Chili's Grill & Bar — Restaurant in Austin

I have been here a couple times in the past, each time hoping the next time I will like it better. I have tried the soups and never liked them, I have tried the ground beef in a dish and was very disappointed how processed it tasted.

This visit years later, I was hoping for better but unfortunately it was only a tiny bit better as I knew the dishes to stay away from.

Customer service was a lot better this time. We had a great waitress with a smile. There was a few mistakes but we overlooked that.

Food we all ordered:

Blueberry Pineapple Margarita: Delicious, perfectly infused

Triple Dipper:

Skillet Queso: Some sort of Chili and Cheese mix. The ground beef here is not good, tastes salty and prefrozen - texture is off as well. This dish is very salty.

Fried Pickles: House made pickles packed with flavor but too salty and the breading only made it saltier. The breading was a bit thick for my taste on fried pickles, the pickles should shine more than the breading.

Big Mouth Bites: These were decent, little sliders with a good flavor

-Bottomless Tostada Chips: Love the thin chips but again, they were heavy on the salt. The salsa was ok but since this is Texas, I have had better salsa most everywhere else and again, salty.

Sunrise Burger*: My husband enjoyed this, I cannot describe its taste as I did not try it but he ate every bite with a smile on his face.

Fries: Decent fries, thicker cut but over salted.

Smokehouse Combos:

Half Rack of House-Smoked Baby Back Ribs: Ribs were cooked well and they were average. I got the House BBQ and it was a light enough glaze that it did compliment the ribs. I just dont understand that this is what they are known for or maybe I do since I really did not like it here. They were OK, but nothing special for sure.

Chicken Crispers: These were good, the breading amount was perfect and they were not overly salty. The chicken was cooked well. I liked these.

I asked for these sauces to go with the Chicken Crispers.

Honey-Chipotle: This sauce tasted just like an ash tray - not edible. Everyone at our table agreed to this.

House BBQ: Very odd flavor, not good as a dipping sauce but half way decent lightly glazed over the ribs.

Roasted Street Corn: I enjoyed this, a bit over cooked yet the flavors were spot on with the chili.

House Side Salad: Good salad, good amount. The ranch dressing that is "house made" tasted more like the dry packets you get at the grocery store and make at home. Did not enjoy it at all although my family did.

Pros: Customer Service, Street Corn, Chicken Crispers, Sunrise Burger, Blueberry Pineapple Margarita, Thin Chips

Cons: Ground Beef, Skillet Queso, Honey-Chipotle sauce, House BBQ sauce, Ranch dressing, Fried Pickles, and the heavy hand...

If I could give this experience negative stars, I would. My friend and I got sat, and then it was a long time before we got greeted. When Mariah finally came by, she didn't introduce herself or try to up-sell any appetizers. We got our drinks several minutes later, which we just started off with 2 waters. We were going to get drinks from the bar, but since the water took a lifetime, we decided not to. We started with the queso. This has always been a favorite of mine. This time, not so much. There was a layer of oil on top, and when we finally went to dip the chip, it was very liquidy. The queso wouldn't even stay on the chip. Same thing with the salsa. Not to mention, there was maybe 3 chunks of meat. I recall this appetizer being very thick with an abundance of meat every time I've had it. Also, the queso tasted like someone spilled jalapeño juice in it. It was absolutely terrible! A different server could see the disdain in our faces, and offered to bring a new one. We agreed, but to take it to-go, since our meals would be coming out soon. (When I warmed up the "new" queso the next day, it was the same liquidy consistency, but at least did not taste as bad.)

A third server brought our food, and we went about our meal. Mariah never did a touch back to see how everything was. She was obviously off doing her sidework.

My friend had ordered a burger and it did not come with the sauce the description mentioned. Also, the fries were barely warm. My quesadilla explosion salad was as much of a disappointment as the queso. No dressing was brought for the salad, and the quesadillas were pretty much the tortillas with the tiniest amount of cheese. The two tortillas did not even stay together. In the middle of this subpar meal, Mariah said she was done for the night. She gave us the option of cashing out with her, or being transferred to someone else. We decided to cash out with her, but then she was nowhere to be found again. We wound up cashing out on the table kiosk instead. During our meal, we did overhear her tell another server, "When it's slow, I make no money and I get crabby!" Well, both my friend and I are in the restaurant business, and we agreed that she should be focusing on the tables she did have and not on the ones she didn't have. We always tip well and are pretty easy to please. It was just frustrating that we seemed like such a bother to her. We still left more than she deserved, but she could've easily made way more! I'm very disappointed in this Chili's, and I recommend NOT coming here. You can have a better experience digging through...

Came in for dinner on a Saturday night. We were afraid the place was packed because the was NO parking. I can only assume that's because of the other nearby restaurants because Chili's wasn't very busy and we were seated right away in a corner surrounded by empty tables. Our server was nice, although I think we got forgotten about a little because check-ins didn't happen very often. There were 5 of us altogether, 4 at the table ordered drinks from the bar along with chips and salsa and our meals. Drinks took quite a while to come out, arriving at the same time as most of our meals (about 20-30 minutes after we'd ordered). We never received our chips and salsa. Decided to cancel that, because what's the point of bottomless chips and salsa AFTER your main meal has arrived.

However, the worst part was that it took over 20 minutes after the rest of our meals arrived for 1 meal to come to the table. Our server checked immediately after we received the meals, then had to come back and ask what had been ordered because she couldn't figure it out as "the board back there is a mess." Then she disappeared and I had to go to the hostess stand to ask for a manager as no other employee made their way by our table except for the one going back and forth to the bathroom several times (I'll come back to him).

Manager finally came out with our missing meal and offers of free dessert. We turned down the dessert, due to dietary restrictions mostly, but we were also just ready to be done and leave. He did give us several $5 gift cards (more than covered the cost of the delayed dinner), along with his apologies.

As for the server we saw go to and from the bathroom several times; we really only noticed him because he made quite a bit of noise going back and forth. He would sing and dance as he went by, I'm glad he's happy, but it was a bit distracting. Because we noticed him going by, we also noticed that he did quite a bit of vaping in the bathroom and directly outside of the bathrooms. I'm not sure of the restaurants policy, but I don't think that's usually allowed.

All in all, not a great experience at this location. We don't live nearby, so probably won't be back. But I guess I'll visit my local restaurant to use up all those gift cards...