Gourmet and Company — Restaurant in Johnson City

My maid of honor had chosen this spot as one of our dinners for my bachelorette. She has been here twice, and only had good things to say as well as good experiences. We were a group of 7 girls. The reservation was for 5:30pm. One of our girls is a mom, and was running late due to last minute changes in child care. After 10 minutes, we call her to make sure she is okay, and she tells us she will be there in 5 minutes. At 5:45-5:50pm, who we assume is the manager comes over to our table and asks if our last person is still coming. We say she is 5 minutes away, to which he says our reservation was at 5:00pm, and we have been waiting for our friend this whole time (the specials were not going to be told to us until everyone was there) and they were expecting other parties to come in at 6:00pm. Important to note, we had been ordering drinks and appetizers during this time. It is not as if we were sitting there with just waters. We were baffled by the rudeness of basically being rushed and made to feel unwelcome because ONE person was 20 minutes late. If the reservation has a time limit, this needs to be told to the guests. OR we shouldn’t have been sat until our whole party was there. He did not even ask to see the confirmation of the reservation, which clearly says 5:30pm, to assure that he was not mistaken, as someone with proper customer service skills would do. Our original reservation was 5:00pm, but it had been changed, which is proven by the messages attached.

Our friend arrives 2 minutes after this interaction, and we enjoy the rest of our dinner to try and salvage my bachelorette dinner.

After the dinner, we pay individually for our bills, and to our surprise, the tip is written on the merchant copy with a 20% tip.

I get it, we are all 20 something year old girls eating at a fancy restaurant and they ASSUME we are not going to tip. Little do they know, almost all of us have worked or work in the food and beverage industry. I myself have 5 years in this field. I KNOW writing in the tip on the merchant copy is illegal. Because we were all in shock, we signed the merchant copy, which does make it look legal. Now, their policy could be that groups with 6 people or more, gratuity is automatic. But this should be notified to guests once again, and PRINTED on the check. NOT written in. Several of us were shocked because we were planning on tipping the waiter $20 (which was 25-30% tip according to our bill) in cash due to his manager being rude, not him. But we are not sure who wrote in the tip, so we left the 20% on the card.

This is an EXTREMELY disappointing experience, especially this being a fine dining restaurant. I get ONE bachelorette party in my life, and this place has tarnished my memory of it. I am fully aware that some people have a bad day, and that may be why the manager was so incredibly distasteful and rude, but in this industry, you leave your attitude at the door. Food is great, but the...

TERRIBLE customer service. I tried booking a room for a private event our company wanted to host for several physicians in the area, an easy $1000-$1500 profit for this restaurant - I have never experienced such horrible customer service. I spoke with Rebecca when I initially called and she helped me book the reservation - she told me she would follow up with menu pricing and a contract for us to sign. Great! After a week of not hearing or seeing anything in my inbox I followed up and spoke with Rebecca, again, who then directed me to contact Howard Walker, the "event coordinator" - Great! I then sent an email to Howard that same week and after several business days, still no response, no nothing. I then called this afternoon and was finally able to speak with Howard who seemed bothered by the fact that we wanted to reserve a room and kept grunting and huffing while trying to formulate questions he had for me. I answered all of his questions and then he answered mine regarding pricing/accomodations/etc., I thought we were finally on the same page. Then, I received a phone call five minutes later from Howard on his cell, he starts asking me more questions about the reservation and asks me if I can GUARANTEE that 15-20 people will show up that evening. Of course I cannot guarantee, but that is what we hope for. He basically said that he doesn't want to book a room for us when I cannot guarantee attendance, when he could book (I am assuming) another party for that room who could guarantee attendance. (MIND YOU, this is for a THURSDAY night... no offense, but I highly doubt your restaurant will be that busy on a Thursday in such a small town.) With that, I immediately told him to please cancel my reservation and we would find another restaurant to accommodate us. Without hesitation he said, "OKAY" - in which I just hung up. Shortly after I receive an email from Howard stating that if I have trouble finding a venue for that night to "let them know" and they will "try to accommodate us" - and then proceeds to tell me that they already have another private party that night and the odds are they will "book up" for that evening soon and they are "well known" in the area. If that was the case, then why was I told by both Rebecca and Howard that we had a reservation for 6/29? I am assuming it was just an email to cover himself, which I am not surprised by, based off of my previous correspondence with him. Highly disappointed in such a "well known" company. I would never recommend this place for a...

Let your foodie adventure begin here at Gourmet & Co - must try!

So I’m headed to Johnson City for work and my partner finds this article about 10 best restaurants to try in what was named “little Chicago” (some Capone history here). First on the list is Gourmet & Co. Open Table had no available spots for my one free night of dinner, but the restaurant website said to call them if you run into that problem. I called. Dinner for 1? Anytime? No problem!!!

7pm bar seating and away we go!

My bartender/server is excellent— busy as hell, but helpful, attentive and a delicious drink slinger.

I start w a dirty martini with goat-cheese stuffed olives. Wow! Who knew? And he made it just how I like it.

The menu had such delicious soy ding options, but I’m dining alone and only have one stomach. If my chosen specials were indicative of the quality of all the dishes, a chef tasting menu here would be phenomenal to experience.

But alas, I chose with me ‘literal’ gut— what sounded good to my belly — go local it said!

So we start with the locally sourced mushroom cream vegetarian soup - 6+ types of mushrooms with lots of mushroom bits to much on while you enjoy.

Then, another special - grouper, crispy skinned, on a bed of local veggies - more local mushrooms, pea shoots, garlic, radish, fennel, and swipe of herbaceous sauce painted on the bowl. Fresh, bright, delish!

And can we squeeze in a bit of sweet at the end? Why, yes!!! — Local strawberry hand pie… Local strawberries, goat cheese filling, creme anglaise, and charred lemon sorbet. The crust was light and fresh, with more creamier forward (less than strawberry forward) filling and the lemon sorbet show stopper.

Wonderful! I have eaten at gourmet restaurants all around the world and this restaurant stands up!!!

Of course I needed to order the oatmeal cookie martini to sip on as I wrote this review for you. And it is a mind twistingly accurate oatmeal cookie flavor! Wow! Again, cannot say enough good things about the talent of my drink slinging mixologist with a heart who apparently has worked here 16 years —...