn't give us. I didn't realize until it was too late. I am so mad with the services . Everytime I come here , I experience worse and...

The only reason I’m giving this even 1 star is because the ambiance was nice. When we first got there it was cold inside, second it was a PF Chang special going on from 2/11 to 2/15, the host nor our server didn’t know anything about it, the server had to ask management about it. As a restaurant knowing it was Valentine’s Day weekend, you should of had knowledge about the special.

The food was bland, we asked for fried dumplings got steamed dumplings. The shrimp seemed like frozen shrimp you got out of the box. The soup was bland. The entrees were ok. We had Mongolian beef and the Korean bulgogi. They were stingy with the bulgogi sauce, the steak was bland without it. Finally we had cheesecake and the chocolate cake. The cake was the good part of it as the cheesecake tasted kind of old. The person who brought it out to us brought it to the wrong table as our server yelled at the poor kid to not bring it there. We finally asked for the champagne but the server said it maybe $10 extra but it didn’t say it on the prie fix menu. The server brought it out and said it was part of the Valentine’s Day menu even though we already knew that. It tasted like Chardonnay more then champagne.

The bathrooms were nasty, should be cleaner knowing we are in a pandemic.

The parking sucks too because they give you one hour of free parking after that if you stay 2-3 hours it’s half off, after that’s it’s full price for parking.

Do they expect us to devour our food in a hour so we won’t have to pay for parking? Come on parking should be on PF Chang’s dime for at least 3 hours.

I will not go there, one and...