Olive Branch Italian Grill — Restaurant in Maryland

After a long, horrible day, my friend and I decided to go out for dinner. We were trying to decide on a restaurant and I remembered the Olive Branch. They had always served a decent amount of food for pretty reasonable prices. Quantity doesn’t mean quality. Our decision was made. It was reasonably crowded, as it was about 6:15 and the place was in full swing for dinner. It was a Tuesday, so not as busy as a weekend. We were ushered to a booth, located behind a large pole. I didn’t really mind that, as I was not there for the view. But, unfortunately, when seated behind a pole, you are sometimes completely forgotten. We sat for a good 5-10 minutes with closed menus waiting for someone to come and take our order. A young waitress sauntered over with the greasiest glasses I’ve ever seen in my life. How she could see two feet in front of her, let alone find customers behind a pole, I’ll never understand. Our waitress, Amanda, took our drink order and we gave her our dinner order at the same time. She said she’d be right back with our drinks. A few minutes later, she arrived with two drinks and one straw. “Be right back with a straw, breadsticks and salad.” A really long time went by. We began to feel forgotten. I did a “Whack-a-mole” maneuver and popped up above the bench to see if I could see her. She was nowhere in sight. A few minutes later, I tried the “Whack-a-mole” again. I popped up and looked around. Nowhere… Another waiter saw me popping up and down and came over and asked if we needed anything. Within a minute he was back with the straw, breadsticks and salad. Usually, you have a good amount of time to eat the salad before the dinner arrives. A couple minutes later, our dinners arrived. Or, I should say two dinners arrived, not necessarily ours. The man handed my friend her dinner and said what it was, then he handed me mine. “Chicken parmesan,” he said with a big smile. I had ordered eggplant parmesan… He took it back. My friend was just about finished by the time I got my dinner. At that point I had eaten enough breadsticks and salad that I wasn’t even hungry any more. I had a couple bites and that was it. Amanda finally came back. No apologies from her for anything. She asked if we wanted to have dessert. We decided against it because we figured it would be well past midnight by the time our dessert might arrive. While Olive Branch does offer large portions at reasonable prices, the food is below average. The service is absolutely awful. I do not recommend...

BE CAREFUL & BEWARE - CHECK YOUR RECEIPTS when you visit The Blue Lagoon (formerly called Olive Branch Italian Grill) in Reisterstown!!!!!!! See the photo of our recent receipt (not sure why it shows "DOOR DASH" on it because we have nothing to do with that!) attached to this review. Blue Lagoon will rip you off and they don't give a care when you bring it to their attention, they just smile and shrug.

On Tuesdays they have a special deal on crab cakes. $27.00 for a single and $49.00 for a double. We called ahead to order a double and went to pick it up. When we arrived the server lady at the take-out counter told us the total was $58.85?????!! When we told her it should only be $51.94, she shugged and smiled and said, "I know....but that's just how it comes up in the system". I asked, "Okay, isn't there something that can be done about that?" She replied still smiling, "No....they've been working on it, but that's just how it is". So, we begrudgingly paid the incorrectly inflated charges, left with our order....confused, disappointed and immediately knowing we needed to write this review.

Another thing to be careful of on their Crab Cake Tuesdays is that the special price only appies to the Crab Cake platter NOT the Crab Cake sandwich (which makes no sense since they are the same exact crab cake). They will cheerfully take your order for a crab cake sandwich on a Tuesday but conveniently NOT tell you that you won't be getting the discount price on it. Then when the bill comes, you're stuck with paying full price.

Lastly, WATCH OUT.....they will UPCHARGE you for things. They upcharge if you request a substitution of your sides, they upcharge you 3% if you use a credit card, they add a 1% upcharge for the "Plastic Reduction Act" (whatever the heck that is....just another way to squeeze more $$$ out of you). I'm surprised they don't upcharge for silverware, napkins, catsup packets, salt & pepper, using the restroom....you name it. Smh!

The food here is good, but the way they do business with their greedy/shady ways of nickel and diming customers is inexcusable.

AGAIN I can't say it enough....BEWARE BEWARE....Don't pay them before you carefully CHECK YOUR RECEIPT!! Or better yet, avoid this restaurant so you don't risk...

I don't think we will be returning... My fiance and I have been to this location a few times over the years, it had always been great. That's why we've always chosen to go back, and would recommend it to friends.

Not after today. The last couple visits seem to steadily decline, but this one was the last straw for us. Besides taking 40+ minutes between standing at the door waiting to be seated, and getting drinks ordered (keep in mind I say ORDERED) then we had to wait another 20 for our drinks to come. No cocktail menu just beer and wine/sangria selections, fine. Moscow Mule and Margarita were ok.

Now onto the food. We were never brought salad and bread sticks. We both got soup, he enjoyed his MD crab but there was definitely something off with the cream of crab. It looked reheated multiple times and was super thick. I've gotten it a few times in the past. Tasted alriiiiiight, didn't finish it. He ordered wings which were fine, I ordered a veggie pizza. When it came out my fiance literally laughed at how undercooked the pizza looked. I took a bite just to try, and it was pure dough. The waitress even said she just had to send back another pizza too. (Then I'm guessing when she went back, the cook told her to say it had something to do with ricotta cheese not cooking?? I know what raw pizza dough tastes like 🙄) so honestly that's what really peeved me at that point. I didn't order anything to replace it, my appetite was totally ruined. While we waited for our check my fiance said he saw another order be sent back to the kitchen. So I'm not sure what's going on here, I'm guessing its management. It's a shame, no restaurant ever lasts at this location for more than a few years it seems. I know this is a lengthy review but this was a really disappointing experience that honestly ruined our night(and now my morning because I feel absolutely so SICK 🤢) I had to share.

On another side note, I swear I don't remember them adding the gratuity to your bill before. I could be mistaken. It's okay I don't really mind it, but it seems like now the quality of service has declined also because of it. $70+ for all this. Totally...