Islands Restaurant Avondale — Restaurant in Avondale

Absolutely the worst experience. Mid afternoon about 3pm on a Saturday. We were seated promptly, restauraunt was half filled at best. Literally waited over 20 minutes before I pulled a server aside that was going past my table. She said she'd be right over. Another 10 min and finally she came back to take our drink order. We told her we were ready to order. Table of 4, we all ordered chicken sandwiches of varying style. I personally ordered a Bluenami Chicken with buffalo sauce on the side. Sandwiches took almost another 30 min to arrive. Server placed sandwiches to everyone and ran off. I had to wait to find her again because there was no blue cheese on my sandwich. She did promptly bring that over, but she again ran away, literally. My wife took one bite and realized chicken was pink and not even cooked. Same thing with my oldest daughter, uncooked chicken and bun was still cold. Grabbed our server and told her, she apologized and took the sandwiches away. About 15 min later, she shows back up at our table and said that she told the manager and he'll be right over, he's dealing with another problem at another table. While assuming our server had asked the 2 sandwiches to be re-made, the manager shows up and says he's sorry and he's talked to the cook. He asked what we wanted him to do, my wife said I just would like our sandwiches. He stated that he saw the one piece was pink, and he said it several times, like it was just that one small piece. It was the whole piece of chicken, maybe if you cared, you would have looked at it. He then said ok, I'll have them make you new ones.....WHAT??? We now have to wait more for the food to be prepared????? During this time, my youngest daughter begins eating a piece of her sandwich as we cut it up in quarters for her. She bites and then pulls out what I hope to be a beard hair. I'm bald with no facial hair and my wife and girls all have straight long hair. Definitely didn't come from us. Now everyone is fully disgusted, manager comes back and we tell him this. He continues to say not sure how that happened and has not offered yet to remedy anything. New sandwiches were made, we promptly paid the bill and asked for boxes only to be too happy to run out of there and be done with our 3 hour lunch. NEVER AGAIN!! I truly hope dirty dining reads...

UPDATE: 8/3/24 Just went back to try them out again and wouldn't you know, the burger was back baby!! Cooked nicely to a medium temp (I preferred medium rare but will take it over the past years of really well done). Fries were cooked perfectly and tiki tenders right on the money. Only food lacking was the ranch this time around which tasted metallic. I didn't take a chance on the sodas this time to check if they were also fixed finally. But I'm happy the food is getting back up there again! The service is still very much lacking, took forever to get items we asked for and only got refills after 30 minutes and were done eating and he came back with the check. All looked like teens so that's unfortunately how it'll be for the most part. Updated my stars on food but lowered for service as the 4 family's around us were also complaining about service and the waiters never showed until the check came around. As long as the food keeps like this, I'll deal with some service issues from teens! That's what the bar area is for....keep up the food quality guys! Glad to see you're back!

Original Review: Been coming here for about 15 years now, probably longer. I remember the food well from then and it was amazing enough to keep me coming back here all these years in the hopes to recreate the taste I remember. But over the past 6 years, it's been in decline. Burgers have gotten smaller, dryer (dont ever expect a medium rare burger here), less seasoning/flavor, and the buns and fries have changed several times. They've gotten extremely stingy with toppings, cheese portions are non existent. The fries are very hit and miss and the portions have gotten ridiculously smaller now. Drinks are always flat or little syrup, never refreshing in anyway, cost shaving is obvious. The chicken tenders are still great tasting, but are now much smaller. It's disappointing to say the least how far they've fallen. Every couple months or so, I go back in the hopes it's gotten better, going in 6 years now of this and still holding out hope. It's not disgusting or anything, and if you don't know what they used to taste like, you will probably think it's an OK burger. I unfortunately/fortunately do remember and it's just no longer the same. With the area expanding rapidly, and better options being all around, I see...

Unfortunately it has been at least 10 years since I've been to an Islands for dinner. The menu has changed significantly which was a disappointment. The service was horrendous. We literally waited 10 minutes before our server even came to the table to introduce herself and it was not busy at all in the restaurant. My 8 year old grandson literally said at one point, "We've been sitting here for an hour and we still don't have our food." That came from an 8 year old! When the food arrived, all of our food was on the table except for my wife's tacos. The server asked with a huge smile on her face, "Is there anything else I can get you guys?". To which my wife replied, "Uh, my food please." The server laughed as if it was funny and said she'd be right back with her food. A few minutes and she returned. Remember when my 8 year old grandson said we didn't get our food for an hour? Well quite literally after our food was dropped off at our table, we had a busser come by and ask if there were any plates he could take from the table. I responded with, "Uh no. We literally just got our food so thank you but no." Well about 10 minutes another young lady came to the table and asked the same question. This time my wife responded by saying no and that we just got our food and are barely eating. So about 15-20 minutes later, another young lady came by and asked again if she could remove any plates or bowls from the table. I told her no again. I cannot make this up, about 10 minutes later, ANOTHER young lady came by and asked to remove any plates. We were pretty much done eating so I said somewhat rudely, "Seriously! Yes, please take all of the plates and bowls. Apparently we are done and you guys want us out of here so yes please take all of our dishes". So while it took over an hour for anyone to bring us our food, it took only about 10 minutes after we got our food that they wanted to take our food away from us. I told my family I felt like we were being pranked or something because it was so strange that they all started coming to our table once we got our food. All I know is the service was terrible and with the menu changes, I definitely will not be returning to this Islands again. Oh, it also took 10 minutes to get a Bud Light and a Pina Colada from the bar that was empty. All in all, not a...