Denny's — Restaurant in Dundee Township

Look, I'll be honest with you, I've been an IHOP guy my whole life. Ever since I was a kid, the International House of Pancakes was my destination of choice for super cheap breakfast food. I had stuck with the brand I was loyal to through terrible service experiences, the thing with the B, and even a medical emergency in one of their locations. Through all of these events, never was there a moment when my faith was as shaken as it is today. I am rocked to my core by the experience I had at the Carpentersville Denny's last night. It was my first time at the chain. There is no Denny's within a reasonable drive from my house, but due to extraneous circumstances that I will spare you from, I was within range of this location. I walked through the front door and was greeted by a shockingly modern interior. Smooth surfaces with little to no grime bucked my every expectation, and the warm lighting cast the dining area in a welcoming light. Clearly, the dingy diner scene I had expected to find under the Yellow Hexagon was far from reality, but the guantlet of my judgement still stretched on, and Denny's would have to work hard in order to pass through my IHOP-biased trials. My party and I sat and chatted for only a brief moment before our server approached us, she was attentive and kind and when we had questions on the menu, she answered with the utmost enthusiasm and knowledge. We waited a very reasonable amount of time for our food. My coffee was still hot by the time the Grand Slam Slugger I ordered was set down in front of me. (From what I understand, the Grand Slam Slugger was the optimal choice for a first time Dennysgoer such as myself, as it gave me the full array of the breakfast basics). The ambiance and service judged to exceed my wildest hopes, the final frontier of my fore into the foreign diner was the food itself. Let me just say, that every aspect of the meal, from syrup to scramble, was exactly what I wanted. Not so good as to make the rest of the experience seem unfitting, but still satisfying and far beyond the parallel items at my native 24 hour diner. In the end, I left Denny's a changed man. No longer blindly devoted to the oppressive IHOP Industrial Complex. Denny's in Carpentersville freed my mind. So, if there are any IHOP loyalists reading this, take it from me, as a man who was once one of you: Go to the Carpentersville Denny's, all you have to lose is...

Our party of three arrived at the Denny's at around 11:30 pm on Friday September 6th. There was a gentleman waiting for a pickup order. We waited the entire length of a song, before the hostess seated us. Then the other woman who was there took our order. Two coke zeros and one root beer to drink. Two of us ordered the Philly cheesesteak omelettes with multigrain pancakes 🥞. We also asked if we could add avocado 🥑 to the omelettes and we're told, "yes". The third person ordered the chicken fried chicken. The waitress repeated "Chicken Fried Chicken." While the waitress was writing down our order, she made a comment about how bad her writing was. She laughed and said that she was putting it into the system so it would be all right. When the food came, we noticed that there wasn't any avocado 🥑 on our omelettes. I told the waitress that we needed avocado and refills on our two empty coke zeros that we placed at the edge of the table. The waitress left to get the avocado. Just then, the one of us that ordered the chicken fried chicken noticed that underneath the breading was dark meat... It was steak, not chicken. After explaining to the waitress what happened and waiting for the chicken, I noticed that there were now three drinks emptied and lined up on the table in a row. We never got refills. I then left, hopped into my car and drove to the gas station down the block. I purchased two Coke zeros and one a&w cream soda since they didn't have root beer there. I drove back to the restaurant to see all three empty cups still there. We had the chicken fried chicken and with my help, we had drinks. Pretty sad how many minutes three empty glasses sat there at the edge of the table unnoticed. Pretty ridiculous that I had to leave and come back with drinks for refills. We were charged full price for our drinks plus what I had to pay at the gas station. I would not recommend coming here in the middle of the night,...

I just came back from Denny's, i have been eating here for a while, since 2004. I used to love coming here, but what i had today has made me never want to come back. I had ordered the country fried steak and eggs, and an order of biscuits and gravy. As i was sitting, waiting for my order, i couldn't help but notice the cooks in the back glaring at me. When i got my food, the hashbrowns were SOAKED in grease, the scrambled eggs were also greasy and rubbery, the gravy for the steak tasted bland and watery, i had to scrape the gravy off because the steak tasted worse with it. The steak tasted...ok? Not bad, not great, just ok. And then i went for the biscuits and gravy. I LOVE biscuits and gravy, i could eat it all day, but this was an insult. The gravy tasted like bland mud, at least it wasn't watery, the sausage was in big chunks, like they didn't even care to Use ground sausage, like they just used extra sausage links and cut 4 of them in half, and the biscuits were flavorless and dry even with gravy on them, its like they made hockey pucks out of flour, cut up sausage links, and drizzled it in edible paint. I took one bite after eating the country fried steak, and then i payed and left. Do yourself a favor, save your money and time, make the food at home, it will be cheaper and taste better than...