Rainforest Cafe — Restaurant in Auburn Hills

It was cool for the experience and the views of course, but the food sucked and our service was just crap too. Our food took an eternity to get to the table and when it did, it was obvious that it had been sitting in the window for quite some time. I got this $31 shrimp and salmon sampler thing and I was extremely disappointed, the only item that was good was my 3 pieces of coconut shrimp. My salmon was bland and dry, had some strange dry overcooked veggies on it, my vegetables weren't seasoned at all, just boring and my rice was almost as hard as it is when it isn't cooked yet, not from being undercooked but because it was old dry and overheated. My daughter and my sister's husband ate almost all of their meal without refills, and we never saw our server again until we were done. By that time there wasn't anything she offered to do with our bill for getting shitty food. She brought me out two 4 oz cups of black beans (strange replacement side) which also sucked. I can honestly say it was a giant disappointment food and service wise. And we sat down for dinner way before their dinner rush! The side of fruit that comes with kids meals was a couple apple slices and 2 orange slices, a crappy side of fruit for the prices. My ten year old had a kids meal pizza that was about as big as a pizza in a pizza lunchable. She's tiny and was asking for something to eat within 30 minutes. For "Red Lobster/Olive Garden prices", we got the meal equivalent of some old leftovers. We all agreed that we would have had a better meal hitting the McDonald's drive through on the way out of the mall. My sister's husband got a drink that includes the glass to keep, and since when is it customary to make the person take their used (with alcohol in it still) glass home with him??? Something else strange that stuck out to me was the way the silverware and napkins just gets thrown in a pile in front of one person. It was like being at a food court. Our server was really sweet and friendly, she just forgot to provide the service part. The restrooms hadn't been checked or cleaned probably all day. There were either 2 or 3 trash cans with diapers and paper towels overflowing all out onto the ground. I was a corporate trainer as a server for 11 years and with all of the servers walking around and singing the birthday song, I couldn't figure out why there was zero teamwork once our food was brought out. If ANY server walks past an empty drink especially with a customer still eating, you offer to help your coworkers out by helping their guests! Anticipating the guests needs is food service 101. There was none of this taking place this afternoon. I don't recall seeing one manager the entire visit either. Their one plus was the environment, but that's just not enough to bring both of our...

This was the worst experience I’ve ever had at a restaurant! If I could give it negative 20 stars I would! We drove 90 min to get here. Had to make a reservation the night before hand. We got there and they brought us to a table right in front of the bar. It wasn’t near anything for my son to see. All we could hear was the blender going constantly and not even hear each other talk. We asked for a different table and the host said there’s no other tables open as he sits 4 more families down after we spoke. The food is WAY over priced and there’s very little to choose from on the menu! The burger was ok very dry and the lettuce was black in some places. We also ordered the ribs, shrimp and steak trio. When we got it the steak was super super dry and hard, the shrimp had grease dripping out of them and the ribs were so dry that they had to be cut with a steak knife so basically they were burnt. We asked to speak to a manager as my boyfriend couldn’t eat that. They comped his meal. Another manager comes over her name was LUCE or something like that and said “Yes?” We said umm who are you she said the manager your server said you wanted me to come over. I said no another guy came over already and took care of us. She walked away and went behind the bar. I got up to go outside and was right behind her and she said to our waitress right in front of the other customers so I went over and talked to them and he had a horrible attitude (funny thing is, is that he didn’t even talk to her I did!). So as soon as she turned around I said “oh, I’m sorry we had issues with our experience here and that you feel it’s totally acceptable to talk openly about guests in front of other guests. I said “I’m sorry you have to deal with someone that hasn’t even spoken to you horrible attitude. She said “thanks” and walked away as fast as she could. The fish tanks were cool but some of the fish have issues like their eyes are popping out of their heads, one fishes eye is completely gone and some of them have weird growths on the mouths. I just don’t think they are being cared for at all. It’s so sad. I’ve worked in customer service for over 13 years. If I were to treat a customer the way we were treated I would expect to be fired. I guess good, caring, and courteous help is hard to find since COVID is still here. But that’s not a good enough excuse as to why their whole experience was horrible! We will never be back and I will be making sure all of my family and friends and anyone else who will listen, that they know what a rip off this place is and not to waste their time or money. I’m absolutely disgusted with The Rainforest Cafe. I should’ve believed the other horrible reviews I read...

My family chose to have a Father’s Day lunch here to give our kids a cool experience, knowing the food would be mediocre at best. I have 3 kids and one is a disabled baby. We have a stroller that holds 3 children, which we use to hold my child’s medical equipment and to make outings significantly easier. I let the hostess know that we would need to bring our stroller in. She asked me if we could just take the car seats and leave the stroller, to which I replied that my son is disabled and needs to stay in the stroller. He was also asleep upon arrival. She immediately acknowledged this and said she would make it work for us. We saw two other families come out of the restaurant with their strollers so we thought it would be no big deal.

The hostess tried her best to accommodate us with our stroller. She found a great spot for us to park it beside our table and out of the way. Our waitress was kind and provided great service. We noticed lots of eyes on us while eating dinner. We waited close to 30 minutes for our food to come. After 10 minutes of eating our food, a male server approached us and said that our stroller needed to be parked outside and that the car seat could stay. I did not feel the need to explain once again that our son was disabled and that the stroller needed to stay with us. I told him we were just about done and were ready to pay for our meal. Not one minute later, a female manager approached us and said the exact same thing to us again. I let her know that someone else just came by to let us know — and that we were leaving. She also said ok and walked away.

I don’t understand why there is such a lack of accessibility in such a large cafe. Not to mention, we saw at least three other strollers with babies parked beside their parents at their tables. I don’t feel the need to explain my son’s disabilities to multiple people. This should have been handled by the staff upon our arrival when we were given permission to bring our stroller in, knowing my son has special needs.

We will never return, and we will let our friends and family know that this cafe is unfortunately not inclusive or accessible for individuals or medically complex families. Do better, Rainforest Cafe. And possibly lighten up on the stroller policy or enforce it for ALL families. Many families rely on their strollers for different reasons. If you do not allow it, give everyone the courtesy of honesty up front and put up a sign...