University Roadhouse — Restaurant in Kalamazoo

Well folks, don't judge a book by it's cover!

When I first heard of University Roadhouse, based on the name I honestly thought it was just a dive bar with junky fried food. Rode the bus past it so many times and didn't give it a second thought.

After a very lame experience at a place that rhymes with Plop Fat, we decided to try somewhere new and went here on a whim for an early dinner.

Man! What a great place! Yes, it does have bar areas but I don't know if I would necessarily put it in the "dive" catergory, it's more of just a sports styled bar. We sat outside upstairs and the view was beautiful.

The food was really tasty and I'm excited to come back and try more! The menu is definitely more of a diner style and more high end than a dive would be. I had the Mexican streetcorn dip as an appetizer, the pot roast meal and fried brussel sprouts for my entree, and a snickerdoodle cobbler for dessert.

The food here is leagues above Plop Fat, I'll tell you that! The dip itself was clearly made to order somewhat and properly seasoned, not just microwaved and tossed out. It was delicious and I almost filled up on it but had to save room for the entree.

The pot roast was great! Absolutely cozy and well seasoned with some goopy sauce on the side. I needed to add some salt but that's just my personal preference. Decent mashed potatoes and I'll definitely be ordering the brussels again. Whoever is working the kitchen here knows how to COOK!

The snickerdoodle was amazing and the perfect portion size. Honestly, you could come here for just dessert and leave happy. My fiance had the peanut butter pie slice and he said it was the best he ever had - and he's a real fiend for peanut butter so that's saying something!

The waitress was super kind and helpful as well, and anticipated all our needs and was very open and honest - she had to go downstairs to get the lemonade and let us know it would be a little bit. I appreciate that level of honesty and clarity.

I have no negatives to say about this place, it was really a unexpectedly great experience. I saw several famillies with kids eating there too, so don't let the bars inside turn you off...

Terrible dinner quality and not a good experience this evening. My primary complaint with the experience was how the management chose to address my feedback. My wife ordered the rib special with a side of Mac-n-cheese. The ribs unfortunately were severely over cooked. You know that feeling that you get when over cooked pork turns grainy and it’s like chewing saw dust? Extra BBQ sauce couldn’t even save them. The Mac-n-cheese side dish however was quite tasty.

The waitress was really great, took the feedback to the manager. Her message back to us was “ the manager said that since the ribs were a special, there is nothing that they will do”. Who ever heard of such a thing? I imagine that if they had come out raw, would this have been an acceptable response? The worst part is, the manager he/she/they/them,… didn’t even consider coming out to talk to me. Apparently, Absolutely 0 interest in customer service quality.

My meal was even sub par. I always get the Seared Ahi Tuna, (I know, tuna in MI?) but for the past several years it’s been surprising good. Today it was what one would expect a MI restaurant would provide someone who doesn’t know what a quality preparation should be. But I didn’t mention it, to the server, as it’s shame on me.

I know and am aware that we are coming out of a pandemic. Restaurants are working to get healthy again, financially and service wise. I always give grace and support to local establishments. However when a place is managed is a way that finds my experience as acceptable, I draw the line. Honestly, it will be a long while before I return, if ever. I will miss the best chicken tenders in town, but running the place in this manner and seeing such a big hit to the quality, is disappointing. Avoid until they address their management issues and start to pay attention to customer service,...

Told a 15 min wait then they offered to let us sit on the patio. Since we weren't interested in watching the MSU/UofM game we said fine. We were told it was seat yourself. So we went upstairs to find a table but it was busy. No big deal. Then we ran into a waitress who asked if we needed anything and we said we were looking for a place to sit. We didn't see any covered patio area so we thought this was it. She cleaned off a table of decorations for us and handed us the special menu. We ordered some waters and asked for a regular menu. She didn't even know if they had regular menus but she found one. She came back with our waters and that was the last time we saw her. It was getting pretty loud and we saw some others going out a side door so we decided to go out there as well. It was the patio area and it was pretty empty. One tv and 3 tables were sat. A waitress came out and completely ignored us. We sat for almost 30 min with just water. We couldn't get anyone's attention. So we left. Despite it being a special game day, we should've had better service then this. We are flexible, understanding people having been servers ourselves before, but this was just unacceptable.

I can't comment on the food but it smelled delicious, though the prices seemed pretty high for just a burger. For example, a regular burger was $8.50 and toppings like mushrooms, onions, lettuce, tomatoes, were $1.50 EACH.

Either way, we won't be back.

ETA: I really love how they only reply to 5 star comments - WITH THE...