River Terrace — Restaurant in Columbia

River Terrace left a bitter taste in my mouth after my friend’s 31st birthday celebration. I always eager to support local businesses, I had high hopes and recommended this place to my friend for her birthday, I now regret that decision. With a reservation made in advance for our party of 11, including a baby, we expected a celebratory evening.

Myself, arriving a bit late with two friends, I noticed the waitress’s attitude from the start. She seemed put off, a sentiment echoed by the rest of our group. Despite this, we ordered, and my Moscow Mule, though delayed, was enjoyable. I settled on the Eggplant Parmesan, which turned out to be just average.

The real disappointment began when another table was seated near us. While we understood a crying baby might not be ideal, the waitress’s visible annoyance was off-putting. The owner intervened, offering a toy that eventually calmed the baby down within a couple minutes.

One of our friends was not too hungry and just ordered fries, but they arrived cold. Reluctant to bother the already irritable waitress, we encouraged our friend to speak up. The owner handled the situation, but her method of asking to taste the fries before agreeing to refry them seemed unprofessional.

As the evening progressed, we realized our checkout process would be far from smooth. The waitress warned us it would take a long time, and she was right. After waiting around 25 minutes in the back room, someone from our group went to check on our bills, only to find the staff complaining about the birthday girl’s crying baby. To make matters worse, there were very concerning activities involving a staff member in the bathroom, which I believe was made aware to the owner. I had stepped aside, to removed myself from the situation, since I did not want my nephew to overhear the matter.

Finally, after what seemed like an eternity, we approached the staff at the front desk to inquire about our bills, it seemed like the staff only started checking us out after we approached them, unsure of why we had to wait so long. Adding to the disappointment, there was an automatic gratuity included due to our party size, which felt unfair given the poor service. One of my friends even had an incorrect bill with an added $45 gratuity, which was rectified after questioning.

Overall, the experience at River Terrace was incredibly disappointing. Considering the complaints about the birthday girl’s own baby, the discomfort caused by our waitress, the concerning situation in the bathroom, and seeing the owner’s poor responses in viewing past reviews here, I can’t recommend River Terrace. It’s unfortunate that what should have been a joyous celebration turned into such a disappointing experience. Really has put a damper on the rest of our week here. It was all of our first times here and we will not be...

I love supporting small business & I will be the first to praise where praise is due, but…..I had high expectations due to so many 5-star reviews, however our experience fell very short. Sadly we felt the food did not live up to the hype, & even though they weren’t crazy busy the service was slow & the kitchen seemed very disorganized. Ordered the spinach artichoke dip & crawfish egg rolls for apps. Egg rolls were fabulous & served hot like freshly prepared food should be, esp since RT boasts made-to-order food. The spinach dip was a very thick glob of spinach with a few scattered shavings of Parmesan cheese on top & served with Tostitos scoops. For a more “upscale” dining venue (as described on the website) it was very odd to see Tostitos as a part of any dish. Crostini or some sort of pita would have been more well received. The dip was also brought out barely warm. We complained about it being cold to the server who brought it to our table (not our original server) & she took it back to the kitchen & had it reheated instead of replacing it with a fresh hot dip??? Our main entrees: eggplant NOLA was just ok, best part of the dish was the eggplant which was fried to a golden crisp. Mom had the 6oz Filet with baked potato & said it was cooked well & she enjoyed it. My husband had the seafood trinity & said it was “ok”. He’s usually a member of the clean plate club esp when dining out & the meal is good, but he left half of his dish in the bowl. Our little guy had the chicken tenders & fries, but it was not delivered along with the rest of our food. After a couple minutes & it still had not arrived we flagged down the server who had brought out our food. It took another 10 mins for them to bring out his meal & it was piping hot, like burned my fingers hot. This confirmed they had forgotten it & had to prepare it. They also forgot my Mom’s side salad, she had to ask about it when they brought out our sons food. Our actual server was very pleasant & friendly but she only came by to check on us once during our main meal. We saw more of the server who ran our food to our table than our actual server. We sat with empty drinks for about 10 mins during our meal & the one time our original server came to check on us we had to point out that we were in need of refills instead of our server noticing our glasses were empty & offering to refill. Sadly, all in all it was a disappointing experience of mediocre food & a lack of attentiveness/attention from the wait staff & kitchen staff. Just expected better given that this was a $170 dinner (sans alcohol) & so many positive reviews. Gave 3 stars because my Mom enjoyed her steak & once we finally got it our sons chicken tenders & fries were good/hot/fresh. If this rating were solely based on mine & my hubby’s meal it would be 2 stars. Sorry Elizabeth, this was a...

If I could give 0 stars I would. The worst restaurant experience I have ever had. My wife and I showed up around 6:30 on a Saturday night and it was fairly busy so we expected a wait. The hostess couldn’t give us an exact estimated wait but said there was a few tables in front of us so we decided to get a drink and wait. Ended up being around 45 min until we were seated. Our waitress greeted us and was very nice, but once we had said that we needed a minute to look at the minute, it took her quite awhile to come back. We were ready to order and once we started, they were out of a lot menu items. The waitress didn’t acknowledge this at all with us at first so we were stuck trying to figure out what to order since everything we kept trying to get was out. We ended up having to go to our third back up on entree and side items which was fine but still would of been nice to know all this before we started ordering.

From here it just tanks! We ordered our food at 7:22 and ended up waiting an hour with still no food. We ended up seeing our waitress one time during that whole hour to refill our drinks with no update on our food or even apology for the delay. Our waitress eventually casually walking by and says our food is up next. We waited another 10 min while watching other tables receive food so we decided to pay for the drinks and leave. I had to go up to the hostess to let her know my situation. She apologizes and says the kitchen has been backed up. Our waitress comes out from the bar area to let me know our food is being put in to go bags and that she will “calculate” up some numbers for our tab. I’m assuming there would be some sort of discount or compensation of some point and I was fine taking the food if that was the case and if it was actually ready at that point. So the waitress brings back her chicken scratch written itemized receipt with the amount and to my amazement not only is it the full amount but even more than it should of been. At this point I’m beyond trying to deal with anymore with this restaurant that I pay the check and go.

Not even thinking the food could possibly be messed up at this point, I looked through the bags half way home to see they have messed up my wife order. She calls the restaurant to speak with the manager. The hostess says she could take a message for her so we explain everything. The hostess apologizes and tells the manager in the background with her reply, “that we can bring the food back and look at the ticket”.

Long story short, if you want to wait all night for your food with poor service and management that could care less about your experience, then this...