Madison Chophouse Grille — Restaurant in Madison

I had heard about the Chophouse for a few years now but had never had the time to make the trek down there as it is close to a hour from my home. Friday night we took our daughter out for her 25th birthday and for me it left much to be desired. I had the prime rib which is my all time favorite dish at any restaurant that I patron. If prime rib is on the menu then that is what I am having. I was served a salad with thousand island dressing. It was excellent! The lettuce was fresh, everything I did NOT want on the salad was left off just like I requested it to be. In fact, I would venture to say it was one of the best house salads I had ever received with regard to freshness and dressing taste. That starter made me excited for the prime rib to come. I received my prime rib along with a loaded baked potato. The potato followed the lead of the salad--nothing short of excellent! Then I saw the prime rib. It was a 12 ounce prime rib but honestly I have saw waffle house steaks that were thicker and juicier. I was very disappointed in the appearance. I had ordered it medium and received it medium well, more heavy on the well. The flavor was "ok"...not horrid but definitely not prime rib quality. It honestly tasted more like a medium well cooked ribeye. Was it bad enough that it couldn't be consumed, no it wasn't. However, it, along with the other two prime ribs that were ordered, wasn't worth the $185 I ended up spending on the four meals. I was thoroughly disappointed. I will say though, a pleasant highlight of the restaurant was the service. Our server was attentive, quickly retrieved any items we asked for and refilled our drinks at just the moment they were empty. Good service in the food industry is hard to find these days but at the Chophouse, from what I observed, each server was extremely attentive to their customers. I never write off a restaurant with just one visit. Maybe Friday night was an "off" night for them. Maybe they had call outs that made tending to the food while it cooked more of a rush job. In any case, I will give it a try at some point again however, if the food is average like it was on Friday night, I probably won't be...

As like many other patrons, we have been here before. The first time was about a year ago. Then sometime in the middle of Summer and then today. To say the least we were disappointed. We were sat at a booth at our request, then waited approx 5-10 minutes to be greeted. We ordered a diet coke, coke zero and a regular coke. The server laughed trying to make a joke about how hard it was to tell the 3 apart after they were poured and would have to go back and pray about it. We laughed too. Then she left the table to get the drinks. Time passed and passed and passed. We thought, where is she. How long does it take to bring 3 drinks? I caught the attention of who I thought was a manager (tall white gentleman with a red striped button down shirt with very short hair) and shrugged my shoulders at him. Another 3-5 minutes passed when our server stopped and apologized that they were short servers and 2 more were showing up within the next 10 minutes. She finally brought our drinks and we ordered. We ordered the pretzels as an appetizer. We had a French onion soup, Bang Bang Shrimp and a Hamburger with fries. The only cheese they offered was Pepper Jack and Provolone. They were out of everything else.

The pretzels came looking like they were burnt. See photo. We went ahead and ate them because we were starved. We received our food within 15 minutes or so of our appetizer arriving. The French onion soup was good, the Bang Bang shrimp was overcooked and the hamburger was a hamburger. My Mom asked for some bread to go with her soup like a roll or Baguette. The server didn't know what that was. We ended up with texas toast, which was fine, atleast it was bread.

We ate and had to run the server down for our check. We told her about the burnt pretzels and she explained that they always looked like that. She could take them off the bill. We said ok, but then had to call the manager over to fix the check. We said nevermind and paid.

Needless to say we will...

Went last Friday with a rather large party 14 to be exact....it was a COMPLETE JOKE!! They had one waitress serving our table and it was obvious she was STRUGGLING!!! Poor management if you ask me. We waited over 30 minutes for drinks, this was not even for the alcohol we ordered. It was another 15-20 until that was at the table. The waitress was extremely rude when we tried to order more drinks and we ended up going straight to the bar to get our own drinks. She was making smart remarks thinking she was funny and it was not funny at all.

About an hour later we are asked if we are going to order....everyone orders. Oh btw the “sautéed vegetables” that are on the menu are straight from a bag that are steamed in the microwave. They are horrible. At this point we are so over this place and ready to leave. We get our check. $107...to be expected with 2 adults drinking and eating steak. Before we pay this amount, she brings us another ticket for $88. We pay it and STILL tip $20. As we are trying to leave, they tell us we still owe the $107 and tried explaining that the $88 was wrong. My checking account now shows a charge for $105.91 and $22.05. They couldn’t give us an explanation as to why there are 2 charges, neither amount I signed for. We only pay the $88 and I tipped her $20 CASH. Today I look at my checking account and I have a charge for 107 and a “pending” charge of $105.91. This place is a joke and clearly can’t handle a large party.

We...