Village Inn — Restaurant in Dubuque

Long story short, it's just not what it used to be. We went for dinner with my wife's parents on a Thursday evening. The host was insanely slow and inefficient at seating people and, because of his ineffectiveness, a backup quickly built up in the lobby. After we were finally seated by one of the wait staff who jumped in to help, then no one seemed to know who was covering which tables. We never did receive ice water (that used to be immediately covered by the host or a bus person). After a fair wait, one of the servers finally came by to get our orders. His first comment was on how crazy busy they were. We were shocked because there weren't very many customers. He took our orders and then disappeared. Eventually we got our soup, salad, and drinks. Although we asked for it, still no water. As we waited on our food we tuned in to the dynamic among the staff. There was open bickering about the table coverage. The front end manager took no obvious action and seemed to blow off the person who commented. For what it's worth, that manager didn't seem to really know what he was supposed to be doing and didn't appear to have any control of what or how they were covering business. Meanwhile, we saw the lady we recognized as the main (general?) manager came out of the kitchen and she only seemed concerned about something about 3 people at table 10 and she was obviously flustered. We watched the continuing dynamic among the staff and eventually another waitress brought out our food. The orders were close, but not quite right. Our waiter reappeared, asked what we needed, again commenting about how crazy it was (still far from busy) and disappeared again. After the second reminder he got our orders right. The food itself was decent, just as its been for years. With regular prodding, we were able to get our needs covered but it was pretty obvious that a lot of the customers were frustrated. From management on through to the crew, this place needs help ord it's going to fail due to faltering service. It used to be excellent. Last night's experience was at least our 3rd or 4th with mediocre to poor service. Our patronage (once quite regular) has been lost. There are a lot better...

This is, sadly, my first very negative review of a restaurant.

We visited for a quick dinner on a Saturday evening. It was awful. While in line to pay, the cashier said to the patron in front of us, and subsequently to us, that "they hadn't expected the rush." OK, they acknowledged the problem, but that's kinda sorta blaming the customers. Had there been a line for seating, we would have shrugged, said "this place is very popular", and gone to a counter service place. Instead we were seated.

And here is why I said "awful":

1. Store menu did not match on-line menu: Pot roast and meatloaf where not present on the store menu.
2. Service was poor. Server was slow to arrive at table. Food took approximately 40 minutes from order to table.
3. Food was poor. Dry (though hot) hamburger served with cold limp fries made me wonder what had gone on in the kitchen. Tilapia smelled strikingly fishy, even from across the table.

We had no time to complain and wait for a remake, so we picked through the food we had, passed on the included desert and went to pay.

This place is locally popular. I certainly hope this was a one time breakdown in the kitchen, but I'm rating my visit, not my hope, and the place...

The food was okay, but I wouldn't return. Because when we first arrived we were greeted with a staff that was sloppy with untucked shirts and without any sense of urgency or so it seemed, the waitress didn't smile and (neither did the hostess who seated us) or visit our table after the food was delivered to ask if everything was alright. When the food was dropped off we were given an empty bottle of ketchup, and had asked for a drink refill, she never came back so we sat thirsty and ketchupless for the entire meal. Then as we were checking out the host didn't seem to care that I was a paying customer and had a comment about my experience thus far as she paid more attention to what she was reading on her watch than what I was doing or the couple behind me. As I was leaving I told them it wouldn't hurt them to smile and then she suddenly seemed to care that I was in her establishment and took quite the offense, aside from all the other things I didn't care for that I had experienced, I wouldn't have cared about them so much if the environment was warmer and more welcoming and if staff looked like less like they were being held against their will and had a friendly smile every...