Texas Roadhouse — Restaurant in Cartersville

There are terrible restaurants and then there are places that have no business being in business. Texas Roadhouse: Cartersville, Georgia, falls into whatever category is below the latter type. This place is horrible and horrifying all at the same time and ironically, it isn't because of the food; rather, it's all about incompetent managerial policy combined with a poor excuse for a staff.

To begin, this restaurant thinks it is perfectly okay to have a server take your driver's license away from the table, out of your sight, so as to scan it into their computer system, just so that you can order an alcoholic beverage. This may seem benign to some patrons, but when you see the quality of people this location hires, it makes one very uneasy that this sensitive information is in their hands.

Add to this tonight's experience.

For drinks, we ordered two old fashions and one specialty margarita. For dinner, we ordered one shrimp appetizer, one salad with thousand island dressing, one 18 ounce, one 26 ounce bone-in ribeye, chicken tenders, and a kid's burger. The old fashions are listed as being made with Maker's Mark bourbon on the menu, but the server indicated that they were made with Jim Beam and this was only after we questioned why they didn't taste right. They later remade them with the right bourbon, but only after having some back and forth with the server concerning why it should matter which spirit was used. Then this issue required even more difficult interaction with the bar tender. The server, we suppose, couldn't be bothered to handle this issue after that. Next the margarita comes, but it looks nothing like the one I ordered and tastes even worse (as I've had this one on the menu at other locations many times before). Sure enough, this had to be corrected as well. After almost a half an hour of this nonsense, the salad finally arrives, but with ranch dressing. I told the server, again, that our order was wrong and could she please get me the dressing I ordered. Ten minutes goes by and she is no where to be found. So I walked my way to the kitchen myself and asked kitchen staff to get me the dressing I wanted. All of this confusion also resulted in us realizing that our server never even bothered to ask us how we wanted our steaks cooked. With trepidation, we waited many more minutes for them to arrive. They were cooked to medium (my preference is rare). How was this done-ness level even chosen? How did she not realize that she needed to come back to us and ask us how we wanted them? Did she just guess like she did with the drinks, choosing cheaper spirits that we didn't want?

By this point, we just wanted to finish with this terrible meal and leave, but suddenly our server started to develop a new interest in our discussion and proceeded to take the entire booth apart behind us just so that she could listen in to our conversation to see if we were upset. I would have almost dismissed this as speculative paranoia if the server hadn't had the audacity to whisper to our minor son and ask him if we were upset, making our son extremely uncomfortable in the process. Who in their right mind does this? Add to the fact that management requires servers like these to TAKE YOUR ID (with ALL of your vital PERSONAL information) AWAY from the table and you can see why this is an insane policy that I can only hope gets them one day sued.

Stay far away from this place. I think I'd rather starve to death than...

My first visit here was not very impressive so I was reluctant to come back, but it's where my mom wanted to eat for her birthday. We signed in with the hostess at the front door and was extremely nice, but unfortunately I don't remember he name. After putting our name on the list we stepped back outside for a few minutes, but the 90+ degree heat was too much for my parents so we came inside to sit down while we waited for for our table. There was absolutely nobody sitting down on the benches in front of the hostess stand, but we were rudely advised by the host that we couldn't sit there and were pointed back outside. Not off to a good start, and it only got worse from there. So we went to the porch for another 5 minutes before I received a text stating that our table was ready and to "quickly" proceed to the hostess stand. As we were trying to quickly proceed to the hostess stand we found that we were locked outside on the porch! We knocked several times but none of the 3 staff noticed, so I knocked hard enough to warrant a dirty look from all 3 staff members. At that point we were asked to sit at the bench we had attempted to sit at just 5 minutes prior. When we were shown to our table, the booth had not been properly cleaned and was "disgusting" according to the waitress who cleaned it. We were given a basket of bread and no silverware to spread the butter with. Our waiter, Nick, came to our table, introduced himself, and took our drink orders. Of all of our complaints, the service that Nick offered was definitely not one of them... he was very upbeat and had a positive energy. He made sure that none of our drinks were empty and was very friendly...so if a manager or the local owner happens to read this, just know that he did an excellent job and is a valuable employee! As we waited for our drinks, I handed menus out to my parents. When my mom opened her menu she found that there was butter smeared all inside. We were still waiting for our silverware so she had no way to wipe her hands clean until Nick brought her some napkins. My mom and I both ordered filet...my mom ordered the 6oz and I the 8oz because the 6oz filet I received on my first visit here looked more like a small medallion than a 6oz steak. When our steaks came out they looked about the same...in fact my mom's looked a little bigger. We both ordered medium rare, but both were medium at best. I'm not one to send my food back...if you've seen the movie Waiting you know why! I took a picture for reference...can you tell which is 6oz and which is 8oz? So there's that and the quality of the meat was horrible...I had to spit out serval bites because of gristle. The only reason we left without speaking to a manager was because Nick was an excellent waiter and I didn't want any of this to reflect on him. Our salads were good and my dad's sweet potato with carmel sauce was amazing. Other than that, I don't have anything else positive to say about this place. Huge...

Karen, was absolutely the best. ! Fast, well spoken, extremely professional. Thank you for that.. Only wish the owner of such a fine establishment, to know how lucky and blessed they are, to have this lady, working for you! Best hold on to this lady. We came in for mother's Day, couldn't of asked for a better experience. She was fast, caring, charming. Plus who staff was extremely happy to see there old Co-worker, Hanna Wooten. My daughter, I was truly amazed at everyone there. Coming over to our table, to hug Hanna. Am very proud of you as well Hanna. On what a awesome impact you had on this place. And each staff member. You did the correct thing by not during the place for failure to keep the guy from rubbing and touching your butt. Most ladies, such as yourself would of not just walked away. With such grace. Very proud of you. Hurts me to think when you went back to ask for your job back. How you were turned down? As you were the criminal here? Fact you didn't go forward with legal.. Should of shown the management here how well moral of a person you are. To allow a staff member here. To rub u up. . . Then get treated like u are the bad person, on this. As your dad. Am truly sorry this place and it's management,treats people that way? (Birds of the same feathers flock together).. I only pray, the person in charge of these decision making, children / daughter one day doesn't have the same thing happen to them!! And they get injected into what "trauma" this placed, allowed upon you, and your family members.. and the audacity of them not hiring you back? After several several months. I could tell by the way the staff came up to you.. You was a very valuable team player, at this establishment.. It's a shame the management team that's so "incompetent" don't recognize this? Again I apologize, Hannah on their behalf!! Next time maybe you'll get a police report and go to the the labor dept. I mean it showed massive integrity that you didn't draw unemployment off of them.. Everyone else does! Very proud of you. Trust me, you are to great of a human to work at such a place. One day, it come right back on them. Staff 5 star. Leadership of this place.-1star. to the owner. Best be glad I raised my daughter to allow God to do her fighting. Most parents would of seek out a attorney. After what that Young demented staff worker did to my child. O" if you do have the audacity to make a comment about my review please apologize to my child Hannah Renee Wooten you can make that a public apology as you see we are forgiving people that we came back into your establishment spend our hard-earned money and ate there.. Only because ,not many options in...