Applebee's Grill + Bar — Restaurant in Baton Rouge

It's okay. I tend to get a burger and a soda to judge a restaurant. The entrance and dining area was clean. We were promptly seated. Found it pretty cold because we were right under the air vents. But that's ok, could always ask to be reseated. The host righted the table for us to sit at. Was probably being cleaned, which is admirable. Got given a pack of silverware and napkin. Not the cloth kind. Made me feel a bit like a child. Were quickly waited on. I ordered a pepsi. It was too much soda water and not enough pepsi juice. It wasn't bad but not strong enough for my liking. Cause pepsi already tastes like a weaker coke.

Ordered a Neighborhood Burger, friend ordered a chicken sandwich with bacon. Food took a pretty average amount of time to arrive. And was pretty average itself. I'd describe it as light eating. The burger was cooked well. The bread was brioche and buttered. Really helped carry it. Lettuce and pickles and sauce worked. Sauce was a lil light, but I am a sauce boss. Lettuce was under the meat so it got a little gross. But the crispness of the pickles helped restore the crunch. Thinking back on it, the burger was above average. I've had much worse. Seemed a little small.

The fries were not my favorite. Not squishy but also not crispy. Went alright with ketchup. There's those mini glass, salt and pepper mills. Which is great cause I get to crack pepper. Really helps out. My friend had his sandwich. Which looked pretty good! Fried chicken breast and bacon. He said it was ok. He ordered 2 sides. His mashed potatoes were ok. His broccoli was in a very small portion. But he enjoyed it, the well-buttered broc that it was. We then paid and left.

Service was great. Waiters were always on top of refills and kept tabs on us. The place was clean and the atmosphere was actually pretty nice. I like how it's arranged. What really dragged the experience down for me was the price. If my burger and fry was a few dollars cheaper, I would have been pretty pleased with my meal. As it stands, what we ordered was not really worth what we paid. But I think if you wanted a quick meal, in a clean restaurant, with good service, then you could do worse. Maybe you just come here to drink and have a decent burger or steak instead of the lousy options you may find at your...

So first we get greeted at the door...greeted is too strong a word, more like acknowledged at the door by someone with a real flat 'I don't want to be here' expression. Okay, sure, whatever, everyone has a bad day. Tables clean, server comes out promptly and we place our orders.

So my order comes out and I ordered a meat dish, the butchers meat and potato. I didn't come with meat. They didn't put meat in my meat dish. I flagged down a manager and he gives me a half-hearted apology. 'Sorry, that's weird. I have no idea how that could happen.' He offered to either redo the whole thing or just bring out the missing steak part, I chose the latter. When I saw what they brought, I thought that maybe the forgot it again. It was like four sugar cube sized pieces of steak. I guess that's why they don't list the weight in the menu. I certainly didn't look like the picture.

We didn't come during a rush, or they weren't understaffed or whatever, the service was quick and the food came out quick, albeit wrong. The waitress never made mention of the mistake and when we got the ticket we had a $2 discount that no one mentioned. So like less than 10% of the individual item for giving me a meal that didn't include the main part of the meal. I didn't raise a fuss. I've worked food service and I know what happens to customers that complain too much. But for the first time I decided I needed to post a negative review to hopefully shame the management into getting their staff into something resembling an...

The quality has really dipped at this restaurant. I don't know if it's a COVID thing, a new management thing, or what, but in the future we'll limit any orders to burgers, wings, and desserts.

The other night we ordered:

Half rack of ribs - not thoroughly cooked, meat was very tough, not falling-off-the-bone as usual.

Fish & Chips - the fish wasn't fully cooked. The batter was crispy only on the very outer layer, but the rest of the batter was gooey. Also the chips were cold and hard (and I was there to grab the order as soon as they brought it out, and we live five to ten minutes away - we often have to toss fries into the air fryer for a couple of minutes, but in this case they were so hard that boosting them with hot air didn't help at all).

12 oz Ribeye - One of the worst, most unappetizing steaks I've ever had. It was gray, not at all seared, and flavorless. It was also very thin - no way was that a 12 oz steak. I'll never order a steak at Applebee's again.

Had we been in the restaurant, we would have sent the ribs, fish, and steak back. It wasn't worth packing everything up and driving back. Instead we're chalking it up as an expensive learning experience.

This wasn't a case of them being super busy, either. We were the only car in the Carside Pickup spaces, and we ordered at 5:25. One plus: the order was walked out the door exactly on time.

As noted, as long as they have the Quesadilla Burger and decent wings we'll limit our order to that and a dessert. But we've placed our...