Cheddar's Scratch Kitchen — Restaurant in Asheville

We went to eat at Cheddars Saturday (08/23) for my birthday, the restaurant was maybe quarter-half full when we were seated, there no wait. We sat down and ordered 7:48 PM (I received a text shortly after ordering, that's how I know the exact time). My wife received salad about 5-min after ordering, come 8:35 PM (after looking at my watch several times) our daughter started to complain about being tired. I'm thinking we have been here for over 45-min, what in the world is going on?? Knowing once we were to get our food, eat it and then drive 25-min home, it was now gonna be really late for our daughter, so we finally told the server to cancel our order. The people behind us immediately spoke up and said "yeah we want to cancel too." Ironic or not our food came out right after asking to cancel, so we just told them to box it up.

Being retired military and now a business owner, I certainly understand things happen, after I walked outside the waitress told my wife that the cooks are new and inexperienced. I appreciate her candor and attempt to explain the situation, we did not have any issues we her directly. However, what really gets under my skin is that this is such an easy fix, this is obviously a known issue with the cooks being new and inexperienced. If it's a known issue, wouldn't it be better in the "long run" to inform the customer ahead of time to alleviate any expectations the customer may have? not once did we see a manager or the people behind us for that matter. There are multiple customers complaining, what's the magic number before a manager walks around to explain and apologize for the long wait? What we have found in our business is that when a customer is kept informed of any delays, issues, etc. most understand. Communication, communication, communication...it's so easy to do.

But the icing on the cake was when we got home and opened the to-go boxes (my birthday dinner), whoever packed our meals just dumped the french fries over the top of my pork chops and scattered throughout. The pork chops had caramelized onions on top of them with a bourbon honey sauce, because of that the fries were a SOGGY mess of caramelized onions and bourbon honey. I also only received an extremely small "racquetball sized" portion of mash potatoes, small enough my wife had to make some rice. This is NOT the same restaurant (pre-Helene) that we ate at every time we'd go to the mall, I don't know what's changed since reopening! There appears to be a "training issue" unfortunately; customers shouldn't be able to sense disorganization, if there's an issue customers should be informed, customers should NEVER witness/overhear employees in an intense conversation (I read the same experience in another review) and a little training on how to pack to-go container, for several reasons, is needed. *Three things should be noted; 1) The restaurant NEVER got above half full. 2) If the delay would have been explained to us ahead of time, this whole thing could've been avoided. 3) We are a fair and honest family, so we would also like to share that on a positive note, the Pork Chops & Steak were fantastic!!

Great job on that end guys/gals!! Hopefully some additional training and maybe procedural updates on how things are done will help bring Cheddars back to the pre-Helene Cheddars. It's OK to have new and inexperienced cooks, that's understandable given the circumstances from Helene, but it's not OK to make customers go through this kind of experience un-informed, even if it's an unexpected delay that pops up, if the manager would have stopped in to explain why there's a delay, I'm quite sure both my table and the table behind would not have had a complaint. As a business owner myself, there's just no excuse for that with communication being a simple task, especially is a customer service...

we’ve been coming to cheddars since they opened and we came in Friday night and my sister got the chicken Alfredo she gets this EVERY single time and she noticed it didn’t have as much sauce as usual so we asked the waitress if we could get a little bit more and she says it’s a extra charge we get a little offended because there legit was no sauce on the pasta and she goes to get the manger. Of course we understand there’s always gonna be an extra charge but we were not there to get anything free it wasn’t even the fact we would have to pay for the sauce it’s the lack of unprofessionalism and no one wanted to make the situation better as if our concern didn’t matter I wonder why? But here she comes this unprofessional rude condescending women. she doesn’t even introduce herself which my mom asked who are you? Isn’t the manager suppose to introduce her self she is a reflection of the store right? The manager was crouched down with her disgusting mouth almost touching my moms cup breathing all over her drink. she continues to say she was the one who made the pasta and pointed to my 14 year old sister and said in the most condescending way pointing her finger at her a 14 year old child. and says “there are 12 ounces of Alfredo sauce in your pasta” what happen to the customer is always right? I mean I’ve worked in a restaurant and even if we don’t argue with the customer the moto most of the time is the customer is always right. Anyways I’m not sure how this women is a manager the food and the customer...

We normally have a super good experience at Cheddars. However, tonight we came in at 5 with a party of 6 and were told 30 to 45 minutes due to not being able to give certain workers bigger tables but she doubted it would even be 30. After 47 minutes, we were still waiting. I sent my q3 year old son in to check on the status and he was told by the hostess "you can wait 10 more minutes or go somewhere else to eat." We all went in at this point.The hostess said she was waiting for a server to clock in. I stated that wasn't very helpful. She mumbled under her breath. She continued seating many other families. I am unsure what exactly we did to trigger her. She then said their only 6 top was dirty and someone needed to clean it and we still had to wait for a server to clock in, she said. About 15 minutes passed and she said "follow me" without even looking at us. She lead us to our table and tossed our silverware across the table. At that point, I told her I could appreciate the situation of waiting but I did not appreciate her terrible attitude. She became confrontational and clearly just wanted to argue.. This hostess had the poorest attitude I have ever encountered in my life. For as long as this hostess is working here (and I feel like it won't be long) we will not come back to Cheddars. We are a patient and kind family and this was not ok. Our food was delicious and our server was amazing but the hostess should find...