Cracker Barrel Old Country Store — Restaurant in Bessemer

If I could give a 0 star rating for my experience I would. The only thing that warrants any star was our server. I had the most ridiculous experience! The manager, HOLIDAY, was obnoxious from the moment we arrived.

Just to preface, everyone at the table either owns a restaurant/bar or works in the service industry

Our server was EXCELLENT & could not have been more accommodating & apologetic for the insane experience that I am about to detail.

#1 - we arrive at our table (party of 10) and Holiday, without giving my sister a chance, tells her "take your kid out of the stroller and sit it anywhere, you cannot have it here, fireplace is fine." -----again- I work in a very busy restaurant & I got up & asked "are we sure this is where we want to put this?" AS IT WAS DIRECTLY OUTSIDE THE SERVER ALLEY... so, thankfully the servers had the mental capacity to immediately determine that the stroller should go somewhere other than parked right where they walk onto the floor. We get that situation handled.

About 3 min pass & we finally get settled, kids in high chairs, chairs pulled up, etc. AND HOLIDAY RETURNS and puts her hand on my sisters small purse, that has a shoulder strap, and puts the strap, which is contained in her chair area, on the chairback & tells her "there are other people on the world other than you" THENNNNN proceded to touch her zipper on her small bag & tell her "we have people that steal here @ this restaurant, you need to zip this"

We brush this interaction off... we proceed to go on about ordering.

I, fully capable of reading a menu, ordered a sirloin, catfish, hamburger steak & bacon. Which, I followed up by saying, "I realize this is all a la carte, this is what I want, however"

A good 35 min passes (I know this bc when CLAIR came out she told us how long the ticket times were & reason being, she was in the kitchen with 2 people only & having to pump out food for the entire restaurant) 35 minutes pass, and we r fine, just catching up. HOLLIDAY comes returns!

#2- HOLLIDAY says to me "they have some of you guys food prepared, but, i saw what you ordered & before I let this come to the table, I want to make sure that you saw the price & that you can afford that"

When, I tried to still let things go and said "I'm well aware" but she stays at the table.

SHE, Holiday, was pointing at our napkins because she was telling my sister, which she didn't say aloud until she finished berating me about my ability to pay for my breakfast.

#3 "you need to get that napkin and wipe that babies nose." And proceeds to hand her one.

At this point I tell her we are done talking and she needs to walk away. Very calmly and politely. SO MUCH SO, the adjacent table, who I believe will also be contacting corporate, turns around and said "yall were much more classy than us bc that would have been responded to with a throat punch"

But, the fun does not end there...

#4 HOLLIDAY, returns after having been asked to walk away, and tells us that "we have ghetto people come in here and order crazy stuff like you did and complain about the price, then we are out all that food so I'm just here doing my job bc that what happen here"

THENNNNN my mother, who has the 6 y.o. in the bathroom returns at the end of the convo & finds out about, from the adjacent table, that Holliday has said her grand baby needs his nose cleaned up... My 6 y.o. neice had just stepped in a fist sized pile of dried feces in the womens restroom, so she brought that to her attention.

#5 after 15 more minute Claire comes out of the understaffed kitchen (her words) in a filthy apron, not rolled up, only to explain that HOLIDAY is not a bad person. And continuously defend her, when my sister is calmly explaining to her the whole situation. Cameras, which with retail & dining I am sure u have, will confirm everything. Pic w baby, disgusting enough to warrant a stranger providing his mother with a napkin and give parenting advice, is attached. About 5 more relative points, but out of characters. I expect this to not be deleted as my sisters...

Placed a pickup order. I sent someone to pick it up. The order was incorrect. One of my meals were missing. I didn't get the silverware I requested and there was not any syrup. I had 2 orders of Fench Toast. I also ordered a sandwich and requested no tomato but they still put tomato on the sandwich. I called the restaurant to inform them about the mistakes of my order. I was on the phone with the automated system for 10 minutes before a actual person came to the phone. A guy answered and I explained what happened and he just said ok and held the phone. I asked him was he going to help me. He then said he was going to transfer me to a Manager. My call was transferred 3 more times after that. Mind you I had to tell my story every time. Once they heard the story the told me to hold on and transferred me to another person. Finally I got a lady named Tina on the phone. She informed me she was a manager. I informed her I had been transferred 4 times and each time they told me they were transferring me to a manager. I explained I was upset because my order was incorrect and because I had been transferred so many times after telling my story. She was trying to interrupt me and I asked her could I finish telling her what my problem was before she interrupted. She then says well I fixed your order so if you would have requested silverware I would have put it in there. I was like ma'am I did but it's not only about silverware. I told her that I had food also missing. She put me on hold and came back and said, well I found the other order here on the counter that he left and the bag said bag 1of 2. I stated that it was still the restaurant mistake because they only gave him 1 bag, and I asked how was he supposed to know it was 2 bags if the restaurant didn't give him 2. So at thus point I am really upset because you're saying it's our fault. Every time I told her something was wrong she put me on hold and came back with an excuse. She asked me was I coming back to get the food and I told her no because it would take too long. She finally stated she would refund me for the missing meal. I told her thank you. I told her as being a business owner myself I didn't feel like she handled the situation correctly because not once did she apologize. I told her I was not sure if they were short staffed or what the problem was but I felt the first thing she should have done after hearing everything I had went through was apologize. I told her to consider that in the future. She seemed mad by my response and tried to say some smart but I cut her off and said well you said you were going to give me a refund so there's nothing else. Her whole attitude...

I usually don't have bad experiences at Cracker Barrel and I usually don't leave reviews criticizing a restaurant because I've worked restaurant half my life. I will preface all this by saying it was 8:45 when we walked out of there and they close at 9. However... When we arrived we were going to be seated right behind the hostess table... in the entry way where there's no room around the chairs it looked tight and uncomfortable and both my husband and I struggle a little with claustrophobia so we asked for a different table they let us move. That was very kind. When we did move no one came for our drink order for quite some time. When she did come she was very nice, took our order came back with our drinks and we made our orders really simple-exactly the same. Lol I ran out of my drink before she brought our food and sat silently after she brought our food waiting for her to come back with the drink and my husband kindly let me drink his since we ordered exactly the same lol I drank both our drinks completely dry and still waited so I loudly sipped after we looked everywhere for our waitress. She then came but at that point we were ready to get boxes and our ticket. My husband asked for boxes and our ticket but she didn't bring both she brought boxes and disappeared again then we tried pursuing her for the ticket again. Now to the food: 😒 I have NEVER been to a cracker barrel that served burnt and I mean literally black on the top biscuits. Never would I dare to let that exit my kitchen as acceptable to eat. I didn't bring my phone in with me and didn't take pictures while we were eating but I was hungry enough that day to melt butter on and eat the burnt hockey pucks. Now.. the chicken and dumplins. Dry. No broth or sauce to speak of... nothing to dip my burnt biscuit in... took it home to Dr it up and save it. The hashbrown casserole...😱 crispy like burnt rice.. had I had dentures I wouldn't have eaten it for fear of breaking something.. I saved the fried chicken because I have an amazing air fryer for reheating. I ate the meatloaf but then felt sick later that evening and the only thing I ate after 7am was their food. And I've been fine today. I may end up not reheating or trying to save any of our leftovers. I will say that the manager handled the situation well. We weren't even going to say anything about it and pay and leave but they asked us how we liked our meal and I was honest about our food experience. She greatly apologized and tried to make it up with a gift card but now we don't know if we can trust to go back and feel people should know...