Brio Italian Grille — Restaurant in Frontenac

First Impressions Mean Everything ...

Wife and I frequent Plaza Frontenac (the mall) often and eateries in the area so we decided to give Brio a try. We had never been there, never heard anything about it (good or bad) but something new to do since we have ate at other places in the area before. From the moment of us walking in I knew it would be bad experience.

It's later afternoon (exactly 2pm), there are several employees tidying chairs at tables in areas where no one was sitting, others employees were talking, what appeared to be a manager (as she was dressed in regular business casual clothes) she was wrapping silverware, and then there is us (my wife and I, and several others 8 total) standing waiting to be seated).

To better set the stage, the restaurant is probably at 10% capacity (maybe less, 2 people at the bar, and 5 tables of others sitting already), so its NOT busy at all.

We are still standing waiting to be seated.

A guy comes running up, he is scattered brained ... the lady with 4 kids in front of us, asked for a table of 6 ... he looked at her and said wait a moment, and runs back to the kitchen. 5 minutes later, he comes back and he proceeds to sit them. Meanwhile, another customer comes in, asks for a gift card, the guy which was going to seat us, says "hold on" to us (as in, the remaining 4 people who have been waiting nearly 10 mins to get seated, in an empty restaurant), but he takes the gift card buyer over to computer station to sell gift cards. We wait.

So now we are waiting nearly 15 mins, and not yet seated.

Remember, there are workers tidying a completely empty dining area, a lady wrapping silverware, and yet waiters are chatting, and we are still standing waiting to be seated.

The guy comes back, he asks if we had reservations (we did not) he says no problem, he seats us. We sit down, I take my jacket off, I notice its 2:15pm on my cell.

At 2:25 we have yet to have a waiter greet us. My wife says, in 5 mins we leave. I agree, the countdown starts.

Now to further set the stage. We are seated in between the 5 tables of others already sitting, so the waiter is literally walking by our table without a saying a single word. NOTHING is said to us.

At 2:30 we get up and walk out ... as we leave, not a single person says anything to us ( nothing, no have a nice day, or how as your meal, etc... ) NOTHING. But also, I checked to see if the people who had came in with us who also waited with us if they had gotten service, but nope.... they were sitting and waiting too, as they hadn't gotten any service either.

30 mins wasted off my life for nothing.

I could understand it the store was busy. I would have understood if the waiter for the area I was seated in was overwhelmed, if she would have spoken to us ("hey, I am a bit busy, I will be with you guys in a second") ... but to say nothing and yet walk by us 5 times, and talk to the tables behind us and in front on us ... WOW. POOOOOOOOR service, POOOOOOOOOR everything.

BUT my money spends well at other places.

So we went back to one of our favorites places "BrickTops" (which is across the parking lot) and was greeted, had our drinks, and appetizers delivered within 15 mins of walking in.

Everything is better at places where people see people.

My opinion, Brio Italian Grille, I never ate there before, tried eating there yesterday, an epic failure on their part. I guess I will never know what the food is like.

DO NOT WASTE YOUR TIME going there, unless you have time to waste ... BUT my time is too...

Made reservations online for 5pm on the Sunday of Memorial weekend thinking it would be busy. I've driven past here so many times on South Lindbergh that i was so happy to find an excuse to eat here. Overall, everything from the service to the food was sub par. Starting with arrival, we got to the restaurant around 4:50pm, and waited in what felt like a long line (only 2 parties were ahead of us), while the hostess was on the phone taking down an order it seemed like, and there were plenty of employees in the kitchen, bar, and basically everywhere else in the restaurant except for the front. If they let hostesses take orders from over the phone, it should not be taken from the front where the room can get loud, and people are waiting to check in and be seated. Luckily an employee eventually ran over and quickly seated everyone. I'll also mention there were only 4 tables with patrons inside when we arrived, so maybe there was a shift change. The host was very nice and gave us an outdoor seat on the patio and let us choose where to sit. It was a beautiful night to sit on the patio. Our waitress was pretty fast in arriving to our table for drinks, but I had to ask for water since I ordered a non alcoholic drink, and my husband received a water without asking. The menu has plenty of choices to choose from, both food and beverages. My husband ordered the margarita, and I ordered the "house-made lemonade with a sugar rim." The lemonade tasted pretty sweet, but there was no sugar rim for esthetics. I don't suggest ordering since it costs $5 and doesn't promise what is described on the menu. Then came the Margherita Flatbread and bread and butter. The bread and butter were pretty good, but the butter comes out as if it were just taken out of the fridge. We had to wait a few minutes for it to melt a little before really enjoying it. The Margherita Flatbread had A LOT of parmesan cheese on it, no sauce, so it was basically a cheesebread. The basil and thinly sliced tomatoes were a nice touch for flavoring. For entrees, I ordered the Brio Pasta, and my husband ordered the steak salad and asked for no pecans- to which the waitress acknowledged. The food came out pretty quickly and there was either a miscommunication between us and the waitress or the waitress and the kitchen staff because my husband's salad came out with nuts on it. Instead of asking for it to be remade, he took the time to pick the pecans off the salad himself, and also made the joke "I hope this came with a life preserver with all this dressing." His salad was literally doused in dressing. My suggestion if you order a salad is to get the dressing on the side. I had very high expectations for my pasta, and it tasted as if it came from a cheap restaurant. I personally do not like the recipe, and couldn't enjoy it when I normally love pasta. Would not mind spending this type of money on good food, but I definitely did not receive the high value from our order. This restaurant just did not do it for me, but I am overall...

Me and my mom used to enjoy going to brio every few weeks or so, kinda our "go-to" spot for a nice meal where we can dress up and enjoy each other's company over a nice meal. Well it seems that for some reason there was always something wrong with her food. She doesn't like mashed potatoes so she'd ask for a substitute veggie, then the food would come with the damn potatoes anyway. We're not the complaining type so we just let it go. Then we ask for extra sauce and it would come out dry as a bone, then when we ask for extra sauce instead of just bringing some they took the entire plate away from her and left her without food for over 5 minutes and when they finally brought it back it had sauce but was cold. So last night we went again, my momma got her same dish that when it's made correctly is delicious, praying it would come out right. Well, it was compete garbage. The middle part of the food was ice cold. Like it had been prepared much earlier, stored, then pulled out and reheated although they didnt bother to nuke it enough or something. sent it back, and my mom got to go home hungry because of this. Yes they did offer to remake it, but by then we were tired and with the weather being bad just wanted to go home, not sit there while they make more crappy, rushed food. and this morning this was her message to me about the quality of the meal:

" that food was crap. It did not have one spice one bit of flavor in it there was no lemon flavor. There was no caper. There was no thick grade sauce. If you noticed it was Swimming in some watery broth. That’s all it was. It wasn’t sauce. It wasn’t gravy. It was swimming in water literal Like Chicken water. It was disgusting. I only ate it because at first I was hungry and then when I felt that cold under that, and I knew that it had been reheated, it piss me off. I was so angry. It took everything in me to not go crazychaotic out of my mind at those people. I was so mad that once again they ruined my food. " By the way, the dish in question is the chicken Lamon or whatever. And these are the last 3 experiences we've had there, there have been more issues. So we've had enough. There are major quality problems going on right now at Brio and we will not be returning anytime soon, most likely for several years, honestly maybe never. To mess up my mother's meal literally every single time we go there in one way or another, and then to completely destroy it last night sealed the deal for us. We don't get to spend too much time together anymore, and when we do get together all we want is for our food which we're paying top dollar for tastes good and is prepared correctly.

I would think twice about going here if you want your dinner made correctly! And AVOID THE CHICKEN

Our visit was on 4/4...