The Pan — Restaurant in Gardena

Disclaimer: As a veteran African American teacher, I will provide reviews especially when service is subpar as well as embedded in stereotypical misconceptions of African American people…..This is why telling the true history of African Americans in our history books is so critical to healing America.

I have bought take out as well as dined in several times at The Pan, Gardena. I have opted to eat here because it is my neighborhood restaurant, the food is tasty and hearty for the price. I decided to celebrate my 54th birthday, July 8th with my family, friends and my pool family at the Gardena location; this was my second time encountering the Manager waitress…..My internal instinct did not feel settled, however I went with the flow because I wanted to be happy and at peace on my birthday. However, today’s experience with my pool family confirmed my internal discomfort was spot on: the Latina waitress/greeters present themselves as being very uncomfortable servicing a group of African American people, lacks welcoming atmosphere for dining, impatient with adding people to party, lack of customer convenience as it relates to paying. The entire experience makes one feel as though we are an inconvenience to their business. The Pan is a chain restaurant, therefore I do not understand why the individualized electronic paying machine is not implemented at their restaurants. Today, I intentionally ordered my food online because I did not want to have an issue paying for my food with a card, with a group; yet I was not even offered a glass of water. I will NEVER patronize The Pan again and I will spread the word amid my village: my students, my family, my pool family and my sorority; I will tell them not to spend their money at The Pan because the service is horrible and they do not care about losing customers. Lastly, thank you to the chiefs, /cooks for doing your job well, your meals are consistent, however the servers really tarnish one’s entire experience. Note: July We spent $300+, August $250 and I spent $40 for my meal...

Red Flag Restaurant. We order chilakiles and kids pizza! I post it before, apparently didn't go through! The place was kind of slow but they don't have coordination, they all want to do a little of everything when in fact In a restaurant you have assignments. These guy was all over! Kitchen cleaning tables seating ppl! I guess they can multitask but in a wrong way! He was picking up plates and bringing them to a bus tub station touching from the rim the glasses where ppl put their mouth, dirty Silverware and napkings then cleaning on his shirt and pants, no apron or napking to clean them! The. Seats two ppl grabing the menus w dirty hands then comes back to pick up the roll-up w same dirty hands! After that he cleans a table and grab a filty cloth from a bucket and cleans the table and splash all over the window put it back in there and wipe his hands w. His shirt! Unsanitary, that along deserves a "C" fron health dept. I ask for greenand red sauce and they brought me only red but Yet they charged me $2.00for extra sauce that it was missing in action! My son didn't like the pizza and decided to take it home and ends up forgetting it! His reaction was, " it's ok pops it was not that good, too dry and no flavor! Some ppl don't mind this but me coming from restaurant experience over 30 years was a disappointment 😒! I had to flag a person to get more coffee! Over all you see the stars already. You can give it a try and be...

They have another location about 2 miles away from this one, although this location is definitely their most popular. It’s somewhere in between a traditional diner and standard breakfast restaurant. Our server was very polite, although it took quite a bit of time for all of our food items to come out. They have a very small free parking lot attached, and we were lucky enough to find a space for our Sunday brunch, but most other people I noticed had to do free street parking which is fairly plentiful in this part of town. I’m giving it a 4/5 because the flavors were good but not great, I have had better recently, but I am still happy that we tried it.

For my meal I chose the Short Rib Benedict and thought it had some nice flavors although I was surprised it did not come with a side. It was just the Benedict. I have to give it a 3/5 though because the eggs were completely hard-boiled and any true good Benedict has to have poached eggs or at least a soft boil. That really took away from the flavors. I also ordered a Cinnamon Roll Pancake on the side and was sad to see it was full of nuts. It really took away from the cinnamon flavor and I felt like I was eating a nut pancake. The caramel latte was nice and I would recommend ordering that.

Overall a decent breakfast spot, but considering I drove down from West LA specifically for it I don’t plan to be back. The flavors were good,...