Olive Garden Italian Restaurant — Restaurant in Baytown

I want to make this clear, this experience was at the location on Garth road in Baytown, Tx. Every other location I have ever been to has been a great experience. On this day, at this location, it was horrible. Although there was no wait time to be seated, it took 10 minutes before being waited on at our table. Another 22 minutes, from the time we were seated, until our breadsticks and salad arrived. And then another 20 minutes before my bowl of soup arrived. That's right, 20 minutes for a bowl of soup. So 52 minutes from the moment of being seated until my complicated order of soup and salad was fully delivered. Yes, it was lunch time on a weekday, but REALLY?! 42 MINUTES for soup and salad? Now, if that were the only issue, I probably would not be leaving a scathing review, BUT, while waiting for my soup, and while my niece was in the restroom, I was looking around and suddenly noticed to my horror, the filth on the walls at our booth. Splattered food, dirt, dust and crayon scribbles. I scooted to the edge of my seat and patiently waited for the soup, although I should have asked for my check at that moment and left. When the soup finally arrived, I found a huge ball of mystery substance clumped together the size of a meatball in my soup. I took this foreign substance and put it on my plate and cut into it and it looked like it might be a clump of raw meat of some kind, maybe ground sausage but I couldn't be sure. Honestly it looked like something that had been regurgitated. I had had enough of this luncheon at this point. So I went to the front and asked to see a manager. I showed him the mystery clump and pointed out the filthy walls. He immediately took my soup to the kitchen. He returned moments later to tell me the ball was a bunch of raw bacon bits clumped together that somehow got into my soup. I'm still not so sure what it was. I told him I would pay for the salad, but obviously not the soup and I wasn't going to try another. He comped my salad, apologized for the experience and upon my departure my niece could overhear him telling an employee to clean all of the walls in the restaurant. My niece lives in Baytown, I do not. I live in Clear Lake and have always enjoyed the location at Baybrook Mall. I would not recommend the Baytown location, even if they clean the walls. My niece who lives near the Baytown location said she will never return. It was a poor experience and obviously the place is poorly run from the waitstaff, to the cook, to the managers, who in the end, are responsible to over see everyone else's tasks. The manager took away my soup and the clump of so called bacon before I could take a photo, but here are pics of the wall at our booth. I hope you can expand them to see detail. It was truly disgusting and if it weren't for me being involved in a conversation at the time I was seated, I would have noticed it sooner. And never had stayed long enough to order in the 1st place. Go to any other...

I'll preface with the food was great! Chicken & shrimp Carbonara and Steak Gorgonzola Alfredo. The lasagna fritta was a bit overcooked though and a bit cold when it arrived to the table.

Now, the reason for the 2 stars. Our waitress seemed completely clueless and almost out of it. She never once offered a refill on our drinks. I ordered a Moscato and it took over 10 minutes for her to bring that back. The place was NOT full and she only had 2 other tables. She was standing by the fireplace laughing and chit chatting with another wait staff. When we placed our order we asked them to leave the bleu cheese off the steak gorgonzola to which she simply nodded her head. Off she went to the kitchen to put in our order.

Thirty five minutes later we get our food. The steak gorgonzola is just steak and noodles with barely any alfredo sauce and none of the sun dried tomatoes which are advertised with the dish. I ask her about that and the alfredo sauce and she shrugs and says she can go get some sun-dried tomatoes from the kitchen and turns back to get those. I assumed maybe she would get a little alfredo sauce as well, since we literally had one small spoonful of sauce in the middle of the noodles. If I had to guess I would say 2 tablespoons of sauce. She came back with a small serving of tomatoes and no sauce. We had to ask her again about the sauce and she replied "Oh you wanted more?" (that was the point of brining it up the first time), and walked off to get more. The manager walks up to the table to ask how everything is. We tell him basically what we are saying here and he is nonchalant with a simple "Sorry. Enjoy your meal." and walks off. We just shrugged it all off and began eating our meal, which was actually really good.

I go to pay for the meal and realize that they have charged me for the sun-dried tomatoes. I ask the waitress and she flags down the manager. He explains that the bleu cheese and tomatoes are pre-packaged and measured, so since we didn't want the bleu cheese he had to charge us for not using the pre-packaged tomatoes. What?! That's insane. And it wasn't a large amount of money but it's the fact that the waitress failed to inform us that if we OMITTED an ingredient, we would have to pay extra for the other advertised ingredient.

This location has been going downhill for some time, but this was possibly the worst service we have had at this location (we have had 3 other issues with slow/inexperienced service and never complained). We won't be back.

Also, why does it stink so bad each time we walk in? The floors look filthy, I assume they need to be heavily shampooed...

It happened on a Wednesday morning, in the midst of the covid quarantine of 2020, after a long day at work. My roommate and I were both too exhausted to cook dinner. After scrolling through a list of all the nearby restaurants and naming suggestions to my friend Brittany, we finally decided we were in the mood to get "Olive Garden fat" After experiencing some problems with the app, we had to call in our order. The To-go specialist who took our order was actually pretty polite, and she repeated the order back to me as well. She said the food would be ready in twenty minutes, so we stopped at Wingstop first to get a side of their fries because they are hands down the best fries in the service industry. Upon arrival to the restaurant, I could see that our food was ready to go in a table by the door that was set up to encourage social distancing. A young manager came out and took my payment, at which point the to go specialists who took our order came out from the drink station with our unsweet peach tea. The food smelled really good and by then we had already finished our Wingstop French fries. Once we got home, we turned on our Roku to watch Vikings. We are in the 5th season, where Rollo joins the French and betrays his culture and brother. As Brittany was warming up the to go food, she noticed they gave us a miniscule amount of Alfredo dipping sauce, although we ordered the large portion. She also noted that they placed her cold salad in between hot food, which is a big No No in food safety. She requested I write a review, so I have written an essay. At this point, she is upset that I am still writing a review and that Vikings...