College Café — Restaurant in Fort Collins

My husband and I have eaten here twice, and both times we had negative experiences. I'm typically not the kind of person to complain or leave a negative review, but I was so displeased with how certain situations were handled that I simply can't bring myself to ever try this place again, nor would I recommend it to anyone.

During our first visit with a friend who was from out of town, we had ordered an appetizer (the lettuce wraps). To our dismay, they brought out wilted-looking lettuce that was room temperature, PLUS there was hardly anything on the platter to justify the price. Our friend politely approached what I presume to be the owner, and he asked that our lettuce wraps be replaced (or more be brought out). The cook/owner/whoever was visibly annoyed at our request, and he only obliged after another customer who saw our plate chimed in that he would ask for a refund if he was in our shoes. It took another stranger to bring it to their attention that they should value their customers enough to make sure they have somewhat palatable food, which I think is a huge oversight on their behalf. But, since they did eventually bring out more lettuce wraps that looked considerably better than the original ones, I decided to let this slide.

Today my husband and I tried this place again, and I was very frustrated with more unprofessional behavior and poor demonstration of customer service. I had ordered one of their tofu dishes for the lunch special, and after my husband and I had already paid and were seated, they sent someone to our table to say that he had punched in my order wrong, and they needed us to pay the $1.29 difference. Now, I have no issue with paying the price if it was punched in incorrectly, but it was the way the situation was handled. First of all, I don't believe it's to any company's advantage to put $1.29 over customer retention; coming to our table to request more money after we've already paid felt awkward and uncomfortable, and it's hardly worth the trouble. Secondly, the way we were approached was beyond rude. I don't remember the individual's phrasing verbatim, but essentially he told us that we had to pay this dollar difference before we could get our food. Why would you say it in such a douchebag way? Wouldn't it be better to approach the situation such as, "I apologize for the trouble, but I made a mistake at the register. Would it be any trouble to ask you to pay the small difference that I overlooked?" You're still accomplishing the same thing (I pay you what was accidentally overlooked), but you've done it in a much more polite and humble way, as opposed to seeming like a bully or as though it's somehow our issue.

Neither of these encounters are big enough on their own to warrant me boycotting the facility, but combined they make me feel as though customers are not truly valued. As much as I like getting decent food for a great value, I appreciate establishments that seem as though they care and handle their customers with class. This place is not that in the slightest, so I will not...

College cafe...

I used to LOVE college cafe. The cost was so damn affordable, the service, omg, the owners, the kids, the family, I wanted to support their food/restaurant literally for as long as I was in FoCo.

The dilemma.

They expanded their menu.

Their everything used to be soooo amazing for a reasonable cost. Perfect for a college town.

And then one day, something happened.... They expanded their menu. Chinese food that included sushi? What happened? Why? Who did this? Why was this a thing?

From this point a noticable change occurred. The food quality went down. It wasn't perfect "Chinese food" which in reality was just american influenced chinese, but it didn't matter. It was good.

Did I always feel good after eating, def not, but did I enjoy every bite, hell yes.

Unfortunately the expansion of the menu created a negative impact for my stomach and tastebuds. And when processing orders...

I gave up on them a handful of months ago. Their food quality hit a point that I could no longer depend on. And as my reviews are supposed to be, it's not because I wish to harm the restaurant, but it's because I wish to influence the direction of the restaurants decisions. I want them to stay in business.

But, as of my past 10 experiences, their quality has gone down hill, their taste is basically non existent. Sure, it's bang for your buck, but in comparison, if you want good chinese food, this isn't the place.

Unfortunately my review is up and my verdict is I won't be ordering from them no matter how much I appreciate them as a family, as people, as an establishment that has been serving the FoCo community since I was a kid, and that's because they expanded their menu and changed their flavors. The original chefs... They got it. The new feel? They have lost everything that this...

We've ordered from College Cafe 3 times, and have had one positive experience. The first time, it took almost 10 minutes on the phone to get our order accurately placed. When the delivery driver got to our door, he took our cash and didn't give us our change back so he ended up walking away with a $8 tip which is not what we had intended (our order was a little under $12 and we gave a $20 bill, expecting change). The second time, we spoke with a gentleman on the phone who quickly took our order, correctly, and we got our food within a half hour. This was our positive experience. Last night was the third and final time we will order from there. We were passed between two people on the phone, one of which was pretty rude. Ordering took a little less time than the first time ordering, but still a decently long time. We were given an estimate of 40 minutes for delivery time, when it really took a little over an hour. We ordered the General Tso's chicken, and it was like two different batches of chicken were used. Half felt undercooked and chewy, the other was overcooked and way too crunchy. The College Cafe soup was fine, but really the only positive part of this experience. The entree caused food poisoning-like symptoms in my boyfriend all last night and for the majority of today, without going into too much detail. Pretty disappointed because we had heard good things about this place, but haven't been able to experience good things ourselves. Will not go back, would not...