Roost Fried Chicken — Restaurant in Bozeman

The worst “restaurant” experience I have ever had in my life.

I am the general manager of a restaurant now & have to worked my way up from dishwasher, many moons ago.

The food was pretty good but the fact one of the employees picked my receipt up out of the garbage with her bare hands in front of me then proceeded to grab my food with said hands was pretty gnarly. The worker at the front also told me I could get dark or light meat from any part of the chicken! I politely pretended that didn’t happen lol then attempted to make my order but the person taking my order had never used that POS cashier system before. 😂

So she rang in the wrong entree items which mind you, three small meals totaled $70! 😬 another employee came by to help enter the items into the system. All in all, what could have been a 60 second pleasant order took about ten minutes lol but then I overheard one of employees say, they wish there was a manager there to help… :(

I then started to realize that these two young college students, I’m guessing, had received no training, no knowledge of product & were tossed to the public, set up to fail. I then went to sit on the patio & most of the tables & whole patio area were pretty disgusting. I then go to get some sweet tea & the tea is not sweet.

Okay, throw some sugar in the tea. Grab a seat inside and pimento cheese comes out & it was just how my Mississippi grandma makes it. 🤌🏼

Food comes out & there was something missing from each of the three peoples order. No worries, they go to grab it & all is good. Cooks did a wonderful job, crispy, flavorful chicken & the okra with the comeback sauce was delectable.

I guess I am writing this to the leadership to encourage you to set your people up for success. There were multiple people in line after me who were not restaurant people & were not as nice to your employees due to what was clearly a failure of leadership.

So I would urge the “management/ownership” of this little chicken shop to take some time to invest in your employees, maybe show up for a whole day & work alongside these young folks. I was quite the whole time & ate my food in peace as I realized that these hardworking folks had been set up to fail since before their shift began by a complete & utter lack of leadership.

So, I really do encourage the owner to spend maybe two days at your shop & see what you can do to quit leaving your employees out to dry… 👎

I have managed multiple restaurants in Bozeman & across the country from dishwashing at Cracker Barrel to being a Sommelier at The Four Season’s Maui & many of dive bars, chicken shops, sushi restaurants & everything in between.

The leadership here needs to take a long hard look at themselves. The patio was filthy as well & many health code violations through the restaurant that just I could see in the front of the house. 😬

I don’t write much on the internet due to being in a restaurant my whole life, but this made me sad for the employees who have to bear the brunt of what is clearly an absolute lack of owner involvement in daily operations. Or, even scarier these are just the standards they operate on with ownership there…

I wish you luck if you attempt to eat here.

With care, Marcus Joshlin

General Manager

Ruth’s Chris Seattle 727 Pine St Seattle, WA ...

Good and fast, but expensive. ~$18 for not much food. I ordered the mixed 2-Piece Fried Chicken and a "large" side of Collard Greens, and a sweet tea. The classic combo familiar to any southerner. The food came out less than five minutes after I ordered it, which was a bit startling.

The sweet tea was passable, but very weak. I hadn't expected the collards to be any good, but I was pleasantly surprised. Though a bit on the mild side, they had a pleasant vinegar flavor and a good amount of pork shavings. My only complaint is that if this little soup cup is a large order, what counts as a small? Perhaps I shouldn't complain since collards are near impossible to find in the west, much less decent ones, but I'd pay an extra dollar or two for more.

The chicken was also pleasant, and might be authentic to some part of the south, but it doesn't resemble the thick, crunchy chicken of the Carolinas that I'm more familiar with. It is, however, flavorful and moist, with a deeper flavor to the breading than the typical salt and fat taste of western fried chicken. Again, my only real complaint is quantity. I ordered a 2-Piece and got one thigh and a leg. A leg should not count as a whole piece. That's half a piece, at best.

Last was the biscuit, which came gratis with the chicken, which is good since I wouldn't buy one on its own. By far the most disappointing part. Somehow both dry and doughy, with little to no flavor to speak of. A little starch pillow. It didn't come with butter, either, nor do the tables have any. I had to request it, and strangely they only had pecan butter. I won't complain about that, it was actually rather nice, but the biscuit served only as a vessel for this pecanny sweetness.

Still hungry, unsurprisingly, I decided to try the ice cream they had in a freezer near the counter. "Genuine" brand ice cream, which is a name that feels inherently disingenuous, strangely. The smallest container they had was Honey Lavender, which tasted more of honey than if lavender, but wasn't bad.

Recommended if you're in a big hurry or want some actually decent fried chicken, but definitely not if you're very hungry or...

It saddens me to give this review, because I truly love the food at this place, 95% of the time the food is great! Today was unfortunately the worst service I've ever had here. I came in ordered my food to go and proceeded to wait several people came in after me some with to go orders others to stay. I watched as food came out and as it approached the 20 minute mark I started realizing some of the people who came in after me were being served before me. No big deal I thought to go orders are usually behind in house orders, be patient I told myself. Then 10 minutes more went by, still no food. Now some of those people behind me were leaving after having eaten, so I said "Did they forget about me?" To which I was told my 2 chicken baskets and 1 chicken sandwich was a "long order" and they were having trouble keeping up! Haha so kept waiting another 10 minutes goes by and the lady says they are getting to my chicken sandwich and it will be just a few more minutes lol! Total time waited today 50 minutes before I finally got my order, with the saddest we are so sorry I've ever heard lol Here's the best part I go out to my vehicle to check my order, I can't make this up people they forgot my fries 😂. I was not compensated anything for waiting almost an hour for food and the manager didnt even come out to say sorry either. Lol Bottom line if your looking for a quick meal, don't come here, upside the foods always good and worth the wait! Why 3 stars? This isn't the first time I've waited this long for food from this place and that's a big part of service! Update This place is still bad, guy taking our order was the best part being friendly, talkative and informative. The food, chicken sandwich (drenched in sauce) was somehow dry and flavorless, fried bacon mac balls flavorless wait time crazy for how busy they were (30+ minutes), environment was dirty to be kind, (building in desperate need of a remodel.) The bill crazy expensive over $80 for 3 meals and an app. Overall I've reduced my 4 year old review from 3* down to 2* I as a local will NOT be coming back or recommending the Roost to anyone(maybe the...