Cracker Barrel Old Country Store — Restaurant in Lexington

(VERY LONG COMMENT! HATE TO READ THEM? THIS ONE AIN'T FOR YOU!) Cracker Barrel will never ever see me again. I know they could care less! This Thanksgiving, I didn't cook Thanksgiving dinner because I had to put all of my money on a car repair, and kitchen plumbing work. I could have gone to Golden Corral, but I didn't feel like doing the buffet thing, and the Thanksgiving meal that Cracker Barrel had been advertising on television all month looked awesome! So I ordered me one. When I finally got it home after picking it up, I thought it was a mistake. This couldn't have possibly been my Cracker Barrel Thanksgiving meal! It looked NOTHING LIKE THE THANKSGIVING MEAL ON THE COMMERCIALS. I know that television commercial and print media advertised restaurant food never looks like what the customers actually get. BUT! This dinner was so far off the mark, so damned PITIFUL to look at, I thought some new hire messed up my plate! The Thanksgiving dinner in the commercial shows actual slices of turkey, accompanied by at least a half cup of dressing. With gravy on both! There was practically no gravy on the plate. PERIOD! In the advertisement, they showed what looked like at least a 1/2 cup serving of cranberry relish. A 1/2 serving of greenbeans. And a 1/2 cup serving of sweet potato casserole. What I actually got looked like a high-school cafeteria Thanksgiving meal! One small ice cream scoop of dressing. Some turkey that looked like it came from the Banquet frozen food section at Walmart. It didn't look like real sliced turkey from an actual turkey. Again, it looked like a Jefferson County Schools mass produced, no frills, best they can do, Thanksgiving meal! The greenbeans tasted like they were straight out of a can. The sweet potato casserole was unrecognizable. It looked like somebody put an old halfway rotted sweet potato in a microwave, then took a fork and mashed it, then sprinkled some pecans on it. It tasted like a rotten sweet potato with pecans on it! I tasted no additional sweetners, like white or brown sugar. No vanilla. Not even butter, or nutmeg, or cinnamon! I wish I was exaggerating, but God knows I am not. And they had the nerve to forget my cranberry relish. Disappointed in the meal, I called and complained. They apologized and told me to come and get another dinner on them, with cranberry relish this time! I imagined I was going to get a real Thanksgiving plate that resembled the plates on the commercials! WRONG! IT WAS THE SAME AMOUNT OF FOOD! THEY CHANGED THE SHAPE OF THE DRESSING. I DID RECEIVE AN ACTUALLY TURKEY SLICE. AGAIN, HIGH SCHOOL CAFETERIA SIZED! AND THEY GAVE ME A SUPER SMALL, NOT EVEN A 1/4 CUP, OF CRANBERRY SAUCE! YEAH! THERE WAS NO CRANBERRY RELISH! THEY GAVE ME TWO MEASURED TABLESPOONS OF CRANBERRY SAUCE FROM A CAN! THAT'S HOW MUCH THEY GAVE ME! I HAVE SEEN BETTER THANKSGIVING PLATES COMING OUT OF THE SALVATION ARMY! I SWEAR TO YOU THAT THE SALVATION ARMY THANKSGIVING DINNERS MADE CRACKER BARRELS THANKSGIVING DINNER LOOK LIKE IT CAME STRAIGHT OUT OF A HIGH SCHOOL CAFETERIA! AND THEY CHARGED ME $18 FOR IT! IT WAS THE BIGGEST HOLIDAY DINNER RIP OFF I HAVE EVER WITNESSED! THE MEAL CRACKER BARREL SERVED ME WASN'T WORTH A PENNY OVER $5.00! I SWEAR TO GOD! I SHOULD HAVE GONE TO GOLDEN CORRAL! GOLDEN CORRAL WAS CHARGING $20 FOR THE WHOLE BUFFET! I WOULD DEFINITELY HAVE GOTTEN MY MONEYS WORTH HAD I DONE SO! CRACKER BARREL SHOULD BE FINED FOR FALSE ADVERTISING! I SHOULD HAVE TAKEN A PICTURE OF MY CRACKER BARREL THANKSGIVING MEAL AND POSTED IT ON SOCIAL MEDIA! NEXT YEAR I WILL BUY ANOTHER CRACKER BARREL THANKSGIVING MEAL, AND I WILL FILM MYSELF OPENING THE THANKSGIVING MEAL BOX UP FOR EVERYBODY TO SEE, RIGHT THERE IN CRACKER BARREL! THEN I'M GOING STRAIGHT TO THE SALVATION ARMY AND FILM ONE OF THEIR THANKSGIVING MEAL PLATES! I WILL DO A SIDE BY SIDE COMPARISON! AND CRACKER BARREL WILL BE HUMILIATED, BECAUSE THE FREE SALVATION ARMY THANKSGIVING MEAL MAKES CRACKER BARRELS...

This Cracker Barrel was consistently good once upon a time, but not anymore. This location now is consistently bad! I have been coming here for years and almost always left full and happy. However, the last 3 times have been awful. I kept coming back, and giving them another chance, thinking that they must have been short staffed or something. Today was definitely our worst experience ever and will be the last time we spend any more money here. Things are expensive everywhere, and it’s hard to justify spending that much money for a bad meal and a bad experience. Tonight we were seated at the table behind the hostess stand and next to the kitchen. We sat for almost 20 minutes before anyone came and took our drink orders. The phone rang nonstop the whole time were there, and I do mean nonstop. I asked our server what was going on with the phone? I felt like I was going to lose my mind! We could not even carry on a conversation. I had the Sunday Fried Chicken Dinner and it was so overcooked that you could barely chew it. My wife had the grilled Chicken Tenderloin Dinner, and she stated that her food was cold. My son had the kids Shrimp Dinner. We got on him because he wasn’t eating any of his shrimp and he told us that he couldn’t because they were gross. I tasted one and he wasn’t lying. They tasted very fishy like they were old, so we told him just to leave them. Our server never brought us any refills or asked how our food was. In her defense, she did have on a rising star apron, showing that she was new. When I went upfront to pay the bill the, man behind the counter asked me how everything was, so I told him absolutely terrible and he told me that he was sorry to hear that and then proceeded to ask for the total of the bill. As I was paying, the phone continued to ring nonstop with no one answering it, so I asked him why they were not answering it, and told him about how annoying it was for us to have to hear that for our entire meal. He stated that it was probably people calling for to go orders and that he didn’t have time to answer it. I told him if they weren’t going to answer it , that they should at least turn the ringer off upfront as to not disturb everyone. He said thanks for the feedback and went on about his business. Whoever is running this location and making the decisions is running it into the ground! Customers will only let you let them down a couple of times before they will give up on you and...

I do not normally leave negative reviews but this place is the worst restaurant in the United States. We went in for dinner because we were staying in a nearby hotel after being on the road all day. It took over 45 minutes for our food to arrive and they were not that busy, our server was embarrassed after telling us twice our food was coming soon and finally had the manager come over to tell us the same. Food was acceptable when it finally arrived. We decided to give them a second chance the next morning for breakfast. I regret this choice. Again it took nearly 45 minutes and then I was told they didn’t have the sausage I ordered when my other food was delivered. It was too late to make another choice because I didn’t want to wait another 45 minutes. We were not given napkins with our food either time. Food was cold, no jam for toast, no drink refills after asking, no one check to see how things were. When we finally caught our server and asked to speak to a manager a woman arrived at our table with a fake attempt at being sincere and then said she was not the manager but that she could get what we needed. She did but her “have a nice day” was clearly a “F you” tone. When I asked for the name of the manager I was told it was Dawn but we never saw anyone who identified themselves as a manager. We have traveled across the entire US in the last two weeks and this was the worst experience at a restaurant. Avoid this Cracker Barrel. Thank goodness I had peanut butter in the car so I could make myself a sandwich with the toast and one container of jam I was given for three slices of toast. I am unclear who the manager is or if there really is one but someone from Corporate needs to come in and reorganize this restaurant to meet Cracker Barrel standards because I know they are better than this. It wasn’t a lack of staff, there were plenty of people there and all of them were clearly frustrated with how things were going, even the sweet older lady at the cashier stand who was the best thing they have...