Caroline's Restaurant — Restaurant in Dubuque

We are from the area and own a business in the hospitality industry so decided to go in for a Thursday evening dinner. We started in the lounge and had a couple of drinks before dinner. Bartender was great to chat. Unfortunately that is where the good experience ended, Went over to Caroline's and was seated by a younger guy who proceeded to run his hands through his hair as he was seating us and handing us our menus. We later watched him walking through the dining room continuing to run his hand through his hair multiple times and then observed him setting clean plates on a table. I'm going to assume no hand washing was done prior. If your hair is that long and you feel the need to constantly touch it to keep it off your face then perhaps a hair cut of a job in a different industry. Now onto the meal. We ordered the cheese and charcuterie plate to start. What we received was deli cut meat and cheese with some berries and walnuts. The meat and cheese were all about 1/8" thick and we received a total of 1 and a half slices of salami and capicola, 3/4 of a slice of mortadella, 1 and a half slices each of yellow cheddar and white cheddar (I think) and a dollop of goat. A few blueberries (which a few were starting to mold), some dried cranberries and walnuts with some toast points. Cost was $19 for a plate of deli meat/cheese that maybe cost $2 in total and with the berries and nuts, maybe $3 in total. Someone needs to tell the chef and management that deli meat/cheese is not charcuterie. It was a poor start and we were hoping things would get better with the main course. I ordered the Pork Belly Two Ways and my wife ordered the Blackened Chicken Pasta. Her meal was well done, no complaints I would give it a 4/5. However, mine was a different story. One would think that when a menu states 2 ways, that you would be receiving something that was being served prepared two separate ways as is commonly done. This was not the case. Apparently they first braised the belly and then sear it, so it arrives at the table basically a single preparation. They should change the menu description as it is deceiving. Being braised and then seared, it was somewhat dry for a braised belly, I would give it a 3/5. Brussel sprouts that accompanied were the highlight of the plate, and the polenta cake was uninspiring with no seasoning or flavor at all. For what the meal cost and the quality we received, we will not return. I would recommend Brazen or L'May instead if your in the area looking for...

The two stars are for the atmosphere of the restaurant. Everything was incredibly overpriced, we had bad service and our experience was not great. We were very excited to come here for date night, as we noticed this restaurant right after we moved to Dubuque and we're very excited to have a nice night out. However, our service was very slow, and we felt as though our server was rude towards our feelings, questions and requests that we made. We felt as though we became an afterthought to our server after it took about 15 minutes for her to come back after we said we needed a little more time to look at the menu and took her quite some time after the food came to check on how it was. I loved my dinner and had originally wanted to substitute something else for asparagus as I do not like it, the waitress said we do not do salads after I asked if I could substitute for a side salad, and she said " I'm not quite sure what you are asking" , and looked at me with a blank stare. My wife and I have been in the service industry for quite a long time and we've never been treated that way as a customer, and would never treat one of our customers the way my wife and I were treated this evening. Instead of doing everything that could have been done to help us feel better and make us happy, we felt like we were being brushed off and we just wanted to leave as soon as possible. My wife ordered the special for the evening and it turned out to be what felt like an entire box of pasta drenched in olive oil with a few tomatoes, olives, overcooked shrimp and feta cheese sprinkled on top... We do not feel like a bowl of pasta salad that has been warmed up should not be $22. Overall we were incredibly disappointed and upset with how our nice date night came to fruition. What we thought was going to be a new place for us to go for special occasions and night out with friends will now be on our list of places we will not go and will tell people we had a...

During our stay at the Julien we wanted to try out the restaurant inside. As we entered a little before dinner on a Tuesday, we noticed that the place was almost empty. We were seated quickly. The waitress was pleasant and seemed flustered. We asked a few questions on what was good and explained that it was our daughters 12 birthday. This is the place we decided to celebrate. We ordered a few appitizers, adult drinks for mom and dad and mockitios for the kids. About 20 minutes in we had not received any of the beverages. I finally went to the bar and asked for them and was told he was making them now. We ordered 3 orders of the Korean Tacos. My kids love Korean so they were very excited for these. The waitress came out and told us that they only had enough for one order. We were bummed but said ok and ordered other items. She brought out the one order of the Korean Tacos, and told us that they had ran out of the kimichi so they can charge us only half after sitting them on the table... I ordered a NY strip Medium...it came out raw in the middle. My wife ordered the charcuterie board as it was reviewed well. It was pretty sad looking when received.

I finally broke down and spoke to the manager (which I hate doing). He explained that the waitress should have explained that they are understaffed and out of quite a bit of items. All of this making a rough night for a 12 year olds birthday.

They did discount the $200 bill by $7 for the issue and did bring her a free dessert for her birthday. The manager was pleasant but this night was rough.

The breakfast was amazing. Our server was killer, the food was amazing, and we really enjoyed the coffee flight. If anything you might want to check out what the town has for dinner and wake up early to check out the breakfast...