Famous Dave's Bar-B-Que — Restaurant in Lincoln

When this location opened 20+ years ago it was literally one of the best places in town. It was a solid, reliable bbq restaurant for a very long time. But in recent years, something changed with this place. I don’t know if it’s under different management or the restaurant as a whole just got super complacent because it is definitely not the same. My girlfriend and I ate here with family for a late lunch on Thursday, May 22nd. It wasn’t just this visit but the last few visits have also been disappointing. This one just stood out more. The food quality isn’t remotely close to what it used to be. I had the 4 rib platter with fries, and mac n cheese. The ribs were pretty good. A lot thinner than they used to be of course but they had some good flavor. The fries, mac n cheese, and the cornbread had no flavor whatsoever. It tasted like it was made with no love and zero passion. There was a time when you wanted to devour everything on your plate and couldn’t get enough of it and now I wouldn’t come back for it at all. Don’t make the mistake of ordering the 2 meat or the 3 meat plates and expecting you’re gonna get a hearty meal. My girlfriend ordered that and her portions were extremely small. She did say the cat fish tasted pretty good, just the portion was extremely disappointing. I don’t know if it’s because it seems like you’re ordering from a value menu type thing that they feel like they can give you extremely small portions of the meat especially. But it is laughable at how small some of the portions are with how much some of these meals cost. The service was less than impressive as well. Our server was unenthusiastic, slow, and seemed like she took short cuts instead of providing good service. She talked real quietly and monotone. You’d think with us having a table of 6 people she’d perk up a little and even get the tiniest bit of pep in her step to the possibility of getting a bigger tip but nope. It wasn’t just her though, it seemed like the rest of the staff was unenthusiastic and it was an inconvenience for them to provide service to the couple of tables occupied on this beautiful sunny afternoon. I will point out there was one waiter who was wearing a red shirt with long sleeves who looked like he was taking his job seriously and wanted to provide good service. He delivered some of our food to us and was upbeat and personable. But he was the only staff member on site that showed any sign of life and enjoyment. For many years this place had good servers who were upbeat, personable, and wanted to take care of their customers no matter how busy and packed the restaurant was at the time. Those days appear to be long gone. I get it this digression has happened at many restaurants across the country over the last five years but I expected better from Famous Dave’s. Be better, do better, hire better. It’s a shame what the food and service quality has become. If anyone thinks this location is comparable in any way, shape, or form to what it was 5+ years ago, my friend… you have...

One Saturday night, a group of five and I visited Famous Dave’s, an outlet of a barbecue chain serving wood-smoked meats and sides in an American West, themed restaurant. The restaurant was busy that evening, but that was to be expected as it was a warm Saturday night and its’ relative location to South Point Mall. Upon entering the restaurant, I noticed the cozy and comfortable atmosphere with the dim lighting, wooden walls, and the stone fireplace that was filling the back wall to make the restaurant feel homey. Inside the restaurant there were a variety of groups of people ranging from large groups to couples, toddlers and seniors. We were greeted by a friendly hostess with a smile, who politely led us to our circular table that was located near the wood-burning fireplace. After we sat down the hostess passed around the menus and told us that our waitress would be with us shortly. A few moments later the waitress emerged to our table and greeted us with her name and asked us what we would like to drink. As I can’t remember what type of drink products Famous Dave’s sells, I either ordered a Pepsi or a Coke. The waitress politely took our order and wrote it on her notepad and went off to go and prepare our drinks. While the waitress was gone we began to look inside the easy-to-read menu. Inside the menu Famous Dave’s has a range of foods ranging from salads to award-winning ribs. While it was difficult for me to choose what I was going to eat, I finally decided to order some buffalo wings with sides of grilled pineapple and Mac and Cheese. Each meal comes with a delicious, moist cornbread muffin. At the time, I had braces and eating wings was difficult for me to bite into. I decided that I would order boneless wings so I could still enjoy the taste of regular wings. Unfortunately, Famous Dave’s doesn’t have boneless wings on its menu. When the waitress came over to take our order I asked her if it was at all possible to make some boneless buffalo wings for me. Without hesitation, the waitress said that it was no problem for the cook to make them. About twenty minutes later, my food arrived in all of it’s glory. One at a time, the waitress handed us our platters and boy did it look delicious! All of us thoroughly enjoyed our meals. The flavor of the buffalo wings was perfect; they weren’t too hot and had a taste that just melted in your mouth. Not to mention, Famous Dave’s makes the best cornbread muffins and mac and cheese. The waitress came by multiple times to check up on us, making sure we didn’t need refills on either drinks or sauces. I can’t tell you how many times the waitress filled up my drink. My time at Famous Dave’s was very well spent for a nice and relaxing meal with friends. I would recommend Famous Dave’s to all different ages and groups of people. When comparing the food, staff, and atmosphere, I would rate Famous Dave’s a five...

One experience recently is our take out order missed one item - not a big deal to us. The next day, I called the restaurant with no answer. Truly forgot about it until 5 days later - talked to Jeremy, the gen mgr, who let me know right away that he prefers to be notified within 24 hours of the problem - with a demeaning tone. When I said I had called the following day of our order but no answer, he told me that he’s at the restaurant early every day and that he received no calls. I felt like I had been scolded I understand calling 5 days later is odd - he was correct in saying it should have been done earlier, but his tone and wording was demeaning. By him saying he was at the restaurant Sunday am early and received no calls absolutely indicated he didn’t believe me. It takes a lot for me to expend energy on ppl who I feel are out of line. When he indicated I wasn’t truthful, that’s when I gave him advice to, in the future, use his manners when dealing with any customer. We had 2 dining experiences in the restaurant where we ordered around 7:45 pm both times, served drinks right away. At 8:00 pm, we tried to order a second bar drink and were told the bar shuts down right at that moment. Both times, we weren’t told that we had a shut off time for the bar. The waitress told us that if she doesn’t remove all alcohol drinks at 8:15 pm, she’d lose her license to serve alcohol. We didn’t say this to her but we wished she had returned to us a few min before shut off to ask if we wanted another round. We should have learned from the first time it happened and going forward will go to another restaurant who can serve alcohol later in the eve. I still don’t know if it’s true she’d lose her license to serve by the state or by Famous Dave’s rule and it doesn’t matter A few years back we ordered take out - when we picked up, something was missing , the helper asked who took the order , when we said her name he was very irritated with us saying no one by that name works there. Maybe I got her name wrong but his reaction was over the top. I guess I have to ask is famous Dave’s a tough place to work because there have been several incidents...