BLVCKCOW Grill — Restaurant in Bowie

Review on BLVCK COW.

I had previously visited on September 23rd, 2023, and really enjoyed the meal, service and atmosphere of the BLVCK COW. The only issue then was the music was a little loud for the space. All-in-all, the visit was pleasing. Which is why I made reservations form my Wife’s birthday here and hyped it up to our visiting out-of-town guests.

My visit on March 9th, for my Wife’s Birthday with our out-of-town guests, was the worst dining experience I have ever had.

When we first entered, you could hear extremely loud voices overpowering the music that was being streamed. We were seated, not far from the extremely loud 5 patrons, who didn’t seem to care how disruptive they might be. (I’ll get back to them shortly.) The only other guest in the restaurant were another 4 people who came in halfway into our visit and were seated next to us and two guys at the bar. So, it didn’t seem too busy.

Our waitress was nice, while also doing double duty as the Bartender, took our drink order and the subsequent meal order (salads, soups, entrees.) The drinks came and were great. The salads came in a respectable time and the mood was good. THEN, after an excessive amount of time waiting for the entrees, we received them. My wife ordered the 14 oz. NY Strip, medium well. When received and cut into, it looked medium well, but was dry as if it was an olde piece of meat. No juices, as if it was previously cooked and reheated. I ordered, the Peppered Shrimp special, that was received at near room temperature and was dried out also (overcooked). One of my out-of-town Guests ordered the special that had a Lobster Tail. It too was barely warm, and the rice was room temperature. The Manager did offer to replace my Wife’s steak, but since her birthday dinner was already ruined, she did not desire another. If any of you are like us, sending things back to be redone or replaced comes with perception (real or not) with what happens when you complain. To add insult, her birthday was only acknowledged by the hostess that seated us.

Three quarters of our visit, the noisy patrons (who never let up on their loudness) FINALLY decided to depart. On the way out they were being hugged by the Maître d’, the Hostess, and the Chef (who came out specifically to speak to them.) This seems to kind of explain why they were allowed to be so rude and overtake the sound of the other guests. However, the Chef made no effort to come over to see how we were since we sent the meal back.

As a consumer, I try to patronize local businesses (especially Black Owned) and I am usually not a complainer. This time is different. Other than our Hostess, the visit sucked. I really hope BLVCK COW gets it together, because if they continue to serve and provide the experience we had this past weekend, and do not take the customer seriously they will go out...

I've been here now 3 times, HH, brunch and now dinner. This is definitely a place I don't need to return to for anything other than HH. I posted on another platform about the great HH experience and the horrible brunch, last night I went for dinner. It's a holiday week and it snowed, so I get it, it's slow. Therefore, the kitchen is short staffed and the restaurant is EMPTY. At 5:45 we were the only ones there other than the staff. And honestly, we were ok with that as I haven't seen my friend in 20+ years, so we were really catching up. With that said one would expect everything to be over the top. The only thing over the top was our server, Derrick (sp). He made for a very pleasant experience. They have a new menu, not the one published on the website, so don't look at that to decide if you want to eat here. They no longer have any steaks other than the ribeye nor do they have wild caught salmon, Chilean seabass, or lobster ravioli. Derrick went over the new menu that had prices scratched out and written in btw and pointed out some of his favorite dishes, the salmon cakes and the salmon pasta were at the top of his list. As they only have farmed raised salmon, both of these were a no for me. They had a shrimp pasta, but didn't describe the pasta, so I inquired what type of pasta was used. Derrick asked the kitchen and they showed him fusilli, a spiral pasta, which I was fine with. My friend opted for the salmon cakes. As soon as the order was put in Derrick came back and said they were out of salmon cakes, so my friend ordered the ribeye and the garlic mashed potatoes. The food comes and I am presented a bowl that has a combination of fusilli and penne pasta with shrimp. In whose mind was this acceptable? Now if you know anything about pasta, you know fusilli has a lighter mouth feel than penne, which is a heavier more rustic pasta. So I asked if I could just have one pasta and unfortunately the kitchen told Derrick no, that's how the dish comes. That needs to be on this new menu. Clearly that was sent back immediately. Thank God it was still early and HH is throughout the restaurant until 7. I ordered the jerk shrimp flatbread and told my friend to eat so his food wouldn't get cold. His ribeye looked overcooked to me as it was well done, but he thoroughly enjoyed it, so he may have ordered it that way. The flatbread finally came out with 8 squares, each topped with a half of shrimp and not quite crispy as a flatbread should be, but I didn't want to send anything else back as I could easily take it home and pop it in the oven or air fryer to achieve the crispness a flatbread should have, which is exactly what I did.

The next time I'm asked to go here, the response will be...

I decided to come to Blk Cow for my birthday. My reservation was at 5pm and we arrived to the restaurant at 4:40pm. At 5pm we went up to the door and it was locked so we went back to the car and sat to see if other people would come. We decided to try the door again. The door was still locked at 5:07 and I could see two people looking at us from the inside. As we were walking back to the car a man opened the door and told us that they were open and he asked if the workers had opened the door for us earlier which I told him no.

Once inside, the hostess and a man said they would have a table ready for us in a few and told us to sit down to wait. The restaurant was empty. While waiting the workers told us they were waiting for the owner to show up with new updated menus as they had changed their menu. I thought that was weird because they hadn't made mention of the menu change on their website. They said the owner would arrive with the new menu in 20-30 minutes and we would only be able to order from the happy hour menu for the time being. A man asked us twice to sit at the bar as they didn't want people to see us just sitting there waiting. Once again the restaurant was empty and no one was there but us so it was an odd request. We said no and continued to wait and after a while a hostess took us to a table.

After being seated, we asked the waiter for a Sierra Mist and Pepsi. She came back and said the fountain machine wasn't working. While waiting for the owner to come with the new menus, our waitress told us they had a tasting of the new menu the day before and she was able to remember some of the new menu items from memory. Since we were tired of waiting for the menus we ordered items based on her MEMORY. We got the empanadas and Mango BBQ wings. When the wings arrived they were cold. The empanadas were delicious. Later we tried to see if the waitress could remember more items from updated menu and we winded up ordering crab cakes only later to be told they no longer had crab cakes. After waiting for almost 40 minutes the owner finally arrived to the restaurant with the new updated menus and we were finally able to order entrees. We had the trout and salmon with mashed potatoes and braised cabbage. The mashed potatoes were salty. And the braised cabbage did not come out with the meal. I asked the waitress about the braised cabbage twice. It finally came out after I had already finished my meal.

Furthermore, the women's bathroom did not have toilet paper, paper towels, or soap. So idk how the women workers were washing their hands and etc.

Overall, our dining experience at Black Cow was disappointing, with numerous service issues and inconveniences throughout...